Is ambition the real villain in our lives? Wouldn't life be more peaceful & orderly if we could shun ambition?

Answer 1

Great question!

I have quite a negative view of ambition. Avoiding ambition would be quite an existentialist thing to do, and was oddly also considered virtuous in the West before the Great Transformation. Ultimately, the issue is of failing to pursue ambition in a society saturated with it. It can create tensions in long-term relationships if one partner has ambition and the other not, and there may be similar tensions in a workplace, because one's talents may not be used at their optimum level. However, it does avoid the Peter Principle - that people are promoted past their level of competence, then they stay there and mess up the organisation. This could be avoided by avoiding hierarchy, but informal hierarchies arise when they are not formally recognised anyway. This occurs in other species, so it may be a natural phenomenon, though this may not be a valid line of reasoning.

There were, and presumably are, cultures where ambition is not considered a virtue. In such a culture, there are fixed roles into which people are born. This is quite an inefficient way of running a society because it means that variations in abilities cannot be exploited for the benefit of society. Even so, valuing ambition has led to this kind of society, where abilities are also not used efficiently. It might be possible to organise a society with accurate assessment of abilities leading to permanently ascribed roles, but such a society would have to ensure that its assessments were in fact accurate and it would have to impose positions of political power very carefully indeed.

You remind me, actually, of two stories by Isaac Asimov: 'Franchise', where governmental policy is decided by a carefully selected average member of the public, and 'Profession', where roles are decided permanently and early in life.

So, maybe ambition is a bad thing in one's personal life, but deciding it is a vice would have to be a completely unanimous decision, since even one ambitious person in a society could cause a lot of damage if no-one else was. This is not an argument against ambition being a vice though, because rejecting ambition passes the universalisability test of what if everyone did the same. However, it may be prudent to be ambitious.

Answer 2

No and no. Those who are satisfied with their present circumstances may be fortunate, but those with ambition to achieve some goal don't necessarily abandon peace and order. As with everything else, it's a matter of degree. One can have healthy ambition without becoming a backstabbing corporate ladder climber. And for those whose ambition seems to consume their lives, I suggest the villain is not the ambition, but rather its underlying cause, be it a lack of self esteem or other personality problem.

Answer 3

What is Ambition? An earnest desire for some type of achievement or distinction, as power, honor, fame, or wealth, and the willingness to strive for its attainment. (Dictionary.com)
Some other words for ambition? Initiative,desire,aspiration..

No I do not think that ambition is the REAL villain in our lives. I think things like backstabbing, micro-management and cut-throating are the REAL villains in our lives, if we could cut those out, we WOULD be a more peaceful and orderly society.

Answer 4

Ambition may cause conflict, but it allows people to live their lives. It causes people to have goals and strive for a better life. This is done through competition etc, but it keeps our society flowing and moving.

Ambition has some good aspects. People with ambition tend to work harder and achieve more in life. They can be more productive members of our society.

Answer 5

Desire to lead a middle class ,respectable .peaceful life is a huge ambition ,almost impossible to achieve.You also in a way ,seem to think this can be achieved by some means , specifically by avoiding some other ambition!

Answer 6

The guy above is right about ambition being a driving force in society. Biologically, it's what keeps us moving forward.
Cultural ambition is a damn menace though.

Answer 7

No ambition gives us motivation to excel. The problem though is when people allow greed and malice to overtake their reason for ambition and motivation.

Answer 8

If that was truth (and truth is never truely known)
then what would be the point in the mundane and the ordinary, we would have nothing to strive for and nothing to pursue, as a great man once said;
The greatest adventure is not the destination, but the journey....

Answer 9

You are right.
I learnt this early in school and shunned it successfully for the next 55 years.

Answer 10

No.

I would think the villains are the slackers that think the ambitious owe them