Altruistic behavior often leads to desirable social outcomes. We can thus assume that more altruism is better than less, other things being equal. But altruism tends to be already widely encouraged, so efforts to promote it even further may produce little noticeable change. Instead, it might be easier to do more good by improving efficiency of the altruistic behaviors already in place.

Consider howstrange is the question posed by someone who wants a justification for altruism about such a basic matter as this. Suppose he and some other people have been admitted to a hospital with severe burns after being rescued from a fire. “I understand howmy pain providesme with a reason to take an analgesic,” he says, “and I understand how my groaning neighbor’s pain giveshim a reason to take an analgesic; but how doeshis pain giveme any reason to want him to be given an analgesic? How canhis pain giveme or anyone else looking at it from outside a reason?

This question is crazy. As an expression of puzzlement, it has that characteristic philosophical craziness which indicates that something very fundamental has gone wrong. This shows up in the fact that theanswer to the question isobvious, so obvious that to ask the question is obviously a philosophical act. The answer is that pain isawful. The pain of the man groaning in the next bed is just as awful as yours. That’s your reason to want him to have an analgesic.

Take any two persons, A and B, and suppose them the only persons in existence:—call them, for example,Adam andEve.Adam has no regard for himself: the whole of his regard has for its objectEve.Eve in like manner has no regard for herself: the whole of her regard has for its objectAdam. Follow this supposition up: introduce the occurrences, which, sooner or later, are sure to happen, and you will see that, at the end of an assignable length of time, greater or less according to accident, but in no case so much as a twelvemonth, both will unavoidably have perished.

ALTRUIZINE. A metapsychotropic transmitting agent effective for all sentient homoproteinates. The drug duplicates into others, within a radius of fifty yards, whatever sensations, emotions, and mental states one may experience… According to its discoverer, ALTRUIZINE will ensure the untrammeled reign of Brotherhood, Cooperation and Compassion in any society, since the neighbors of a happy man must share his happiness, and the happier he, the happier perforce they, so it is entirely in their own interest that they wish him nothing but the best. Should he suffer any hurt, they will rush so help at once, so as to spare themselves the pain induced by his. Neither walls, fences, hedges, nor any other obstacle will weaken the altruizing influence… We assume no responsibility for results at variance with the discoverer’s claims.

He who was ready to sacrifice his life […] would often leave no offspring to inherit his noble nature.

Curiously, peace-time appeals for individuals to make small sacrifice in the rate at which they increase their standard of living seem to be less effective than war-time appeals for individuals to lay down their lives.