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DividedQuantum
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Registered: 12/06/13
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altruism
#23999090 - 01/10/17 06:53 PM (7 years, 20 days ago) |
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In biology, anthropology and psychology, altruism is the study of why animals (including humans) act altruistically toward other animals. I.e., why they would help another organism (that presumably is not their offspring), the act of which does not confer survival advantages that would result in the propagation of their genes into future generations. It is still admitted by these disciplines that, in reality, they do not understand it very well, but the common explanation is that it has peripheral evolutionary advantages. It is usually reasoned that by helping another organism, an individual can indirectly ensure that genes in his immediate or extended family are preserved, and that this is a genetic imperative. Frankly, I find it weak.
If the selfish explanation for altruism is correct, it seems to me that no one would be able to save the life of someone outside his own extended family. And yet it happens all the time, all over the world. In human societies, people continually give their lives for strangers. How does this have anything to do with propagating one's genes successfully? How are these selfish acts? How do we account for this altruism in the light of the theory of evolution?
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Lucis
Nutritional Yeast

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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: Frankly, I find it weak.
You find altruism weak, or the way those scientific disciplines define altruism?
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DividedQuantum
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Re: altruism [Re: Lucis]
#23999282 - 01/10/17 07:46 PM (7 years, 20 days ago) |
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Their hypothesis attempting to describe why it happens.
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Lucis
Nutritional Yeast

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Some people view altruism as a selfish act because you feel good after you do something good for another person, and this good feeling is equated with a high because it's brought on through a rush of endorphins, I don't much subscribe to this view point on things though because when I do good for people it's because I can't live with not doing good for them.
For example, I was walking to the grocery store and I passed a girl and her father in a parking lot with a flat tire, the father was in a wheel chair, I started to walk past them but got a feeling in my chest which I couldn't shake, that feeling in my chest turned into a screaming in my head that I had to turn around to help those people, I didn't think that I was going to be rewarded in anyway, and the good feeling I felt after changing their tire for them had nothing to do with why I stopped to help, it was like I had to do it because it was the right thing to do.
Nowadays when I do good I don't get a rush of endorphins from it, I am the same before I do an act of kindness, as I am afterwards, so there's no reward for doing the act, it just must be done is how I see it.
You might find this article about humpback whales interesting.
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pineninja
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Registered: 08/17/14
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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: Their hypothesis attempting to describe why it happens.
Some people are just unable to fathom altruism innocently so they project only what they can conceptualize onto others. Sociopaths believe that everybody else must be pretending to not be one. Greedy people think that those helping others must have a return in mind.
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falcon



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" the act of which does not confer survival advantages that would result in the propagation of their genes into future generations" People share so many genes with just about everyone else that this statement is a narrow interpretation by people who know better, but like to split hairs and other interesting but non productive pursuits to keep their thingkers ticking.
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DividedQuantum
Outer Head


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Re: altruism [Re: Lucis]
#23999482 - 01/10/17 08:50 PM (7 years, 20 days ago) |
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Quote:
Fennario said: Some people view altruism as a selfish act because you feel good after you do something good for another person, and this good feeling is equated with a high because it's brought on through a rush of endorphins, I don't much subscribe to this view point on things though because when I do good for people it's because I can't live with not doing good for them.
For example, I was walking to the grocery store and I passed a girl and her father in a parking lot with a flat tire, the father was in a wheel chair, I started to walk past them but got a feeling in my chest which I couldn't shake, that feeling in my chest turned into a screaming in my head that I had to turn around to help those people, I didn't think that I was going to be rewarded in anyway, and the good feeling I felt after changing their tire for them had nothing to do with why I stopped to help, it was like I had to do it because it was the right thing to do.
Nowadays when I do good I don't get a rush of endorphins from it, I am the same before I do an act of kindness, as I am afterwards, so there's no reward for doing the act, it just must be done is how I see it.
You might find this article about humpback whales interesting.
Yeah, when I am altruistic I do not feel any neurotransmitter kick from it, I feel the same as always. Even if it made me feel good, is that really compelling me to do it?
The issue is that scientists, in studying biology, have to have a scientific explanation for why altruism occurs. In my opinion, the group-selection arguments are worthless. Altruism is much more complex than that. It seems to me that maybe, just maybe, there is enough latitude in the consciousness of sentient beings to understand that helping others may serve no measurable personal benefit, but that you can go ahead and do it anyway. The argument that "it makes one feel good" is not a scientific or evolutionary explanation, and it really carries no weight and explains nothing.
The whale article is fascinating, and it doesn't surprise me. Whales are amazing. Over time I've come to the conclusion that some cetaceans are almost as smart as humans, and we can't tell because they don't speak human languages and don't have hands with fingers and thumbs. It is well established that they communicate with complex signals. That these peaceful, intelligent creatures can act intelligently and altruistically, across species, even to the point of preserving a whale corpse, which is pretty abstract, is something I feel they are perfectly capable of, and they don't do it for genetic reasons, and I don't think they do it to "feel good," either.
-------------------- Vi Veri Universum Vivus Vici
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akira_akuma
Φύσις κρύπτεσθαι ὕψιστος φιλεῖ


