The Great problem with Socialism

[sarda karaniwan]

rodshaw wrote:

Altruism comes from the Latin alter, meaning other. Its has nothing to do with elevation.[/quote/]Maybe so, but altruism does, because it is not for a human being to uphold. But if some of you really insist, then I'm not gonna prevent you, do it. Let us see how far you can go before you realize, "hey, I'm only human!".sardaan Ordinarian 

[robbo203]

sarda karaniwan wrote:

rodshaw wrote:

Altruism comes from the Latin alter, meaning other. Its has nothing to do with elevation.[/quote/]Maybe so, but altruism does, because it is not for a human being to uphold. But if some of you really insist, then I'm not gonna prevent you, do it. Let us see how far you can go before you realize, "hey, I'm only human!".sardaan Ordinarian 

 Again, Sarda, Im afraid you are quite mistaken with this line of argument of yours. You present "altruism" as if it is something to aspire to , to uphold – something almost unnatural or otherworldy. The impression I get is that you think you need almost to be a saint in order to be an altruist.   In an earlier post you saidAltruism, from the word alt or alta, which means, to raise up, elevate, higher, above, because adopting this imaginary virtue is sure to raise ones being into a higher level, not the level to become human, but in a transcendental level, the near to God level, if not God.Your misunderstanding of what altruism is about is reflected in your misconstruing the etymological origins of the word as Rod pointed out:  It doesnt come from the world "alta".  Here is the standard explanation:Altruism or selflessness is the opposite of selfishness. The word was coined by the French philosopher Auguste Comte in French, as altruisme, for an antonym of egoism.[1][2] He derived it from an Italian altrui, which in turn was derived from Latin alteri, meaning "other people" or "somebody else".[3](Wikipedia) Contrary to what you suggest altruism is a thoroughly normal and omnipresent aspect of the human condition – just as much as selfishness.  It is what underlies any kind of human morality.  Even the capitalists to whom you referrred earlier practice a form of altruism in the guize of "kin altruism". In fact, human society would simply not be possible had we not evolved a capacity to behave altruistically towards each other. We are social animals and therefore necessarily also altruistic animals – nothwithstanding the fact that we are also inclined towards selfishness

[sarda karaniwan]

"Altruism or selflessness is the opposite of selfishness." I think the word said it all. "altruism is a thoroughly normal and omnipresent aspect of the human condition – just as much as selfishness"So how come you have to look for it?sardaan Ordinarian

[robbo203]

sarda karaniwan wrote:

"Altruism or selflessness is the opposite of selfishness." I think the word said it all. "altruism is a thoroughly normal and omnipresent aspect of the human condition – just as much as selfishness"So how come you have to look for it?sardaan Ordinarian

 You dont have to look for it , Sarda. Its right there under your nose and it manifests itself in countless ways – how we behave towards members of our own family, towards our friends, towards the wider community in which we live. Do you think the lifeboat people who give up their time and without any thought of financial remuneration, are acting out of selfishness to save people from the sea?  Do you think the volunteer who rattles a money tin for some charity on some windy street corner is merely doing this on a whim and not becuase he or she feels some burning desire to help others?  Of course not.   Altruism is nothing special. It is a completely normal part of what makes us human beings

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

Altruism is nothing special. It is a completely normal part of what makes us human beings

Some evolutionary psychologists theorise there is no such thing as true altruism – only reciprocal altruism. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec…)According to this theory, every act of altruism, such as jumping into a river to save the life of a stranger, is done with some inherent expectation of reward that would offset the risk of losing your own life. The theory states that we perform such acts with the expectation that others might do the same to save the lives of our own genetic relations at some point in time.In addition, every act of apparent altruistic kindness, such as giving to charity and performing social work, also makes the altruistic person "feel good" about themselves in some way, such as the recognition they receive for their good acts.

