ĭz`əm), concept in philosophy and psychology that holds that the interests of others, rather than of the self, can motivate an individual. The term was invented in the 19th cent. by the French philosopher Auguste Comte Comte, Auguste , 1798–1857, French philosopher, founder of the school of philosophy known as positivism, educated in Paris. From 1818 to 1824 he contributed to the publications of Saint-Simon, and the direction of much of Comte's future work may be attributed..... Click the link for more information. , who devised it as the opposite of egoism egoism , in ethics, the doctrine that the ends and motives of human conduct are, or should be, the good of the individual agent. It is opposed to altruism, which holds the criterion of morality to be the welfare of others.
..... Click the link for more information. . Herbert Spencer Spencer, Herbert, 1820–1903, English philosopher, b. Derby. He projected a vast 10-volume work, Synthetic Philosophy, in which all phenomena are interpreted according to the principle of evolutionary progress.
..... Click the link for more information. and John Stuart Mill Mill, John Stuart, 1806–73, British philosopher and economist. A precocious child, he was educated privately by his father, James Mill. In 1823, abandoning the study of law, he became a clerk in the East India company, where he rose to become head of the
..... Click the link for more information. , English contemporaries of Comte, accepted the worth of altruism but argued that the true moral aim should be the welfare of society, rather than that of individuals.
altruism
Ethical theory that regards the good of others as the end of moral action; by extension, the disposition to take the good of others as an end in itself. The term (French, altruisme, derived from Latin alter: “other”) was coined in the 19th century by Auguste Comte and adopted generally as a convenient antithesis to egoism. Most altruists have held that each person has an obligation to further the pleasures and alleviate the pains of other people. The same argument holds if happiness, rather than pleasure, is taken as the end of life.
altruism
Altruism
a moral principle of behavior; the readiness to unselfishly sacrifice one’s own interests in favor of the interests of another.
The term altruism was introduced into ethics by the French philosopher A. Comte as the opposite of egoism. The principle of altruism can be traced to ancient eastern moral concepts; it was formulated in Christianity as “love thy neighbor as thyself; during the 17th and 18th centuries it became a component of most ethical doctrines—the works of Shaftesbury, Hutcheson, A. Smith, J. Rousseau, and others.
In the history of the moral consciousness of mankind altruism has had a twofold significance. On the one hand, from the time of the breakup of primitive communes, it expressed the norms of reciprocal aid in personal relationships, opposing the influence of private ownership interests and other social tendencies which divide people, and shaped men’s consciousness in the spirit of unselfish devotion to one another. Altruism has retained this meaning in bourgeois society, where it takes the forms of private philanthropy and personal services.
On the other hand, every attempt to present altruism as a route to the transformation of an antagonistic society on nonegoistic principles led ultimately to ideological hypocrisy, masking the antagonism of class relations. Under socialism altruism has meaning primarily in personal relationships; it is inadequate when people serve “. . . not ‘those who are close to them’ but ‘those who are removed from them,’ i.e., society as a whole . . .” (V. I. Lenin, Poln. sobr. soch., 5th ed., vol. 39, p. 22).
O. G. DROBNITSKII
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