Dispelling Psychological Egoism

Dispelling Psychological Egoism: True Altruism

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2303588/The-mother-says-having-children-biggest-regret-life.html

Psychological Egoism states that humans are always motivated by self-interest, and there are no acts of true altruism. It argues that even when the perception of an act may be selfless; there are ulterior motives that point to self-interest. Above is a link to an article about a UK mom who says that having her two children was the biggest mistake she has ever made. She thought it would be wrong to deny her husband children, so she spent thirty-three painstaking years caring for children she couldn’t have cared less about. In no way, shape, or form was Isabella Dutton acting in favor of her own self-interest when she had her two children. They may be hard to come across, but this is an example of true altruism, thus dispelling the notion of psychological egoism.

Isabella never came to love her children like she hoped she would. When describing her relationship to her newborn son, she remarks, “I heard him stir but as I looked at his round face on the brink of wakefulness, I felt no bond. No warm rush of maternal affection. I felt completely detached from this alien being who had encroached upon my settled married life and changed it, irrevocably, for the worse.” She had no self-serving motivations to have children, and no materialistic drives to raise them once born. She describes her relationship with her children as parasitic, “I resented the time my children consumed. Like parasites, they took from me and didn't give back.” A parasitic relationship, by definition, is one where one party benefits while the other is either harmed or not affected at all. Isabella Dutton took no personal pleasure in spending time with her kids, and raised them out of pure altruism – a willingness to do good for others without gaining or expecting anything in return.

            While I do believe that people act in their own self-interest a large majority of the time, it is not the case one hundred percent of the time. People do feel bad when they do something selfish, or squander an opportunity to help out another individual. That notion is why self-interest is not the sole factor regarding our moral decision-making, it is one of several inputs. People tend to sacrifice their own agendas for those they love. Isabella Dutton loved her husband, so she devoted thirty years of her life to something she did not care in order to make him happy. The human capacity to deeply care for another allows us to put another’s needs before our own. Without love, psychological egoism may be true; but as long as compassion brings forth actions of true altruism, it is a flawed theory.