[robbo203]

gnome wrote:

Some evolutionary psychologists theorise there is no such thing as true altruism – only reciprocal altruism. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec…)

 And "kin altruism" too which is something different to reciprocal altruism…However, while "some" evolutionary psychologists may theorise that, Dave, it is important to what it is they are actually referring to. “Evolutionary altruism“ is not the same thing as psychological altruism; it does not involve motive.  It is simply a question of consequence.  In this context, it means behaviour in which a donor incurs some cost, and the beneficiary reaps some benefit, in terms of reproductive success.  This is what these evolutionary psychologists may be questioning from a "gene centred" point of view  popularised by Dawkins' book The Selfish Gene.  But even Dawkins did not deny the fact of psychological altruism and even applauded it.   Psychological altruism involves motive and is the basis of human morality and may even sometimes be damaging to the reproductive success of its intended beneficiaries as when good intentions to help others backfire disastrously and, in such instances, may run counter to evolutionary altruism.  Like the patriotic soldier who opts to die for his country before he has  had the opportunity to sow his wild oats.  This is an example of what Durkheim called "altruistic suicide"  We may say that in this case it is thoroughly misguided  but it still a form of altruism that fundamentally refutes the claims of psychological egoism.

gnome wrote:

According to this theory, every act of altruism, such as jumping into a river to save the life of a stranger, is done with some inherent expectation of reward that would offset the risk of losing your own life. The theory states that we perform such acts with the expectation that others might do the same to save the lives of our own genetic relations at some point in time.In addition, every act of apparent altruistic kindness, such as giving to charity and performing social work, also makes the altruistic person "feel good" about themselves in some way, such as the recognition they receive for their good acts.

 Yes, this is a fairly common sort of argument that it is made against the claim that people can behave altruistically.  It serves to reinforce a view of human beings is being exclusively driven by self interest, which in turn feeds into a more general argument that goes to reinforce capitalist ideology and thus capitalism itself.  Remember Adam Smith and his invisible hand of the market and his assertion that it is not out of benevolence that the butcher enables his customers to obtain meat  but out his own self interest.  We have to be very very wary as socialists of engaging with those sort of arguments that place undue stress on self interest as a motive for wanting socialism.  Self interest is part of the reason for wanting socialism but not the whole reason and socialists who want to make it the whole reason completely undermine the whole case for socialism in my view becuase the logic off what they are saying beckons them not to unite with their fellow workers but – instead –  to promote their own interests at the expense of their fellow workers In any event, I think the argument you refer to  that every act of altruism is really self interested is,  at base, baloney.  This is what  the moral philosopher, James Rachels has dubbed the egoistic “strategy of redefining motives”  Self interest is held to be  the real , or ulterior, motive for a  person's actions. An obvious example  is the social approval or esteem we are supposed to obtain from helping others.  But even where the donation is made anonymously, the donor is still held to derive some personal satisfaction (and, hence, benefit) from this act which is what, according to our psychological egoist, purportedly motivated him or her to make this anonymous donation in the first place. .Plausible though this argument may seem at first blush it is nevertheless suspect on several counts.  To begin with, all that it shows, as Rachels points out, is that it is possible to interpret such behaviour as evidence of egoistic motivation;  it does not necessarily prove that the individual in question is egoistically motivated in fact.  And there’s the rub – an individual’s motives are essentially subjective and hence inscrutable to others. So how can the claim that this individual is egoistically motivated be empirically tested? On the face of it, psychological egoism would appear to be a closed theory, incapable of  falsification; it is based on a mere assertion that could just as easily be countered  – and with just as much, or as little, validity – by the assertion that all behaviour is altruistically motivated.True, one could perhaps persuade such an individual to undergo a lie-detection test, assuming such a test to be reliable, but even this would not provide the conclusive proof we require.  After all, such evidence that a test of this kind might reveal, pointing to the fact that one wanted to benefit oneself in some way,  does not preclude wanting others to benefit as well and, consequently, need not be taken to imply egoistic motivation in its strict sense at all. After all psychological egoism is based on the proposition that not only do we not care about other people  but that we are incapable of caring about them and this is precisely what is not the case when we say we want others to benefit from our actions as well as ourselves.Nevertheless, a  psychological egoist, while acknowleging  that people  may well appear to be acting benevolently or altruistically towards others, might still want to argue that their actions spring from  a choice and, given that a choice is involved , the individual actor must ipso facto be doing what he or she wants to do – otherwise, he or she would have chosen something else to do.   In this sense, it is claimed, the individual  is still acting "egoistically" or selfishly. The difficulty with this argument is that saying that we are motivated by our wants really boils down a mere tautology.  It overlooks the obvious point that merely wanting something is not in itself selfish; what makes a want selfish has to do with the object of such a want.  If what I want is to help other people then, by definition, my want cannot be construed as selfish since I am including those other people within its purview.  In any case, what I want may not necessarily accord with my self interest. Thus, I may want to consume copious amounts of alcohol every day but it would hardly be in my interest to do so. Psychological egoism is predicated on the assumption that human action is motivated solely by what individuals rationally consider to be in their "best interests" and is therefore unable to explain why individuals should behave in a way that is quite contrary to this. It might be argued that this is just a simple case of mistaking what one subjectively believes to be in one’s best interest for what is objectively in one's best interest.  However, such an inference would not be reasonable: there is no reason to suspect that an alcoholic, say,  is necessarily incapable of recognising the considerable harm that excessive drinking can do to him or her. In the final analysis, while I may very well derive pleasure from helping others, it does not follow that this is what prompted me to offer this  help in the first place – such pleasure may simply be the inadvertent  consequence, or by-product, of my action rather than its cause.  Suppose a situation arose in which one was called upon to save a drowning child in a stormed-tossed sea.  One surely would not stop to consider the pleasurable benefits that might result from doing this before committing oneself to this course of action; in an emergency of this nature it is unlikely that there would even be enough time to engage in such idle speculation, anyway. In these circumstances people tend to act on impulse.  In fact , study after study seems to bear out the truth of this – that  people in this sort of situation tend to  that  "rescue first and reflect second" (http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2014/10/psychology_of_heroism_and_altruism_what_makes_people_do_good_deeds.1.html),  I think this stems quite simply,  from a natural sense of empathy towards others       