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the only thing i can presume is that altruism is a good defence mechanism for keeping the illusion of reality alive.
and that's a good thing, in this sense.
why else would you do it if it doesn't make you feel good...well, you do it because to not do it would leave you with the compunction that to not help would lead to perhaps drastic effects for the unhelped, and imagining this is uncomfortable and stressful, and maybe even lead to a breakdown to the unwitting whom questions too much about his or her erm...culpability to the world at large...ie, if they won't be getting any help, if they are ever in such a position as to need it, they'll feel twice as compelled to feel like shit, and they'll be twice as such found to be wrongheaded about the occurrence of altruism, to themselves.
that leads to one, perhaps, questioning themselves about the purpose of their live and their existence, and whether one would be worth helping, why or why not, ect, perhaps even saving, themselves, or if one is just better off leaving one to be left alone, and to suffer with no help, for the sake of their own destitution being "irredeemable".
so to forgo that possibly happenstance, people say fuck it, and go for it, because it better to just try and help, then to admit that it's perhaps not worth it to bother.
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DieCommie

Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 29,258
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Re: altruism [Re: falcon] 1
#24000789 - 01/11/17 10:46 AM (7 years, 19 days ago) |
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Quote:
falcon said: " the act of which does not confer survival advantages that would result in the propagation of their genes into future generations" People share so many genes with just about everyone else that this statement is a narrow interpretation by people who know better, but like to split hairs and other interesting but non productive pursuits to keep their thingkers ticking.
This is what I thought. Humans share the vast majority of genes. These genes are more likely to propagate when a stranger is saved. Also, humans fare better with a larger population. Those nameless strangers all over the world contribute to my life and success.
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sudly
Darwin's stagger


