ANB

Right there: True feelings.

So to you, "love" doesn't count as a" true feeling"...?


WTF,

1-Selfishness is a taboo, kind of like raping an infant or beating an old lady to death. Your saying that all human traits like greed and piety and selfishness are just abstract patterns and none weigh more than the other...?

So by your logic, a man who gives 20 million dollars to an orphanage is no better than a man who takes adantage of the orphan's inheritance :/

2-Duh women give birth because they "want" to. They WANT you to experience the joys of this world and they WANT to hold and love you!

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Halcyon

That is selfish. Now let me go beat some people over the head with a pipe and take their wallets. I don't WANT to, but I need to do this to survive.

ANB

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Majuub

So, I suppose when you hear on the news a random guy saved a little girl he didn't know, he did it because he wanted her to be like her, or maybe it's because she gave him love even if he didn't know her at all. The truth is, it's true we make a lot of selfish actions, but sometimes we sacrifice ourselves for the other without thinking of the consequences.

Sometimes, parents are completely against what their children want to do in their life, but still, they accept it sooner or later and love their children regardless even if they aren't what they wanted them to be.

When you loved someone because that person loved you in return and that person dies, do you still love that person even if that person isn't there anymore to give you love? Yes, you still love that person even if you only retain memories about that person when that person was alive.

I don't think it's THAT simple, we can't just say we do absolutely everything just for ourselves, if it was really the case, we would still live in caves. We as a society must work together in order to advance, we do it for the survival of our race, it's perfectly normal, if we don't work together we'll just die and be an endengered specie, nature didn't create any specie selfish enough so that specie would die just by that flaw.

When you see a little boy was awfully murdered on T.V. and you hear the criminal just got 6 years of prison, you say to yourself: Damn, that isn't enough, that man is a monster, he should be put in a cage like an animal cause that's what he is. You feel sorry for the victim and sometimes people are shocked and even take actions to stop violence towards a certain group of people, does that mean these people do that just for them? No. They accomplish a noble goal, sure, it makes them feel better but that's not the point of taking actions, the point is to make the world better for EVERYONE and not just for us. A lot of people are concerned by the future of the earth and pollution, some groups like greenpeace are heavily involved in environnemental acts. They do everything they can to help the earth get better even if the know they won't be there anymore to see it getting better. Some of them have no children and won't ever have children, do they make this for theyselves? No they don't, we are a sociable specie as I mentionned earlier, if we don't work together in order to better ourselves we'll just die.

I agree a LOT of what we do is purely selfish but not everything, otherwise the word sacrifice woud have no meaning. I just don't get why people try to turn ''love'' the most beautiful of all feelings, into something useless and purely selfish. Geez, think long before you say that, think about yourself and think about other people. If we love only for oursleves then anyone would be replecable and we know it isn't the case. Sometimes you lose someone and you remember that someone all of your life and no one can take his place.

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Kaio

Right; except when they benefit us, but only because they benefit us do we care about them and vice-versa.

No. . . but we all have the same, basic instincts and emotions.

In return, recognition is received.

Again, recognition and it worked, apparently. I wonder what went through their mind when they felt the pain of the fire? Possibily: "Oh, fuck, I shouldn't have done this" or "It hurts, but at least I'm going to make a difference (and/or go to Heaven)".

Why isn't a legitimate reason? For the sake of achieving pack domination (destroying the imperialists and infidels), they're sacrificing themselves for the sake of recognition, and a ticket to the ultimate zone of self-satisfaction.

No one's forcing you to participate in this thread.

Did your amnesia kick in when you read the rest of my post(s)?

Nope.

Exactly; an opinionated view invented by society.

They are what you want them to be. They're just words and interpretations of things.

Possibly; maybe that same donater obtained that money by taking advantage of forced slaves? Corporations like McDonalds do it all the time for positive reputation.

. . . For their own enjoyment.

. . .Or for recognition and conscious easement.

Not always; some parents are immature/ egotistic about it; sometimes their children become criminals or scrubs.

You acknowledge that the person made you happy, but do you really, ultimately care about their well-being? Or just whether they're there to make you feel better? People forget about the deceased either in certain ways or almost entirely and move on for the sake of survival. If someone you loved deceased, and was cloned, you wouldn't even tell the difference.

Exactly; each person realizes that they can all serve themselves much more by working together; organisms with no brains, such as most insects work together out of complete instinct, yet they don't have the capacity to "love" each other or care. It's instinct.