[Anonymous]

Altruism is part of our human nature

[robbo203]

mcolome1 wrote:

Altruism is part of our human nature

 Absolutely. And without  it human society would not have been possible. In fact not only human society but many forms of animal and insect life

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

mcolome1 wrote:

Altruism is part of our human nature

 Absolutely. And without  it human society would not have been possible. In fact not only human society but many forms of animal and insect life

During certain natural disasters which have affected the well being of others humans, peoples have acted in a much better way than all the so called public institutions created by the state, and they have  spontaneous helped others human beings, and they have forgotten their superficial  division such as:The  colors of their skins, nationalities, age, language, religion,  and social background. We have a very good article published in the website of the WSM which shows how collaboration between human beings  has been one of the main aspect of the human society

[robbo203]

Talking of altruism here's a rather interesting and informative website.  I particularly like the section on "Altruistic Economics"http://www.altruists.org/ EDIT: I see one or two of the articles tend towards the idea of reforming the money system which is rather disappointing but then I havent read them yet so perhaps I shouldnt judge

[sarda karaniwan]

•    Trustworthy,•    Loyal,•    Helpful,•    Friendly,•    Courteous,•    Kind,•    Obedient,•    Cheerful,•    Thrifty,•    Brave,•    Clean,•    and Reverent.That’s the Boy Scout Law, nice isn’t it? How can you not like them, it is perfect in every way, it is a good thing, so good, there is no excuse not to trust it. There is no doubt this law is based on that natural part of human called altruism, and with altruism existing in each and every one of us, then there is no more need for mistrust, the suspicion for ulterior motive has been eliminated, and so every one can relax. Because it is an established truth for any boy scout, every boy scout can now be trusted, and who can be more trusted than the one who is carrying the authority of trust, the Scout Master. So now this Scout Master will come to you and ask that you should allow your children to become a boy scout and let him take care of each and every one of them of which he will be so happy to do. So let us all thank this thing called altruism, which like God is everywhere and comes in many forms that finally we found somebody we can trust our children with.It is not just the Scout Master who have this authority of trust, there is also this Pastor/Priest, or those Muslim Imam who can make any youth into a martyr, but then again why make the story longer, the world problem has been solved, we just discovered altruism.sardaan Ordinarian 

[alanjjohnstone]

