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Selfish Dog!

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UlrikeSE
Is there an action that isn't selfish in some manner?

A aid worker gives a loaf of bread to a child. Some would view this as an unselfish and good action. Good it is! But unselfish?

She must of derived some pleasure from the handing the child the food, which is possitive input from her own possitive output. If she derived absolutely no pleasure from possitive output, and believed nothing could possible come from providing the food to the child, would she continue? I don't believe so. I don't believe anyone would do anything if it didn't provide them with something, material or otherwise.

You could argue, "I know some folks who give even when it's hurts themselves!" Exellent point! But does it really hurt them where it hurts though? Sure if they take money from their pocket when they have little, but does it really HURT them? They must derive some pleasure from providing, and if they did, wasn't that "in-a-way" selfish?

Maybe the word selfishness was only ever valid for "knowing" of it's presence in an action? I don't know, heh.
ocalhoun
How about when Jesus died on the cross?
UlrikeSE
You could argue, even if Jesus existed, he was never REALLY human and something far beyond it.

Or, that he derived some pleasure from saving humans from their sins. You would have to acknowledge that Jesus was level with humans as far as emotions go first, and since human emotions are the most falable and fickle structure ever imagined, well...
Indi
UlrikeSE wrote:
You could argue, even if Jesus existed, he was never REALLY human and something far beyond it.

Or, that he derived some pleasure from saving humans from their sins. You would have to acknowledge that Jesus was level with humans as far as emotions go first, and since human emotions are the most falable and fickle structure ever imagined, well...

Aw, you don't even need to be that subtle. ^_^ Apparently, God wants us to be saved - as many of us as possible. Jesus' sacrifice makes that possible, because apparently our sins cannot be forgiven without someone being punished for them. So Jesus suffered the penalty for our sins so that he (and God) could get what they wanted - souls who can enter heaven because their sins have been forgiven.

So to make it brief, Jesus died on the cross to get more souls in heaven. It was not a selfless act.
ocalhoun
Ah, I knew someone would help me prove my point: Which is,
If you look hard enough, you can find selfish motivation in any action, but that does not mean that the person did it becauseof that motivation.
UlrikeSE
ocalhoun wrote:
Ah, I knew someone would help me prove my point: Which is,
If you look hard enough, you can find selfish motivation in any action, but that does not mean that the person did it becauseof that motivation.


I could argue, and I will, that it was the selfish motivation that caused the action soley and everything else happened as a result. It certainly doesn't mean the person was aware of the selfishness. We aren't aware of most of the things we do on a very constant basis.

I'm suppose i'm just trying to say that it's the slightest unoticable breeze that hit the first domino. The whole process of the action (input, output, result) is like a Rube Goldberg machine, the selfishness is the tiny metal ball that starts rolling. Or..OR...the quick slice of the tiny atom that starts the atomic explosion! Whaha, I could go on.
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