The Importance Of Self-Interest

Self-interest refers to one’s benefits and advantages. People only want what they want or needs and claimed about others. The psychological egoism describes the human nature and states how we actually act in reality. Based on egoism, every act of human is selfish. With so much debates, it is natural to hear people suggesting that human actions are inspired by merely personal wills, while there are also critics attributing all actions to self-interest. This essay will argue that self-interest is not the only component of human behaviours, but also moral considerations and actions. This will be asserted by manifesting how people’s performance are related to psychological elements other than self-interest, and proving that self-interest is not

It is because the social ethics in society influence people’s thinking before committing the action. The social behaviour is entrenched with moral that people will consider whether the reposes ethically and emphasised towards society. Rachels (2010) argued that psychological egoism is false on completing an action is not one’s own desire but what people feel that they ought to do. For instance, a teacher asked the students to submit a thousand-words essay before the deadline, the students may not want to finish their homework but they still have to hand in the essay or they will fail the course. Since the students understand the consequence of overdue homework, they will still finish it on time. Doing homework is not what students desired but they feel like they ought to do it. It proves that what people can do is completely different to what people want to do. Hence, not all human actions are based on one’s own desire that obtained by

It maybe true to admit economic activities take self-interest as the major motivator. Admittedly, people engaging in economic activities are just seeking for personal gains, or simply self-interest. They apply for jobs and get employed because they want to earn money to buy the daily necessities. Also, people would like to equip themselves by studying in universities, and hence gain insight into the industry in order to have their salaries increased. This action is attributed to self-interest from which people can receive the greatest benefits. However, people are not just motivated by their own benefits, there are still many other factors, such as, providing financial support to family members who do not have ability to live alone, namely children and elderly. This action is considered as altruistic since the adults are trying to satisfy the needs of their parents or