Altruism

Altruism is often defined as willingly putting the needs of others before one’s own needs. But is this accurate? A more specific definition might be that altruism, as a practice, puts particular needs of others before particular needs of one’s own. In other words, not all needs of others are put before all of one’s own needs. Altruism, as an attitude, recognizes that the needs of others are as important as one’s own rather than more or less important than one’s own. In practicing altruism, the actor satisfies the needs inherent within the attitude of altruism. Thus, helping a woman who has fallen in the street even if it means being punished for being late for work satisfies the altruistic need. Helping the woman provides greater altruistic satisfaction than work-related punishment results in harmful dissatisfaction. In this choice, it is evident that greater value is placed on altruistic acts than on personal detriment.

A question that arises is whether altruism is a need. It must be within a particular attitude, but the arising of the attitude may have resulted from preference or conditioning. If from cultural conditioning, the question is whether altruism is truly satisfying to the individual and, thus, if it is an obligation even more than a duty. If there is a sense of duty then the element of choice may be involved, but the satisfaction may not be derived from the actual helping of the other but from a sense of fulfilling one’s duty. Is this, then, altruism at all? If obligation is involved it is questionable, at best, to claim that any action or attitude could be altruistic. Altruism cannot, according to its definition, be coerced. Choice must be involved if an action is willed. This, then, means that the decision to act altruistically must be conscious. There has to be an alternative, or many alternatives, to acting altruistically for an action to be altruistic. If conscious choice is involved and the attitude derived from awareness, then cultural conditioning has to be ruled out as a source for the arising of an altruistic attitude. Similarly, altruism cannot be a need if it is, in fact, a choice. For altruism to be a choice in attitude and action it must be a preference. A definition for altruism could then be stated as “Altruism is the attitudinal preference to act in such a way that one or many needs of others are given priority over one’s own need or needs in order to satisfy a preference that one has deemed to be of greater value than the fulfillment of one’s own need or needs.”

If there is any expectation of compensation, even in the form of a gesture of thanks, then the motivation for the act of helping another is not altruistic. In that case, the act was viewed by the individual helping as an unspoken transaction in which the party receiving help was expected to give something to acknowledge the act. Similarly, if there is an expectation of acknowledgment or compensation from third parties, that act is not altruistic. It is merely a more complex transaction. The only compensation or acknowledgment that can result from an altruistic act is internal, the satisfaction of acting on an altruistic preference. This preference has immense value for the altruistic person, so much so that not acting altruistically in a situation in which the individual could have acted altruistically results in emotional distress. This distress is evidence that the value of altruism is so immense that it is a significant component of the person’s ethical framework.

If the altruistic attitude is ethical then it is bound by rules of conduct. If this is the case, then the only way altruism can remain a choice is if one’s ethics are “living,” constantly changing through personal exploration and choice. An ethics that becomes stagnant is no more than an internalized law that cannot be broken by choice without harmful distress to the self. Altruism as an attitudinal preference cannot exist within this framework. However, an ethics and thus an altruism that is regulated by attentiveness rather than by thoughtlessly accepted rule is flexible, living, organic, and impossible to escape awareness. With such vigilance, each circumstance in which an altruistic opportunity arises is an opportunity to reassess and reassert the altruistic preference within one’s ever-evolving ethics. This suggests that altruistic attitudes are not singular in tenor but exist as unique constructions that adapt and change before, during, and after each altruistic opportunity and subsequent action.

It can probably not be argued that an ethics in which an altruistic attitude is preferred over alternative attitudes could have origins that are independent of cultural influence. However, even if the origins are culturally-bound, the ongoing development, if self-directed and explored, can be liberated from its origins, transformed in such a way that the resultant ethics and attitude no longer resemble the source from which they began their development. Ethics and attitudes are not genetically predisposed and, as such, are not likely bound by origins in the way eye color is. Because choice is a possibility origins do not predetermine outcomes. If decisions are not made consciously then origins likely predetermine outcomes to a greater degree but in such a scenario an altruistic preference cannot arise or if the preference does arise then it is rejected as a preference and remains an imposed obligation in which an individual acquiesces to adopt and perform. There is no satisfaction in this attitude or practice; in fact, what is most likely to arise is resentment and self-loathing, an individual who never develops into a thinking being acting according to his or her will.