the reason for life

Originally posted by humy
you left out the compassion part of that; Why? There is nothing selfish about compassion.

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/altruistic
"...showing a wish to help or bring advantages to others, even if it results in disadvantage for yourself: ..."

Bearing in mind it is NOT done just purely to 'feel good'; (why do you ignore the existence ...[text shortened]... uistic? Why cannot there be good feeling with being altruistic? There is no contradiction there.

I'm not suggesting a zero sum value to compassion.
I am claiming there exists a desire to cheat, to deceive, to steal... or, if exchange rates are amenable to all parties, to trade.
No more, no less.

It ain't a bad thing.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH

I am claiming there exists a desire to cheat, to deceive, to steal... or, if exchange rates are amenable to all parties, to trade.
No more, no less.

You seemed to be claiming more than that obvious with;

" ...not once in my time on the planet have I ever met anyone who did not act according to their own self-interest.
Ever...."

I should also add that people often don't only fail to act in self-interest for honorable reasons, such as out of compassion, but because of dishonorable reasons, such as delusions, stupidity, blind hatred, and even insanity. Think 9/11 where the terrorists had the delusional belief they would achieve martyrdom for some kind of 'afterlife' for committing atrocities; they may have thought they were acting in self-interest, but they weren't. They did something far worse than merely die for nothing.

Originally posted by humy
... they may have thought they were acting in self-interest, but they weren't.

And there is the rub. In a similar discussion with divegester he essentially argued that 'self interest' is defined as acting the way you choose to act thus all actions that are not forced are 'self interest'. But I find such a definition to be contrary to what most of us would mean by the phrase.
The idea that because someone chose to act altruistically he was therefore helping himself achieve a goal (acting altruistically) and thus being selfish is just petty word games.

Originally posted by humy
You seemed to be claiming more than that obvious with;

" ...not once in my time on the planet have I ever met anyone who did not act according to their own self-interest.
Ever...."

Everything you've said agrees with what I am contending.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Everything you've said agrees with what I am contending.

I don't see how. The meaning you give to the word 'altruistic' is clearly different from what most other people including I give it.
Both I and most people would say people that do charity are generally being 'altruistic' .
It is, depending on circumstances, also possible to be both selfish and altruistic at the same time; the two often not being mutually exclusive. Being kind partly to help maintain one's own personal sanity is a possible example of that.

Originally posted by humy
I don't see how. The meaning you give to the word 'altruistic' is clearly different from what most other people including I give it.
Both I and most people would say people that do charity are generally being 'altruistic' .
It is, depending on circumstances, also possible to be both selfish and altruistic at the same time; the two often not being mutually ex ...[text shortened]... ive. Being kind partly to help maintain one's own personal sanity is a possible example of that.

It is impossible to do good without some measure of benefit for the act toward oneself.
No matter what situation or scenario which could be imagined--- even in situations wherein the do-gooder forfeits their lives--- a measure of benefit is seen as desirable to the actor...
otherwise, they wouldn't act.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
It is impossible to do good without some measure of benefit for the act toward oneself.
No matter what situation or scenario which could be imagined--- even in situations wherein the do-gooder forfeits their lives--- a measure of benefit is seen as desirable to the actor...
otherwise, they wouldn't act.

There are situations where that does not enter. One time on vacation in Canada with my kids, we passed a big rig truck on its side and we stopped to look. I saw the driver pinned down inside with broken seats on him and he was pressed in there like a pretzel. There were these idiots standing around looking dumb. I looked at it and saw fuel dripping from the fuel tank. I immediately saw at least the possibility for a big fire with 50 gallons of fuel.
Without thinking I climbed up the side of the truck cab, very large looking when on its side, and saw that if I broke the drivers window I would get broken bits of glass all over him. So I climbed up and dangled my legs inside the cab and kicked out the window from the inside, pulled up the seat pinning him down and he was able to escape his prison.

We left before cops would show up, and there was not one second of thought of some kind of reward, I did it because it needed to be done to save a fellow human. That was ALL I thought, ZERO reward in that situation.

My wife saw me in a bit of a new light that I would do something like that (dumb, perhaps, putting myself in danger, but that didn't occur to me either).

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
It is impossible to do good without some measure of benefit for the act toward oneself..

nonsense.
But even if that was hypothetically true, as I said, you can be both selfish and altruistic at the same time; the two often not being mutually exclusive.

Originally posted by ogb
The reason for human life is to advance our knowledge of science. Especially on the quantum level.
All other endeavors are worthless., except for chess.

The purpose of life is to live and experience life. Anything else is just semantics.

Originally posted by caissad4
The purpose of life is to live and experience life. Anything else is just semantics.

Hi Caissad, just as an aside, I wondered what your OTB rating is, you have an exceptionally high rating here, is it anything like that OTB? I played over your game, just the one?, with Vandervelde and it was a draw, but you had the exhange. Was there a reason for the draw or was that just team related? I know he had the past pawn and could have gotten the B to protect it probably but was that the reason for a draw? I think you are not using engine, that game was way too human🙂 So thinking you are for real, I have always wondered what the OTB ratings were for non engine users as high as you, in the 23's. Forgive ne if I seem too nosey. My OTB rating is pretty bad, only about 1750 and I sometimes get that high here but mainly live in the 16's.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
It is impossible to do good without some measure of benefit for the act toward oneself.
No matter what situation or scenario which could be imagined--- even in situations wherein the do-gooder forfeits their lives--- a measure of benefit is seen as desirable to the actor...
otherwise, they wouldn't act.

When you say 'desirable to the actor' you apparently mean 'the actor desires to act in that way', whereas that is not the usual meaning of such a phrase. One can easily desire to act in a way that is not beneficial to the actor. In addition, as has been pointed out, many actors simply do not act based on desires but out of preprogrammed instincts.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Hi Caissad, just as an aside, I wondered what your OTB rating is, you have an exceptionally high rating here, is it anything like that OTB? I played over your game, just the one?, with Vandervelde and it was a draw, but you had the exhange. Was there a reason for the draw or was that just team related? I know he had the past pawn and could have gotten the B ...[text shortened]... g is pretty bad, only about 1750 and I sometimes get that high here but mainly live in the 16's.

My OTB rating is 2045. It has been as high as 2159.
My USCF id is 11106111. (Number 2 in the over 60 crowd (womens) in the US)
For a long time I played 700 to 800 games at a time but now my gameload is under 100.
I also have several databases now.

Originally posted by sonhouse
There are situations where that does not enter. One time on vacation in Canada with my kids, we passed a big rig truck on its side and we stopped to look. I saw the driver pinned down inside with broken seats on him and he was pressed in there like a pretzel. There were these idiots standing around looking dumb. I looked at it and saw fuel dripping from the ...[text shortened]... mething like that (dumb, perhaps, putting myself in danger, but that didn't occur to me either).

"Without thinking."

You sure?

Originally posted by twhitehead
When you say 'desirable to the actor' you apparently mean 'the actor desires to act in that way', whereas that is not the usual meaning of such a phrase. One can easily desire to act in a way that is not beneficial to the actor. In addition, as has been pointed out, many actors simply do not act based on desires but out of preprogrammed instincts.

When the actor is behaving in a manner in which others or, even, his own rationalReveal Hidden Content

at least as others would call rational

self would call the opposite of beneficial for the actor, he is doing so on the basis of belief that some greater value is being obtained.