> I think you misunderstand altruism. Let's see if we disagree. > Altruism is primarily about whether your motivations are driven by the welfare of others, or

> I think you misunderstand altruism. Let's see if we disagree. > Altruism is primarily about whether your motivations are driven by the welfare of others, or by the welfare of yourself. That's basically what I said, so I'm not wrong about altruism. The remaining question is whether folks who don't appear to maximize their expected monetary return are typically altruistic. Consider an econ professor vs a strategist at a hedge fund. The econ professor has a much less stressful life. She's got interaction with students, etc. Some people value those things more than they do the chance at an extra $500k/year. > "Never confuse non-monetary rewards for no rewards." That has nothing to do with altruism. It doesn't matter if a person is receiving a "non-monetary reward", in the form of a sense of fulfillment, or in satisfaction. The claim was that folks who aren't receiving monetary rewards are necessarily/mostly altruistic. I pointed out that they're often receiving non-monetary rewards. It's not clear whether you're saying that someone who does something for non-monetary rewards is being altruistic, but if you are, you're wrong. (Consider working for apples, or so you can live some place that you like.) > Your "envy driven versus greed driven" argument is still one of the most peculiar things What's odd about it? People who are concerned about how they're doing relative to other people behave differently than people who are concerned solely about how they're doing. Yes, it's possible to "implement" greed by taking from others, but that's seen as bad. For the envious, that's seen as good.