Sarda,not sure if you have heard about the Socialist Sunday School movement but a brief overview here. I think a lot better than the God and Country paramilitary Scouts. (i'd also recommend the credo of Woodcraft Folk before the Scouts http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Woodcraft_Folk ) http://socialismoryourmoneyback.blogspot.com/2013/05/sunday-sermon-teach-your-children-well.html 1. Love your school companions, who will be your co-workers in life.2. Love learning, which is the food of the mind; be as grateful to your teachers as to your parents.3. Make every day holy by good and useful deeds and kindly actions.4. Honour good men and women; be courteous to all, bow down to none.5. Do not hate nor speak evil of any one; do not be revengeful, but stand up for your rights and resist oppression.6. Do not be cowardly. Be a good friend to the weak, and love justice.7. Remember that all good things of the earth are produced by labour. Whoever enjoys them without working for them is stealing the bread of the workers.8. Observe and think in order to discover the truth. Do not believe what is contrary to reason, and never deceive yourself or others.9. Do not think that they who love their country must hate and despise other nations, or wish for war which is a remnant of barbarism.10. Help to bring about the day when all nations shall live fraternally together in peace and prosperity [Look forward to the day when all men and women will be free citizens of one community, and live together as equals in peace and righteousness ILP version]DeclarationWe desire to be just and loving to all our fellow men and women, go to work together as brothers and sisters, to be kind to every kind of living creature and to help to form a New Society with Justice as its foundation and Love its Law. The Verse  Version1. Always love your schoolmatesMake happy those in sorrowThe children of today will beThe citizens of tomorrow.2. To parents and to teachersBe grateful and be kindFor we should all love learning(Which nourished the mind)3. Let every day be holyBy doing some good deed;To all do kindly actionsWhatever be their creed.4. Be just and fair to all men,Bow down or worship none.Judge man by what he tried to do,Or has already done.5. Hate not, and speak no evil,Stand up for what is right,And do not be revengeful,But 'gainst oppression fight.6. Try not to be a coward,But always help the weak,Whatever path of life you're in.For love and justice seek.7. All good things gathered from the earth,By toil of hand and brain,Instead of going to the few,The workers should retain.8. Speak (the) truth at all times,And try not to deceive,And what opposes reasonWe ought not to believe.9. Love all the races of mankind,Abolish war and strife;That we may reach the higher plainsOf our intended life.10. Look forward to the day when menAnd women will be free;As brothers and as sisters liveIn peace and unity 

[sarda karaniwan]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Sarda,not sure if you have heard about the Socialist Sunday School movement but a brief overview here. I think a lot better than the God and Country paramilitary Scouts. (i'd also recommend the credo of Woodcraft Folk before the Scouts http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Woodcraft_Folk ) http://socialismoryourmoneyback.blogspot.com/2013/05/sunday-sermon-teach-your-children-well.html 1. Love your school companions, who will be your co-workers in life.2. Love learning, which is the food of the mind; be as grateful to your teachers as to your parents.3. Make every day holy by good and useful deeds and kindly actions.4. Honour good men and women; be courteous to all, bow down to none.5. Do not hate nor speak evil of any one; do not be revengeful, but stand up for your rights and resist oppression.6. Do not be cowardly. Be a good friend to the weak, and love justice.7. Remember that all good things of the earth are produced by labour. Whoever enjoys them without working for them is stealing the bread of the workers.8. Observe and think in order to discover the truth. Do not believe what is contrary to reason, and never deceive yourself or others.9. Do not think that they who love their country must hate and despise other nations, or wish for war which is a remnant of barbarism.10. Help to bring about the day when all nations shall live fraternally together in peace and prosperity [Look forward to the day when all men and women will be free citizens of one community, and live together as equals in peace and righteousness ILP version]DeclarationWe desire to be just and loving to all our fellow men and women, go to work together as brothers and sisters, to be kind to every kind of living creature and to help to form a New Society with Justice as its foundation and Love its Law. The Verse  Version1. Always love your schoolmatesMake happy those in sorrowThe children of today will beThe citizens of tomorrow.2. To parents and to teachersBe grateful and be kindFor we should all love learning(Which nourished the mind)3. Let every day be holyBy doing some good deed;To all do kindly actionsWhatever be their creed.4. Be just and fair to all men,Bow down or worship none.Judge man by what he tried to do,Or has already done.5. Hate not, and speak no evil,Stand up for what is right,And do not be revengeful,But 'gainst oppression fight.6. Try not to be a coward,But always help the weak,Whatever path of life you're in.For love and justice seek.7. All good things gathered from the earth,By toil of hand and brain,Instead of going to the few,The workers should retain.8. Speak (the) truth at all times,And try not to deceive,And what opposes reasonWe ought not to believe.9. Love all the races of mankind,Abolish war and strife;That we may reach the higher plainsOf our intended life.10. Look forward to the day when menAnd women will be free;As brothers and as sisters liveIn peace and unity 

