Actions, Rewards, Penalties or Why we do what we do.

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I have very strongly held opinions. They are my opinions and I am well aware that others may not agree with them. I really enjoy exchanging opinions and hearing what others think.

I am a Heinlein (Sci-Fi author) fanatic and he has influenced me over the years. In one of his writings he states something to the following: There is no such thing as an altruistic act. In other words no one ever does anything without getting some sort of reward. This reward maybe and often is just simply the feeling of satisfaction of doing what we feel is right. Sometimes it is more tangible.

We can also do things we feel are wrong and get the feeling of guilt. This is penalty we pay even if there is no other repercussion. So every action has a built in reward or punishment.

I made the statement on another site that everyone has their own expectations and that there is "no such thing as and altruistic act" and expecting people to act altruistic is a waste of time. I admit I stressed the no altruistic act thing a bit too much. Well the muck hit the fan and hit me in the face.

I still contend that people have their own reasons for doing things and expecting them to just simply help you out with out question and without expecting them to express their opinions or ideas of how things should be done is unrealistic.

 

I agree with you.

 

I think you would enjoy The Republic by Plato.

For most of recorded history, continuing many years after Plato, the primary reason for "Just" acts have been for the reward. In contrast, the primary reason more people do not commit "Unjust" acts stems from the fear of consequence.

Fairly early on in The Republic, Thrasymachus, the epitome of an antagonist, roughly puts forth this argument: "The Unjust is more beneficial and thus better than the Just. If one has the power to take whatever he wants and ignore the consequences, he will do so." Most of the book goes on to analyze this statement. I don't want to reiterate the entirety of it for you here, so I'll move onto my own thoughts:

(Forewarning: I'm going to disagree with you to a point, but I still completely respect your opinion and have no problem with you keeping it. )

I want to look at your analysis of satisfaction and guilt. I say that it is quite pessimistic to attach a corporeal and transient "value" to 'satisfaction.' But I'm sure some of you are thinking "Isn't satisfaction just a fancy subset of cultural conditioning?"

Well, let us look at satisfaction. I'm going to work on the assumption that we are using the general, broad meaning of satisfaction: rewarding feeling after doing something "morally good." [The question, "What is satisfaction? is mostly irrelevant, as we are simply talking about a rewarding feeling, not the true definition of satisfaction.]

One way we can do this is to look at an example. We will create a young child without exposing him to corporeal rewards or giving him the capacity to understand our culture and name him Ted. We will give Ted a container with a lid bearing multiple differently shaped holes and a few three-dimensional objects of various shapes, all dimensionally similar to the holes in the lid. We put one object into the container while Ted is watching and then we leave him alone. Ted is a curious baby, so he begins to try fitting these objects into the holes, but he does not understand the concept at first. For the sake of our hypothetical, we'll say it takes him an hour to accomplish his task. Would you disagree that he would be quite satisfied and eager to do it again?
This is a fairly limited hypothetical, but Ted has achieved satisfaction at preforming a task without any preconceived notion of a corporeal reward or any understanding of what "moral goodness" is.

Following up from this, would you say that satisfaction can be independent of any other reward?

If you agree, then the only motivation a person would need to preform an act, morally 'Just' or 'Unjust,' is satisfaction.

If you disagree, then we can never be satisfied without expecting some reward.

Now that satisfaction has been distilled into simpler terms, I can address the real statement that I think you pose: "Satisfaction is a selfish motivation and therefore we can never perform an altruistic act." By my reduction of satisfaction [including all the subsets of my two prepositions], this statement seems to be true.

Satisfaction can lead to happiness, which is itself selfish. (Happiness as a state of being, not a superficial emotion you get when you see a cute puppy. I am not saying being in a state of happiness makes you a selfish person. To the contrary; if most of us were a little more selfish in our pursuit of happiness, we'd be in a much better position to help others[altruistically or not].)
However, happiness is a consequence of satisfaction. It is not satisfaction itself. Is feeling satisfied selfish?
I would say not: satisfaction does not require the thought that any other reward will be given. To the contrary, an action which grants satisfaction can come with the perception of punishment.

I will give one final example to show my point of view. We will make it a modern situation, in order to reflect a generally modern culture. A teen girl gets pregnant. Let us say that she is a strong, independent girl who would take care of her baby and give it the best life she could. She decides that the best life she could give the baby is not good enough and will put it up for adoption. Her family and the culture in which she lives find this to be an act of weakness or cowardice. She perceives that she will be punished for this action, she truly wants to keep the baby and raise it on her own, but weighing her options she knows that finding a good family for the baby is the best course of action.

Lets look at it piece by piece. Is she feeling any pleasure because of her decision? No, she isn't getting what she wants. Does she perceive any reward for her decision? No, she perceives, in anything, punishment in the form of disapproval/exile. Is she satisfied with her decision? Yes, she is in a state of satisfaction because of her decision.

In your words "guilt" is a motivation or counter-motivation. I would agree. Guilt is a cultural invention. People who preform actions or do not preform actions out of guilt are fearing the consequences. Guilt does not consider the actions in their pertinence to the situation at all, it only looks at the consequences of any action. Actions caused by guilt are not altruistic. They have a clear motivation: fear of punishment or fear of not receiving a reward. [Punishment and reward here can mean disapproval and approval, respectively, among many other things.]


I believe that altruism is possible. But, we can only assess how rare it is in ourselves, by our own actions and motivations. At our current level of intelligence, we cannot understand the motivations of others well enough to form definite opinions. Despite altruism being possible, acting out of selfishness is not innately "bad." Which is to say, the altruistic choice is not always the wisest or most beneficial to anyone.

