Arguments for Ethical Egoism

1. Altruism is self defeating – if we try to be our “brothers keeper” we will often make mistakes do do more harm than good. Mind your own business. Charity is degrading.

(1) We ought to do whatever will best promote everyone’s interests.

(2) The best way to promote everyone’s interests is for

each of us to pursue our own interests exclusively.

(3) Therefore, each of us should pursue our own interests exclusively.

We know our interests best. –vs – sometimes mother knows best

Robs them of privacy. – not always butting in

Demeaning – not demeaning to feed a hungry child

2. Ayn Rand’s Argument - it. Altruism, she thought, leads to a denial of the value of the individual. It says to a person: Your life is merely something to be sacrificed. All these remarks are part of a single argument that goes something like this:

(1) Each person has only one life to live. If we value the individual, then we must agree that this life is of supreme importance. After all, it is all one has, and all one is.

(2) The ethics of altruism regards the life of the individual as something to be sacrificed for the good of others. Therefore, the ethics of altruism does not take seriously the value of the individual.

(3) Ethical Egoism, which allows each person to view his or her own life as having supreme value, does take the individual seriously—it is, in fact, the only philosophy that does.

(4) Thus, we should accept Ethical Egoism.

The choice is then made to look obvious by depicting altruism as an idea that only an idiot would accept. The ethics of altruism is said to be the view that one’s own interests have no value and that we must be ready to sacrifice ourselves totally whenever anybody asks us to. If this is altruism, then any other view, including Ethical Egoism, will look good by comparison.

But that is hardly a fair picture of the options. What we called the commonsense view stands between the two extremes. It says that one’s own interests and the...