So who do you think will represent the authority of trust here? Just play naive?Just make sure it doesn't opiate the mind of the masses.By the way, I think Engels touch that subject about altruism, along with Robert Owen and the Owenite commune who believe in "pure kindness", I don't know, It's been a long time since I read that book Revolution in Science (Anti-Duhring).It is the social condition that determines consciousness not altruism. sardaan Ordinarian

[robbo203]

sarda karaniwan wrote:

So who do you think will represent the authority of trust here? Just play naive?Just make sure it doesn't opiate the mind of the masses.By the way, I think Engels touch that subject about altruism, along with Robert Owen and the Owenite commune who believe in "pure kindness", I don't know, It's been a long time since I read that book Revolution in Science (Anti-Duhring).It is the social condition that determines consciousness not altruism.

 I'm not quite sure what your reasoning is here, Sarda, or how putting your trust in some authority relates to the subject of altruism.  In any event altruism is inherently part of the "social condition" you speak of. I repeat again – human society would have been inconceivable without group solidartiy and the concern of members of the group for the wellbeing of each other (what we call altruism). How would our paleolithic hunter gatherer forbears have even surivived without such a thing?  Ken Smith, a great guy who sadly passed away a few years ago – he was a member of the SPGB – wrote one or two books and in one of them said this: "Morality, defined as sociality, as love of others, as unselfishness, as concern for the weak of the suffering, is not just a good idea, a pragmatic sanction.  It is a condition of survival” (K Smith, 1994, The Survival of the Weakest: Love . Science and Social Change, John Ball Press, Gloucester,     p.317).   I think Ken hit the nail on the head:  And it is not just among human beings that altruism is to be found, you know.  Here are a few examples from Wikipedia of altruism that are to be found among mammals: Wolves and wild dogs bring meat back to members of the pack not present at the kill.[citation needed]Mongooses support elderly, sick, or injured animals.[citation needed]Meerkats often have one standing guard to warn while the rest feed in case of predator attack.[citation needed]Raccoons inform conspecifics about feeding grounds by droppings left on commonly shared latrines. A similar information system has been observed to be used by common ravens.[18]Male baboons threaten predators and cover the rear as the troop retreats.[citation needed]Gibbons and chimpanzees with food will, in response to a gesture, share their food with others of the group.[citation needed] Chimpanzees will help humans and conspecifics without any reward in return.[19][20]Bonobos have been observed aiding injured or handicapped bonobos.[21]Vampire bats commonly regurgitate blood to share with unlucky or sick roost mates that have been unable to find a meal, often forming a buddy system.[22][23]Vervet monkeys give alarm calls to warn fellow monkeys of the presence of predators, even though in doing so they attract attention to themselves, increasing their personal chance of being attacked.[24]Lemurs of all ages and of both sexes will take care of infants unrelated to them.[citation needed]Dolphins support sick or injured animals, swimming under them for hours at a time and pushing them to the surface so they can breathe.[25]Walruses have been seen adopting orphans who lost their parents to predators.[26]African buffalo will rescue a member of the herd captured by predators. (Battle at Kruger)[27]  Though socialists are right to reject the crude biological determinism of the sociobiologists – the term "evolutionary psychology" which has largely replaced "sociobiology" also denotes a shift away from a hardline deterministic position –  there is a sense in which we are indeed genetically hardwired and that some of our attributes are indeed the product of our evolution as a species. Linguistic capacity is a case in point. Culture determines the language we speak but not the fact that we speak at all.. Its the same with altruism.  Culture determines who we are altruistic towards but not the fact that we are altruistic.   Proof that we may be wired up for altruism came with  the discovery of “mirror neurons” by Giacomo Rizzolati and his colleagues in the 1990s   A mirror neuron is a special kind of brain cell located in the premotor cortex which “fires” in response to the observed actions of other individuals and causes the subject to involuntarily mimic or “mirror” these actions to some extent .  An example of this would be the twitching and tensing movements we tend to make when watching, say, two boxers fighting in a ring.     It has been suggested that, since mirror neurons may be  implicated in our ability to empathise with others – putting ourselves in their shoes, so to speak  – they might also have played a formative role in the emergence of human morality .  Indeed, it has even been suggested that autism – a condition that involves inter alia impairment of an individual’s social skills – may be linked to mirror neuron dysfunction The biological basis of altruism may have only just been discovered but altruism itself has been around since the dawn of time…..