 

When your don't expect too much from people they can't let you down. That's pretty good common sense.

Nevertheless, on very rare occasions you can find good people doing great things without having an ulterior motive. Of course that happens once in a blue moon so in most cases you're probably right.

 

Interesting concept. I have always been torn by this type of subject as I've always felt that mankind was inheritantly good, yet everyone knows that kind of gets thrown out the window when nobody is watching. Does that mean we are inheritantly evil, but the social peer pressure makes us good? I have never thought that "satisfaction" is a reward, but I can see it.

 

I think I agree with the factuality of your statement, Nakia, but I may, given that, question some of your definitions. After all, couldn't you just define altruism as someone doing something for no reward other than that gooey, feel-good feeling?

 

... to generate which is ultimately an egoistic act, the argument goes on.

That said, we agree. While I understand the argument, I dislike the reasoning, for the simple reason that it can be used and has been used to re-interpret someone like Mother Theresa as a selfish person - who only helped the poor for her own egoistic ends, even if only subconsciously - thus trivialising her.

IMO that's one of those great and clever materialist insights that sociology and psychology have blessed mankind with.

And here it goes, my favourite sociologist joke: A sociologist goes to the supermarket and buys a pack of coffee. He goes to the counter, puts the coffee on the counter, pays, and the cashier wishes him a nice day. The sociologist's keen and well trained mind immediately grasps the situation, and he quips: You only say that to make me come back tomorrow!

 

I think it takes a pretty morbid person to see every good action as inherently selfish. I would always say that regardless of them making me feel good or not, I would do them anyway - for something to be selfish I think it would require pre-thought sort of
"I'll hold this door open for this disabled person because Itll make me feel good."

as opposed to;
"I'll hold this door open for this disabled person"

~the person passes~

"Hey, that felt good"

 

Wow!!! You guys are good. I wish I had come here first and asked your opinion before posting elsewhere in a situation that was sensitive.

Thank you, so very much, for your responses. I can still hold my position but with qualifications and a lot more understanding.

 

A very interesting thread, madam! I agree with the general message of the first post... however, I do believe this topic needs a broader perspective.

Correct me if I am wrong, but it looks like every poster so far believes that altruistic actions are always based upon a conscious decision, ergo - are a purely cultural construct. The most basic laws of early societies are usually connected with the survival instinct, understood not as a desire of an individual to live, but as a struggle to preserve a certain sequence of genes.

In exemplum: the immorality of incest is not a purely cultural construct - it is connected with the natural need for the members of a community to be strong and not disabled due to inbreeding; ergo, this particular taboo became a law due to nature, not culture. It is culture that had created more advanced and spiritual motivations for the said law, but it's origin stays the same.

Why would I mention that? Well, the idea of altruism functions in a very similar way. One of the explanations for altruism is evolution. During the early stages of the history of humankind, every person one met was either a relative or someone that would definitely be seen again in near future. Helping both kinds of people would prove beneficial: the well-being of relatives is crucial to the preservation of the genome, and helping a non-related 'neighbor' could be profitable, as the person could return the favor. Thusly, the altruistic urges are a trait we acquired evolutionally as a means of survival.

To make a veeeeery long story short - I do not believe altruistic behaviours are always based upon conscious decisions. It takes a conscious decision not to follow these urges, but following them is 'default' for humans.

Back to the main problem: yes, I do believe altruistic acts are rewarding (for people who chose to follow the ideals of 'good', of course) - this is the way human mind functions (save for the 3% of people who are born with a brain malfunction resulting in 'reward mechanism' being activated during acts of brutality; I had read that five years ago in a magazine and cannot remember the source). Yes, I do believe most of the time the motivation is selfishness and the urge to keep a high self-esteem.

What I do not agree with is the value judgments that seem to be made in the thread. I believe by now it is clear that I view the vast majority of altruistic actions as biologically explainable - ergo, not to be valuated in any way.

/BTW, yes, I am repeating after Freud, Bettelheim and Dawkins /

 

You should know by now that we are all fabulous darling!
(I agree with you by the way)

 

Fixed. If you expect anything at all, they can let you down. Best not to expect anything.

 

"Always expect to be dissapointed. That way you won't be when you are"

 

Silvery, I love you! This is tucked away for future use shall I give you credit for the quote or just be my normal roguish self and steal it?

As my friend my own personal code says "Do not steal from friends." So will you do an altruistic act and just let me have it?

I needed a laugh. Thanks.

 

I love you too! Of course you can use it xx

 

Yes, the injection of such terms as "reward," "guilt," "personal gain" into the dialogue about human nature and the develpment of excellence in character demostrates almost the complete truimph of materialism in western society. Such terms can't be ignored, especailly in this society, and when the deck is stacked with such terms, the final conclusion can't be in doubt. But certainly, that is one way of framing human nature, through the lenses of materialism.

Another right-wing, libertarain, sci-fi writer.

 

Everything a man does has only one goal -- to get laid. There's nothing altruistic about it. There are a few odd men in the world who believe they can get "more" of something (I have no idea what that something might be) at some point in their existence by fighting this urge, but I believe they're insane.

I have no idea what motivates a woman -- if I did I would get laid more often.

 

Um ... I think they want the same thing, truth be told. Maybe a few other things too, but definitely that.

 

...like someone reading their tl;dr posts and commenting on Freud meeting science?