Registered: 01/05/15
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If an animal doesn't have an active fight or flight response then I suppose there's no reason for them to be selfish.
If they don't want to fight or run away then maybe it's just company they're after, and if you aren't running on instinct then the propagation of genes isn't an immediate necessity.
-------------------- I am whatever Darwin needs me to be.
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Kickle
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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: In biology, anthropology and psychology, altruism is the study of why animals (including humans) act altruistically toward other animals. I.e., why they would help another organism (that presumably is not their offspring), the act of which does not confer survival advantages that would result in the propagation of their genes into future generations. It is still admitted by these disciplines that, in reality, they do not understand it very well, but the common explanation is that it has peripheral evolutionary advantages. It is usually reasoned that by helping another organism, an individual can indirectly ensure that genes in his immediate or extended family are preserved, and that this is a genetic imperative. Frankly, I find it weak.
If the selfish explanation for altruism is correct, it seems to me that no one would be able to save the life of someone outside his own extended family. And yet it happens all the time, all over the world. In human societies, people continually give their lives for strangers. How does this have anything to do with propagating one's genes successfully? How are these selfish acts? How do we account for this altruism in the light of the theory of evolution?
Heh. I was listening to this podcast called Invisibilia the other day. The first episode actually. Their catchphrase is that they are exploring the "invisible factors influencing our world" and first up: Thoughts.
It's a pretty heavy episode so if you're considering listening I recommend being in the right mind set for it. They interview a guy who was trapped in his own body with no way to move/communicate with the outside world for 10+ years. Just FYI.
Anyways, the reason this sprang to mind is because of another individual they interviewed. He, one day, started to have these really dark sinister thoughts. Kill your spouse type thoughts. Grab that knife over there and slit her throat type thoughts. And they didn't stop. Not in the next week, not in the next month, not even in the next year. He's constantly trying to keep them at bay but they just keep coming. He tries everything he can think of even gets involved with a therapist. No dice, the therapist even seems afraid of these thoughts!
Pretty polar opposite to altruism, no? Instead of thinking about helping others, this individual is perpetually thinking about harming others. And it's driving him insane. Finally he gives therapy another shot. This time he does a little more research and finds a therapist who has run into this before. So he hops into therapy and you know what the first thing the therapist does is?
The therapist hands him a knife and tells him to put it to his (the therapist's) throat. Go ahead, the therapist prods. Grab the knife and put it to my throat. Because I don't believe, not for a second, that you will cut me, or even have the will to grab the knife. Because, you see, you have a form of OCD. An obsession with these thoughts. Rather than being an evil person, as you may begin to believe when looking at your thoughts, you're an overly righteous person! While the average individual may sometime in their life think, "Aw I could just kill that person!" and then move on thinking nothing much about it, you, by virtue of deigning this unacceptable, turned it into an obsessive behavior.
And it turns out this sort of thinking worked for him. He eventually did hold the knife to the therapists throat, and did realize that he would never actually act on these thoughts. He later did this same technique with his wife. And although he realizes there is no truth to his thoughts, he continues to have those thoughts.
So what does that suggest about human nature? To me it hints that Freud may have been on to something with the idea of a superego and id. Or at least in some sense that a balance is maintained between learned morals as part of social standards and also violent impulses. And in some of us that balance is more dramatic than in others -- up to the point that it can cause serious issues and departures from reality.
Not everyone will die to save another person. Some will not even die to save a loved one. But some will go above and beyond to save anything that lives. I don't think the extremes are where the answer lies -- only that they hint at what we likely possess. A social mooring which attempts to balance morality, reality, and more primal impulses. And yes, I do think this has survival/evolutionary benefit.
-------------------- Why shouldn't the truth be stranger than fiction? Fiction, after all, has to make sense. -- Mark Twain
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Didgedood
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Re: altruism [Re: Kickle]
#24002844 - 01/12/17 12:18 AM (7 years, 18 days ago) |
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Nothing is ever truly selfless
-------------------- “If there were no desire to heal The damaged and broken met along This tedious path I've chosen here I certainly would've walked away by now” -MJK
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sudly
Darwin's stagger


Registered: 01/05/15
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I would think love is supposed to be.
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deff
just love everyone



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nothing may be selfless, but it's possible to see others as your self and then help them as your self - it's a bigger, better kind of selfishness
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Broly
eat more lsd



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Re: altruism [Re: deff]
#24003337 - 01/12/17 08:06 AM (7 years, 18 days ago) |
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Quote:
deff said: nothing may be selfless, but it's possible to see others as your self and then help them as your self - it's a bigger, better kind of selfishness 
Kind of why jesus promoted loving your neighbor.
Jesus and love is altruism.
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laughingdog
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Re: altruism [Re: Broly] 1
#24003551 - 01/12/17 09:46 AM (7 years, 18 days ago) |
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as akira_akuma's post suggests there may be an element of the same factors that control the best strategy in the 'prisoner's dilemma' https://duckduckgo.com/?q=prisoner%27s+dilemma&t=h_&ia=web and 'tit for tat' strategy
as Kickle's post suggests humans are more complicated than other species, so more complicated explanations may be required, that possibly include things like guilt, upbringing aka conditioning, ethics, morals, the culture and society in question etc.
for example, if I recall correctly, the Spartans had very different ideas from the Athenians in this regard although both were Greeks.
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


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greece today includes those kingdoms, it's like saying both the Scotts and the Americans are both British.
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laughingdog
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also as we all know much human behavior is NOT altruistic hence we have in religion the idea that "God is always watching you" this is an archetypal example of control by guilt
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laughingdog
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a complete theory would also have to account for sadism, torture, Nazi's and war and so on. Again these behaviors are human and not animal. Stanley Milgram's famous experiments as well as philip Zimbardo's attempted to address some of these questions
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Broly
eat more lsd



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Quote:
laughingdog said: also as we all know much human behavior is NOT altruistic hence we have in religion the idea that "God is always watching you" this is an archetypal example of control by guilt
It's not control by guilt , god created you.
Do you want to be with God who is love and mercy and or not be with God?
The choice is yours and don't even blame God , only a fool would blame God for anything.
-------------------- *Disclaimer* Everything written from this account are meant for amusement purposes ONLY. Everything written or posted from this account are NOT TRUE.
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