[Dave B]

(6) On the other hand I cannot agree with you that the war of every man against every man was the first phase of human development. In my opinion the social instinct was one of the most essential levers in the development of man from the ape. The first men must have lived gregariously and so far back as we can see we find that this was the case. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/letters/75_11_12.htm  Darwin, C. R. 1871. The descent of man, and selection in relation to sex. London: John Murray. Volume 1. 1st edition  The following proposition seems to me in a high degree probable—namely, that any animal whatever, endowed with well-marked social instincts,5would inevitably acquire a moral sense or conscience, as soon as its intellectual powers had become as well developed, or nearly as well developed, as in man. For, firstly, the social instincts lead an animal to take pleasure in the society of its fellows, to feel a certain amount of sympathy with them, and to perform various services for them. The services may be of a definite and evidently instinctive nature; or there may be only a wish and readiness, as with most of the higher social animals, to aid their fellows in certain general ways. But these feelings and services are by no means extended to all the individuals of the same species, only to those of the same association. Secondly, as soon as the mental faculties had become highly developed, images of all past actions and motives would be incessantly passing through the brain of each individual; and that feeling of dissatisfaction which invariably results, as we shall hereafter see, from any unsatisfied instinct, would arise, as often as it was perceived that the enduring and always present social instinct had yielded to some other instinct, at the time stronger, but neither enduring in its nature, nor leaving behind it a very vivid impression. It is clear that many instinctive desires, such as that of hunger, are in their nature of short duration; and after being satisfied are not readily or vividly recalled. Thirdly, after the power of language had been acquired and the wishes of the members of the same community could be distinctly expressed, the common opinion how each member ought to act for the public good, would naturally become to a large extent the guide to action. But the social instincts would still give the impulse to act for the good of the community, this impulse being strengthened, directed, and sometimes even deflected by public opinion, the power of which rests, as we shall presently see, on instinctive sympathy. Lastly, habit in the individual would ultimately play a very important part in guiding the conduct of each member; for the social instincts and impulses, like all other instincts, would be greatly strengthened by habit, as would obedience to the wishes and judgment of the community. These several subordinate propositions must now be discussed; and some of them at considerable length.  5Sir B. Brodie, after observing that man is a social animal ('Psychological Enquiries,' 1854, p. 192), asks the pregnant question, "ought not this to settle the disputed question as to the existence of a moral sense?" Similar ideas have probably occurred to many persons, as they did long ago to Marcus Aurelius. Mr. J. S. Mill speaks, in his celebrated work, 'Utilitarianism,' (1864, p. 46), of the social feelings as a "powerful natural sentiment," and as "the natural basis of sentiment for utilitarian morality;" but on the previous page he says, "if, as is my own belief, the moral feelings are not innate, but acquired, they are not for that reason less natural." It is with hesitation that I venture to differ from so profound a thinker, but it can hardly be disputed that the social feelings are instinctive or innate in the lower animals; and why should they not be so in man? Mr. Bain (see, for instance, 'The Emotions and the Will,' 1865, p. 481) and others believe that the moral sense is acquired by each individual during his lifetime. On the general theory of evolution this is at least extremely improbable.   http://www.sacred-texts.com/aor/darwin/descent/dom07.htm

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