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An essay on SELFISHNESS
An essay on SELFISHNESS
An essay on SELFISHNESS
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Moral Actions
Honesty and deceit. Compassion and Neglect. Benevolence and malevolence. All these represent the extremes in the spectrum of morality. From the general societal viewpoint, the former represents the attitudes which should be admired, rewarded and emulated, while the latter represents the attitudes which should be abhorred, punished and discouraged. Now philosophers, not being satisfied with leaving things well enough alone, endeavour to discover why this is so. Why do we admire acts of kindness? Why do we loathe acts of malice? It is generally thought that the crux of this question of morality has to do with the magnitude of selfishness accounted for in the acts and thoughts of individuals. If we can think of selfishness as an empirical property, honesty, compassion, and benevolence are acts and attitudes that involve much less selfishness than their moral opposites. This realization, of course, does not answer the question we are considering, it merely pushes it back one metaphysical level. So the revised question should be this: When is selfishness morally acceptable, and when is it not? Nietzsche, in proposing that selfishness is, in a sense, completely free of moral blame at all, comes to a conclusion that is completely opposite to the rest of the philosophers that we have studied. We shall see that Nietzsche is probably on the right track, and that selfishness is a faulty gauge of the morality of an action, and that morality is simply an illusory concept created by the individuals of society to prevent harm to themselves.
We have all seen it before. The African savanna. A cheetah. A pack of grazing gazelles. The cheetah stealthily approaches toward the pack of grazing gazelles. N...
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... of when selfish acts are morally permissible, we have first established that all sane actions are selfish in origin, and therefore, selfishness cannot be used as a measurement of morality. Secondly, the standard of morals which we use to gauge themorality of an action is based on our own selfish desire for personal power. As established by Nietzsche, actions done in the pursuit of personal power are natural, and therefore, from our own viewpoint, these actions are never objectionable. It is only when seen from another's perspective that these actions can be seen to be despicable because it threatens their personal pursuit for power. Therefore, the actions that others find objectionable are the actions performed by us that do not involve stealing personal power away from another. In this case, there is no definite set of morals that one can measure their actions to.
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, a German philosopher, believed there are two different moralities; master and slave morality. For Nietzsche, a morality is a set of value judgements. These moralities define a person not only by their actions, but how they handle these certain situations throughout their daily life. I believe Nietzsche chose these two moralities as they are strong opposites that are rational. The distinction between "master morality" and "slave morality" are easy to be misunderstand.
History plays a tremendous role in the present-day. Awareness of one’s history aids in understanding the significance of its effects. The Brown v. Board of Education case is a landmark in the history of the United States society and the judiciary system. It drastically affected education systems, the civil rights movement, and is known as one of the first cases to acknowledge social science results. This Brown v. Board of Education case took place over sixty years ago, and its affects continues to influence many aspects of today’s society, and more specifically today’s education systems. Despite its numerous accolades, it is still argued that Brown v. Board of Education failed to successfully accomplish its goal of desegregating
Is human nature inherently selfless or selfish? Although a seemingly simple concept, the aforementioned question has long been a profoundly controversial topic. While many claim that humans are intrinsically compassionate and inclined to help those in need, others argue that people instinctively prioritize their own individual security over other people’s welfares. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s literary works, “Young Goodman Brown” and The Scarlett Letter, as well as F. Scott Fitzgerald’s renowned novel, The Great Gatsby, all reference the idea that people impulsively pursue perfection, as determined by their community’s values. While different communities establish different standards for perfection, society as whole romanticizes the idea of perfection and subsequently people strive to create the illusion of a perfect life. How an individual represents the values idealized by a given community determines his/her reputation in that community. Although people may appear to wholesomely follow the values idolized by their community, in reality, human nature is inherently flawed, making it impossible for people to achieve perfection.
In 2002, 51,000 children were adopted through the foster care system. The federal government tracks the number of adoptions from the United States foster care system, and all of its international adoptions. It’s estimated that around 120,000 children are adopted by U.S citizens each year. Half of these children are adopted by individuals not related to t...
