Alan G Isaac wrote: >The difference has been clear and unclear to many people. >In my opinion, it was settled by Joseph Butler >(Fifteen Sermons upon Human Nature. Charlottesville, VA: >Ibis Publishing, 1987(1726).) > >In his refutation of psychological egoism, he noted that the >distinction between my self-interested desires and my other >desires does not disappear just because they are both *my* >desires. You have not faced two related questions: >what is the nature of this satisfaction (i.e., >self-interested or not), and why might the man get >satisfaction from making such a gift? Hurray for citing Butler, who is far more important in the history of this controversy than is generally recognized. But he gets to the real issue. The "homo oeconomicus" is arrived at by creating a false dichotomy: either altruism OR self-interest. And since a pure altruism is easy to knock down, that leaves only self-interest. But this is not the case; there is no necessary conflict between self-interest and concern for others (although there can be many actual conflicts). Indeed, a pure altruism is neither possible nor desirable, but a pure self-interest would simply be pathological. To give another example, a man's "love-utility" is not increased quantitatively by having a harem, but qualitatively by learning to love one woman more intensely. But this intensity is not of the sort that can be subject to mathematics. That consideration gives us the nature of the satisfaction, it is qualitative rather than quantitative. Here is where utilitarian philosophies and economics go wrong, because they confuse quantity and quality. Quantity is only a means to an end, an end that is always qualitative. A person seeks a raise (quantity) only because it represents an improvement in the quality of life; it is a means, not an end. When pure quantities are sought for their own sake, it becomes, as Aristotle noted, a example of "unnatural exchange," an exchange that has no natural use or point. John C. Medaille