Let’s start with Psychological Egoism. Psychological Egoism is a descriptive theory that claims all people are selfish. In fact, Psychological Egoism claims more than that; it says that all people are always selfish in all of their actions. Why? Because whatever a person does, they are doing it in order to satisfy some desire that they have; they are doing it because they have some interest in achieving the result. “But what about a person who risks his/her own life to save another?” someone might object. Well then, the Egoist will respond, that person obviously would not have done so unless he/she desired to do it. Maybe the person is hoping for some sort of reward or recognition. Or, if nothing else, maybe the person just desires the good feeling he or she will get by saving the other person, or to avoid the guilt feelings that might result from not helping. Whatever the desire, it is obvious (says the Egoist) that the person is performing the action because of some desire that he/she wishes to satisfy. It is simply a matter of psychology: the person’s limbs wouldn’t move if some part of them didn’t want them to. Thus, even Jesus, dying on the cross in order to save the world, was selfish, because some part of him wanted to do it. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have allowed it to be done.
Ethical Egoism, on the other hand, is a prescriptive theory which says, not only is everyone, by nature, selfish, but everyone SHOULD be selfish. The argument for Ethical Egoism goes something like this:
Psychological Egoism is obviously true; that is, all people are, by nature, selfish in all of their actions.
The Principle of “Ought implies Can” is also true; a moral command that commands the impossible is vacuous (i.e. empty). Moral commands must not demand impossible things. If we are going to claim that a person ought to do something, it must be possible for them to do it.
But Psychological Egoism claims that all people are, by nature, selfish in all of their actions. What, therefore, are we to say about any moral command that tells people that they should NOT be selfish? The answer: if a moral command demands that a person be unselfish–which is, according to Psychological Egosim, impossible–that command is vacuous.
In other words, if Psychological Egoism is true, any moral theory that tells people that they should behave altruistically (that is, unselfishly) is unreasonable because it is telling them to act in a way that is not really possible to act. Therefore, the only reasonable moral theory is Ethical Egoism, which tells us that we SHOULD be selfish, because it is the only moral theory that is compatible with human nature.
In this way, Psychological Egoism–the claim that all people are always selfish–combined with the Principle of “Ought implies Can”–the claim that an impossible command is an empty command–leads to Ethical Egoism, the claim that all people should be selfish, always.
Now, for thousands of years, many people have found this line of reasoning persuasive. Ayn Rand is the best known modern writer who defends this view, but we can find it being discussed even in the writings of Plato 2500 years ago. Believers see psychological egoism as a realistic view of human nature, and ethical egoism as the only true morality. Elsewhere on this blog I discuss the problems with psychological egoism as a scientific theory of human nature. In this entry, I want to discuss how the argument presented above in fact commits the fallacy of equivocation; or, if it doesn’t, then its conclusion becomes vacuous in its own way.
First, let me explain what Equivocation is. Equivocation is a fallacy in which an arguer uses a key term in two different ways, invalidating the argument. Here is an example (taken from Patrick Hurley’s “Concise Introduction to Logic): “Banks have lots of money in them. The sides of rivers are banks. Therefore, the sides of rivers have lots of money in them.” This argument, obviously, equivocates on the word “banks;” the word is used in one sense in the first premise but in another sense in the second premise. A person who does not know what the words mean might think this is a good argument, but a person who does will easily see that it is invalid.
To see that the argument for Ethical Egoism commits the same fallacy we just have to think about how the word “selfish” is being used at the beginning of the argument and at its end. At the beginning of the argument, Psychological Egoism claims that the word “selfish” means something like “to act on your own interests,” or “to attempt to satisfy your own desires.” Based on this definition, the Egoist argues that ALL human actions are selfish, because in ALL human actions, people are attempting to satisfy some desire that they have. Indeed, it soon becomes clear that it is not even possible to imagine an action that would be unselfish–according to this definition–since even those actions which we would normally think of as unselfish were performed because the persons wanted to do them. As I said before, even the action of a person who sacrifices his/her own life in order to save another can be interpreted as selfish, given this definition, because that person desired to do so.
But now consider how the Ethical Egoist uses the word “selfish” at the end of the argument. It is clear from the writings of Ayn Rand, for instance, that not all behavior is selfish, in the sense that she wants. Her writings are filled with condemnations of those who do not behave in a properly selfish fashion. She and other Egoists want, in other words, to be selfish in a more restricted sense: to be concerned with one’s own interests without concern for the interests of others. This is, in fact, closer to the way the word “selfish” is normally understood. But the problem is that the argument for this conclusion began with a DIFFERENT definition of the word selfish, and it claimed, crucially, that Ethical Egoism was the only reasonable theory BECAUSE it was the only theory compatible with human nature.
To be precise: at the beginning of the argument, “selfish” was defined as “being concerned with one’s own interests.”
At the END of the argument, “selfish” was defined as “being concerned ONLY with one’s own interests.”
Thus, the argument equivocates: the key term in the argument subtly shifts its meaning from one point to the next. But if it does, then the argument is invalid.
IN case this is still not clear, one might think of it this way: suppose the argument DOESN’T equivocate. Suppose that, at the end of the argument, the word “selfish” is being used in exactly the same sense that it is at the argument’s beginning. If that is the case, what will its conclusion amount to? The answer: its conclusion will become completely vacuous. But in this case, the vacuity is not because its conclusion is impossible; rather, it will be because the word “selfish” has been defined in such a way as to include any conceivable action.
Remember, Psychological Egoism–as I’ve already said–defines “selfish” to mean something like “acting on one’s own desires.” And again–as I’ve said–it becomes apparent that any action you can imagine can be interpreted, according to this definition, as selfish, because no one would ever do anything if some part of them didn’t desire it.
Well, if any action whatsoever can be interpreted as selfish, and if Ethical Egoism is using the word “selfish” in exactly the same way, then what does the claim, “You should be selfish,” amount to? It amounts to “do whatever you want to do,” and since any action you could possibly perform is, by definition, something you want to do, the command essentially becomes “Do whatever you do.”
In other words, the claim that all people should be selfish becomes a claim that is empty because it makes no distinctions between good or bad actions. IF ALL ACTIONS ARE SELFISH, by definition, then the command to be selfish becomes a command that is meaningless.It would, in fact, be impossible for a person not to obey the command, since anything they do would be considered selfish in some way.
Thus, in conclusion, the argument for Ethical Egoism, based on Psychological Egoism, either equivocates, in which case it is invalid, or if it doesn’t equivocate, its conclusion is morally empty, because it makes no distinction between actions.
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