In Topeka, Kansas, a black third-grader named Linda Brown had to walk one mile through a railroad switchyard to get to her black elementary school, even though a white elementary school was only seven blocks away. Linda's father, Oliver Brown, tried to enroll her in the white elementary school, but the principal of the school refused. Brown went to McKinley Burnett, the head of Topeka's branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and asked for help. The NAACP was eager to assist the Browns, as it had long wanted to challenge segregation in public schools. Other black parents joined Brown, and, in 1951, the NAACP requested an injunction that would forbid the segregation of Topeka's public schools (NAACP).
"Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U.S. 294 (1955)." Selected Historic Decisions of the US Supreme Court. Legal Information Institute, 1999. 12 Dec. 1999. href="http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/cases/historic.htm">http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/cases/historic.htm
...ruled that they would monitor school boards until they showed plans towards full compliance and followed those plans.
Brown versus the Board of Education in Topeka, Kansas was perhaps the most renowned cases of its time. The thirteen plaintiffs on behalf on their children filed a class action lawsuit against the district in order for it to reverse its policy of racial segregation. One named plaintiff, Oliver L. Brown, an admired African American member of his community, complained that his young daughter had to walk six blocks to the bus stop to attend her all black school, while the white school was closer. After the victory, The Board of Edu...
Patterson, James. Brown v. Board of Education, A Civil Rights Milestone and its Troubled Legacy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.
This event was impacted by the Brown vs. Education case. The town of Little Rock Arkansas was one of the most clean, pretty, and quiet cities of the United States in the late fifties. All citizens that had lived there took an abundant amount of pride in their town for its aesthetic atmosphere and peaceful cleanliness. Previous to the events that changed the lives of nine students, as well as, the race relations in America; Little Rock was a town where there was very little tension. “Negroes and whites, for many years had lived si...
Since violent video games, like Mortal Kombat, were created, adolescents who play these games become more aggressive than before. To me, playing violent video games is unsafe for these people since they have the negative influence on these people. I believe that researching on that topic would help us get the sense of what problems to avoid. I wish to know what are the possible effects of violent video games on adolescents’ aggression. The independent variable is violent video games, and the dependent variable is adolescents’ aggression. My hypothesis is that adolescents who play violent video games become very aggressive than those who don’t. For this essay, I would like to present the findings from each article that will answer the topic I selected.
One of the fastest growing sectors in the United States economy, with sales over six billion dollars in 2012 is the video gaming industry ("Games: Improving the Economy’). Technical innovation has given the video industry power to create exciting realistic worlds, turning video games into the vast entertainment business that it is today. Setting sales records, Violent Video Games (VVG) are now a common staple in many households. One of the most argued topics in media studies, investigation on the impact violence has on society from mass media continues to rage on. Parents look to the media for reliable studies to confirm or distinguish the effects VVG has on children. Even more menacing than violence on television or in movie theaters, VVG have created enticing graphic worlds created to slaughter fellow players. Modern video games allow players to take an active role within the game. Enticing players to engage in realistic assault scenes that are meant to be entertaining. Worthy playing is then rewarded with: trophies, bonus points and extra lives.
Selfishness is one of the most common personality traits shared amongst society, Kenneth Grahame’s literature features the theme of how making rash decisions can lead to dramatic effects to those around you.
This is an act based on maximizing one’s own utility, even if it is merely in his own mind. To those for whom morality and helping the greater good is important, altruistic acts exist even it is within the category of selfish acts. Thus, Hobbes’ theory concerning actions based solely on self-serving motivations is not truly complete.
Egoism is a teleological theory of ethics that sets the ultimate criterion of morality in some nonmoral value (i.e. happiness or welfare) that results from acts (Pojman 276). It is contrasted with altruism, which is the view that one's actions ought to further the interests or good of other people, ideally to the exclusion of one's own interests (Pojman 272). This essay will explain the relation between psychological egoism and ethical egoism. It will examine how someone who believes in psychological egoism explains the apparent instances of altruism. And it will discuss some arguments in favor of universal ethical egoism, and exam Pojman's critque of arguments for and against universal ethical egoism.