I am new to this forum, though some of my friends are here, and they keep updating me about the work and the discussions.
This question has been on my mind for a long time; they suggested that I make it a post.
In my understanding, altruism is being completely selfless, which means that we do not possess anything, as we are not selfish enough to generate wealth or say something to belongs to us.
If nothing belongs to me, then how can I give?
Going by the basics of economics, especially capitalism, any wealth created is arbitrage, as energy is neither created nor destroyed; we only make a belief that there is some value addition, and we charge for that. So, when we create wealth, we take from others, and now we are going to give back; this can be philanthropy, and there can be no altruism in this, as by being selfish, we create wealth.
The above post involves Philosophy, Psychology, and economics, and we can delve much deeper into this. I would now rest with the basic paradigm and wait for this to open up further to take the discussion forward.
If you find some unused ground, plant some seeds, grow flowers, cut the flowers, and make a beautiful bouquet, what did you “take from others”?
Lots of wealth is not “zero-sum” like you describe, but creates new value/beauty/usefulness from thin air and sunlight.
Wealth creation is not inherently bad. In fact if it improves average quality of life around the world (which has happened overwhelmingly since the Industrial revolution) then it’s overwhelmingly good.
It is our perspective to see something as useful, beautiful, or otherwise.
A forest is beautiful in the eyes of an animal, or some of our natural humans.
The mass of the world does not change from the time it is created, it is only the perspective that has changed, with Industrial revolution, we have lost the nature and converted it to the so called useful things, and as we all know, energy can neither be created nor be destroyed, it is naturally a zero sum game.
While energy cannot be created or destroyed at the level of the universe, this doesn't mean it's a zero sum game from the perspective of life on Earth. There is a huge amount of energy available in the form of atomic energy, solar energy, tidal energy etc that is simply going unused. If humans use this, no-one loses out.
Useful or otherwise from the perspective of an Individual, even before the first human being appeared, all vegetables, fruits, and the rest of the resources were there; do we call it a waste?
We don't because we were not there?
Even if human beings cease to exist, all this will continue. Is it not just our perspective? Why do we think everything is around us?
I agree that we shouldn't only care about the perspective of humans. But if humans aren't around then much of the potential energy on Earth will simply go unused (unless another technologically advanced species evolves or visits Earth from elsewhere). So yes, this would be a waste.