1.5.7 Enlightened Self Interest

Version 1.0 October 2022                             (Previous Version)

If other philosophical arguments can’t provide a justification for being good, and we can't justify it by appealing to the evolution of altruistic tendencies, can we at least suggest that behaving in our own enlightened self-interest would lead to a reasonable society? 

This idea is based on the belief that the evolution of altruism is real and most, but not all, humans have at least some degree of compassion and some need of emotional connections to other people, and most get a warm fuzzy feeling when they help others.

Enlightened Action

We must emphasize that we are not considering short term, unsophisticated selfishness.  Short term decisions are less productive over the long term, leading to less than optimal outcomes, such as greater poverty.  Unsophisticated selfishness is likely to lead to social rejection over the long term.

We need to take into account the realities of communal life.  Visibly helping others when they are in need is likely to result in reciprocal benefits.  Gaining a reputation for honesty and decency is likely to make your life easier, not least by encouraging amiable companionship: most people expect their friends to be honest and decent to each other, and passing the time with good friends makes life better.

Socially Sensitive Action

Most people with supposedly normal human emotional responses will feel shame or guilt if they commit certain acts that hurt others, especially if these acts are public or can be discovered.  Many ‘ordinary’ people feel disgust in the face of offensive behaviour which seriously demeans a person. Many people, perhaps not enough, realize they feel better about themselves when they are generous, giving their time or money to friends and family or even strangers.  If someone gives a few dollars to the Red Cross to alleviate a stranger’s poverty it is a good thing, even if it is not much of a sacrifice, and even if it is done only to make themselves feel better or to be seen to be a good person.

Prudent or Skillful Action

Many people avoid doing harm, drive carefully and pay their dues not because they are honourable but because they are afraid of being caught and subject to social criticism or criminal charges.  Doing these things – or not doing them – is good for society even if the motivation is not very laudable: it is prudent, or as a Buddhist might say skillful, because it is in their enlightened self-interest.

Enlightened Self-Interested Action

So someone who is not really trying to be ‘good’ may in fact behave in a socially acceptable way by:

●   avoiding stupid decisions which may be of benefit in the short term but not in the long term;

●   not acting in an obvious selfish way; but apparently sometimes being generous and a good friend;

●   avoiding risky, criminal or offensive behaviour;

●   seem to get genuine pleasure in many human interactions;

●   and so on.

All of these behaviours are laudable in themselves, even if the motivation is not laudable.

Many people who are motivated to do good actually behave worse than someone would if they were following their enlightened self-interest.  Many apparently well motivated people make stupid short term decisions, or engage in risky, criminal or offensive behaviour, or seem to get pleasure by denigrating others or being nasty in other ways.  Such people are NOT prudent, skillful or enlightened, even if they want to do good.

In fact an effective strategy to improve almost anyone’s behaviour is to appeal to their enlightened self-interest.  This is likely to be much more effective than berating people for their lack of will power, hypocrisy, loyalty, or lack of morality.  Appealing to a person’s ethical values can be effective only when they have ethical values, or at least accept the need for them.  But everyone always has their own enlightened self-interest, even if some, out of guilt or shame, choose to ignore it.

And the supposedly ‘normal human emotional responses’ are not essential for enlightened self-interest to be an effective motivator.  It is possible that a person who has little compassion, little empathy, and is relatively self-sufficient emotionally can behave in their enlightened self-interest and still be a totally acceptable member of society.

Psychopaths or Sociopaths

On the other hand, there are psychopaths or sociopaths, who do apparently have little empathy or compassion, who are able to act unkindly, unsociably, and do harm, apparently without regret.  Many psychopaths or sociopaths are quite intelligent and can cover up or rationalize their bad behaviour, or bully others into submission. 

Though we might wish that such people eventually get caught out and get their comeuppance, often they stay on the right side of the law, prosper, and appear to lead successful lives, often as business or community leaders.  They frequently delude many into thinking they are thoughtful and caring, while at the same being vile and abusive to others.  Often they delude themselves into thinking that their post hoc rationalizations of abusive behaviour are in fact justified in some legalistic way.

We cannot in any way justify such abusive behaviour, and cannot support this variety of supposedly ‘enlightened self-interest’ because we believe it is not enlightened but only self-interested behaviour.  As individuals and as a society we need to aware of the reality and frequency of such psychopathic or sociopathic behaviour and do what we can to contain or minimize it. 

Whether they accept it or not, we assign responsibility even or especially to psychopaths and sociopaths, when social intervention can potentially lead to a change of behaviour.  Criminal law should be applied in cases of abusive behaviour, and concerted social pressures applied to other inappropriate behaviours.

However, it is possible for a psychopathic person, though lacking in compassion, to have no particular desire to hurt or dominate people.  They could apparently amiably conform to the norms of social behaviour – generally being polite and helpful – simply because it is convenient and to not draw attention to themselves.  This behaviour is not abusive and perhaps is enlightened, because it takes other people’s feelings into account, if only the keep the peace rather than actually caring.  This could be acceptable, and because there is no evidence of abusive, uncaring behaviour, would be accepted.

Ayn Rand’s Objectivism

In ethical philosophy, ethical egoism is the belief that people ought to act in their own self-interest.  It differs from psychological egoism, which claims that people can only act in their self-interest.  Ethical egoism also differs from rational egoism, which holds that it is rational to act in one's self-interest.  Ethical egoism holds, therefore, that actions whose consequences will benefit the doer are ethical.  Ethical egoism contrasts with ethical altruism, which holds that people have an obligation to help others.  Egoism and altruism both contrast with ethical utilitarianism which holds that we should treat ourselves with no higher regard than for others. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_egoism accessed November 2022)

Our core ethical values of Life, Love, Equality and Responsibility contrast with ethical egoism in general and Ayn Rand’s philosophy in particular.  Love does indeed mean promoting happiness, but the happiness of others, a form of altruism, which Rand rejects.  Equality involved treating others as just as worthy as ourselves (though we make allowances for the reality that we do preference our loved ones).  We know that reason and rationality is not the absolute it appears to be: we fully accept its usefulness and wide application but it has its limits (see Section 1.1.2 on Rationality and its Limits).  If we value Responsibility we accept the need for interventions, imposed by ourselves on ourselves, to help us to follow the appropriate path and make good choices. 

Our core ethical values are presented in the following sections.

Intentions or Outcomes

In the introduction to this Chapter (Section 1.5.1 on the complexities of ethics) we raised the issue of whether ethical behaviour is determined from the intent of the behaviour, or its outcome, and suggested that we often need to take both into account.

When considering enlightened self-interest the intent is primarily to look after number one.  But if the outcome is socially beneficial, which, as we have seen, ‘truly enlightened’ self-interest can be, then, if we judge according to the outcome, acting in an enlightened self-interest way is at least acceptable. 

In addition, many normal humans, including those acting in their enlightened self-interest, nevertheless form attachments to loved ones, friends, family and communities, so their self-interest includes looking after the interests of these people as well.  So their supposedly selfish intent includes the interests of many others, and hence is not as self-interested as it originally seemed, and this form of enlightened self-interest may be the best we can expect from many people. 

But as discussed above, for some psychopaths and sociopaths, their so called ‘enlightened self-interest’ results in excessive abuse accompanied by deception and delusion.  If they were really motivated by REALigion’s core ethical values of Life, Love, Equality and Responsibility they would not behave this way, so the lack of good intentions is a significant concern,

We summarize the conclusions we can reasonably come to on these issues as follows: