Seeing that today marks the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, I feel it appropriate to post an essay regarding the need for and benefits of altruism. The events of ten years ago should remind us of the destructive power that a few misguided individuals can exert over innocents, as well as the unity that we as humans can experience as we put aside differences to confront tragedy.
Last year at Christmastime, the team at Planet Money put together a podcast called Why Economists Hate Presents, and How 7th Graders Solved the Problem. The economists' premise is that when we give a gift to someone, the money we spend on the gift may be wasted or partially wasted because the person would not have spent that money on that item themselves, meaning that its potential for bringing them satisfaction or utility is sub-optimal (this is the same principle that makes the employer-sponsored health care idea relatively wasteful and inefficient). Anyway, to test out how to solve this problem, this team of journalists visited a 7th grade classroom in Brooklyn and randomly handed to all the students different snack items, such as Sour Patch Kids, Reese's peanut butter cups, raisins, and fig newtons. They then asked the students to rate the gifts on a scale of 1 to 10 to determine how much they enjoyed them. When the number was added up for the entirety of the students, it totaled 50 points.
They then asked the students how more of them could get what they actually wanted, since some had complained that they hated the gift they'd received (ungrateful of them, but not unrepresentative of human nature). After only a few seconds of thinking, one student came up with an idea: let them trade with each other. So they allowed the students a few minutes to trade, and at the end, when each student rated his or her new item, the total jumped to 82. Now, this was not a perfect scientific experiment (since the thrill of getting something new may have impacted the students' scores the second time), but the point is that by allocating the same items to different people, you create aggregate happiness. Satisfaction and utility--which are relative terms depending on who is perceiving them--can increase by simply using a market economy instead of a command economy. (http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/12/27/132288035/why-economists-hate-presents-and-how-seventh-graders-solved-the-problem)
What does this have to do with altruism? In a sense, charity and selfless service are commodities to exchange in a market economy. If it takes me very little effort to help someone with their groceries, but to their perception it is of great benefit to their well-being (such as psychologically, in brightening their day), then I have created aggregate satisfaction. I have given up something of little value to me (a few seconds of time, a few calories of energy) and the other person has received something of comparatively greater value. Of course, this is a tricky proposition to make, because the economy of altruism often feels like the Prisoner's Dilemma: it is better for our personal self-interest to act selfishly, but better for both of us if we both act altruistically. Also, we don't know if others will act selfishly, thus harming us for our altruism, so acting selflessly means taking a risk.
But the risks of trust, cooperation, and collaboration bring great rewards. We can see this on an economic scale by comparing humans to other forms of life who do not engage in activities of market exchange or reciprocity. Overwhelmingly, humans benefit from giving something away of little value in return for something that they perceive as being of greater value (and usually, this is true of the other party as well). If I grow wheat and you catch fish, then my surplus wheat is of less value to me than some of your fish, and vice-versa, so we trade. As far as service and cooperation are concerned, though, we have to turn to a sociological and evolutionary reading of this subject. As human societies have progressed through time, we have interacted with more and a greater variety of people, and established institutions to facilitate exchange--dialogue, trade, ideas--between all of these people. Societies have become more tolerant of those outside the mainstream, and even broadened the definition of insiders to include more people as time has gone on (and this process is far from over). Additionally, we have evolved in the direction of cooperation, with society subconsciously selecting those individuals who are less aggressive, less physically powerful (i.e., smaller nails and teeth), and who retain adolescent traits (anything from docility to possibly skull shape--look at a fetal chimp's skull sometime) far into adulthood.
In essence, our societies and bodies have evolved to become less self-centered--less able to survive and dominate on our own strength alone--and more community-centered--more able to think, reason, allocate, and communicate. That is not to say that altruism is the only possible path for modern humans: the powers of reason and communication can be used to further selfish purposes as well as altruistic ones (or simply self-beneficial ones like invention and innovation). And this is one of the principal challenges we face in our day: finding a balance between our own self-interested needs and the needs of those around us that require our altruism (or an altruistically designed economic incentive; see Dean Karlan's book More Than Good Intentions for examples of altruistically designed incentives used in fighting poverty). Since we cannot be assured that our service will be returned, since there is not as of yet a mathematical or scientific calculation for the ripple effects of our deeds coming back to benefit us later, altruism can seem like a bottomless pit into which we pour our good intentions.
In fact, some political philosophies claim that altruism is pointless, and that humanity's only rational course is for each individual to pursue his or her direct interests, to the exclusion of others' interests or concerns. While these philosophies do reflect the reality that rational beings are best at calculating and acting upon their own self-interest, they ignore the panoramic view of the economy of altruism. If I work to benefit the lives of others, I benefit the entire human race--myself included. For example, if I as an educator pour my effort into teaching a teenage boy academic discipline and character, I may make a difference in his life so that he becomes a responsible professional when he reaches adulthood. As a responsible professional, let's say for the sake of argument that he also becomes an educator, and ends up teaching one of my sons in school. While I do desire to teach my son discipline and character, this grown man who was once my student can perhaps teach my son in ways that I could not, thus enhancing my son's education. This advances my own goals of educating and training my son--goals which were less likely to have been met if I had not “altruistically” spent so much effort helping my own student in times past.
This example relies, of course, on an unlikely coincidence, but its principle holds true: what one person does to altruistically benefit the world does, in some fashion, come back to benefit him or her later. Our inability to calculate the impact of altruism does not negate its utility. And in this sense, altruism can be seen as self-interested, faith-based investment in others. We believe that we are building up the entire human race by building up someone else, hoping to see our investment come to fruition at a later time. Yet even for those who do not consider altruism an investment, service provides its own reward. By feeling like we are part of a community, by increasing our gratitude and perspective on what we possess, and by reaching out to benefit others, we not only learn more about ourselves, but we strengthen our character and enrich our own lives. We perceive that which we have as being of greater value to us, and can find greater satisfaction in living.
Altruism makes sense. While we must take precautions not to allow the conniving to exploit our altruistic intentions, this should not quench the altruistic spirit that we either evolved or were imbued with by our Creator (or both). Altruism is the hallmark of humanity, and while we may not be unique among Earth's creatures in possessing it, we would never have achieved such remarkable feats as we see around us without it. Regardless of your political or religious views, from atheist to Muslim or from anarchist to socialist, altruism makes us who we are--and will end up benefiting us more than short-sighted selfishness, paradoxical though it seems.