It can be many kinds of emotions and instincts, mixing together. Expressing your anger towards the crime also expresses conformity and the desire of recognition or perhaps even command over the "pack" (against the criminal or assuring that you must care about that person towards others). Caring about the person alone assures yourself on conformity of the norm of the pack, or feeling guilty that you couldn't save that person or that the same fate could overcome you someday.

For a way of pleasure for their life, for a purpose, for recognition, and maybe even because they see the Earth and humanity as an extension of themselves. I'm willing to bet that if their lives depended on ruining the environment to a large scale that would spoil it for everyone else but not large enough where they wouldn't be able to live the rest of their life, they'd do it, unless they believed in an afterlife reward.

. . .But you can survive without them, right? You may not be able to obtain the same amount of enjoyment from them as before, but you can still survive, or find alternative ways to further your survival even if you're sad that you won't receive that kind of enjoyment anymore.

Lord_Sloth

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Majuub

No offense but, these are not answers at all. Someone won't just think: I'll save that person so I get famous and everyone will love me, seriously, post real answers.

When you see your friend getting punched in the face, will you go and defend him, even if that doesn't make you feel better. I already see you coming and say you helped him because he would have done the same for you and to even thing is a way to feel better. The clone part is crap, it doesn't make any sense at all and you know it. A clone isn't the same person, the clone won't be the exact same copy, only the appearance will be identic, nothing else will be. Why do you offer a present to your girlfriend, isn't it to make her happy, unless you're going to tell me making her happy also makes you happy, if it's the case than that's the whole point of love. You want to love and to be loved. Don't tell me it isn't a wonderful feeling to love.

Tigers are solitary, they don't work together, still that's basic instinct. You have to aknowledge there are sociable animals and lone animals. When you see a pack of wolves, it's because they know working together is better for them, it has nothing to do with instincts, if it was from basic instinct then you wouldn't see lone wolves.

I call that common sense, in any society you think awful to just kill a kid. The part of emotions mixing together is pure speculation. Finding something awful has nothing to do with recognition.

You really have an issue with recognition do you? Some of them hate to clean dirty lakes, some of them are pissed of by the idiocy of others. Don't just say it's the same for everyone, you would have to study about 1,000,000 people to have a clear cut answer of what you think. You can't just speculate because you've read some books or because you are like that. All human beings are different, we have things in common but we are all totally different.

So, going by your logic, we have to be dependent of somone in order to be not selfish towards that person. Of course you can survive without that person because we are all independent beings. You really seem to think all we do is selfish. I got a little piece of information for you, there is two sides in one coin. There is to love and to be loved, you can't love without being loved and you can't be loved without loving. Each side is dependent of the other. We have to love in order to survive, others have to love us in order to survive. We're no cavemen, everything doesn't work by basic instincts.

Honestly, I think most of our actions are selfish, but not all. You have a pesimistic view of the world, it's good for you. I don't try to be positive or negative, I try to balance everything, I view the world just as it is, I just try to see right in the middle. Not good nor evil just between them.

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Kurushimi

Kaio, I have to say that is a rather pessimistic view of the world. I'm no optimist myself but to simply deny that anyone would do anything completely selflessly is simply wrong.

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~ xkcd

Jonny America

Actually... I totally agree. Think about it; if you never felt bad for that cause, would you have donated money? If you didn't think people would hate you if you didn't, would you rescue a drowning dog in the river? And even if it wasn't people hating you, could you deal with the guilt if you didn't? You do everything for you, direct or otherwise.

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Kurushimi

People don't help other people to avoid feeling guilty or being criticized (Well, some do. But that's their problem >_>.)

I don't even know why I'm arguing this. To claim that no single human is capable of unselfish acts is just close-minded, seriously. All the time, somone helps another person, expecting nothing in return. Even, sometimes, putting themselves in discomfort.

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~ xkcd

ANB

Likewise.

And if humanity is that bad Kaio, I guess we may as well start abandoning our families and doing whatever the f*** we want. Let's rape old ladies and bomb third world countries. After-all,

Society told me it was wrong to have sex with my mother. Well I say f** society and I guess I should do just that, lol.

...

In case you haven't noticed, Kaio, I think you're an idiot.

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Jonny America

You're not understanding my example. What I'm saying is this; if you truly did not give a shit about this person, you would not do anything. It is because of your empathy that you do good deeds. You do these actions to satisfy your empathy, or your worries for t