Altruism is a modern concept attributed to Auguste Comte, a French philosopher who founded the field of sociology in the mid-nineteenth century. The idea of altruism has antecedents in the early modern discussion of benevolence and in such ancient religious notions as Buddhist compassion and Christian agape. An important difference is the explicit focus in altruism on the other as the object of concern, which, in turn, reflects the sharper focus on the self that is characteristic of modern self-consciousness. For Comte, altruism identified the concern for others that he expected would characterize the positive religion of humanity that was destined to replace the false religion of the prescientific, theological, and metaphysical eras. Although Comte would have been disappointed with the extent to which altruism has actually flourished, his concept has become an enduring, if ambiguous, staple of modern Western understanding.

Altruism in biology and sociobiology

The notion of altruism has been accorded a significant role in biology, and especially in the refinements of sociobiology, where the term has a technical meaning that narrows the conventional sense of concern for others in terms of the biological concentration on reproduction. As, from a biological perspective, the point of life is reproduction, altruism acquires the meaning of actions that diminish the reproductive prospects of the altruist, while enhancing those of the recipient of the action. For biology and sociobiology, altruism represents something of an anomaly. Because evolution favors the development of inclusive fitness, altruism should have been selected out of existence. But it is firmly present, in the strictest biological sense, in whole classes of nonreproductive workers like ants and bees. Sociobiology has resolved this anomaly by defining altruism out of existence. What may look like altruism on the behavioral level may turn out to be decidedly selfish on the gene level if the recipient of the altruistic behavior is a relative of the putative altruist and so shares the same genes. The concept of kin altruism thus explains the sacrifice of reproductive prospects for those who share the same genes. Cases where the beneficiary has no identifiable relation are covered by the notion of reciprocal altruism. Here again, what appears to be altruistic behavior is really selfish because it is done with the expectation, genetically speaking, of reciprocal aid that may be required by the altruist in the future. The imperialism of selfish genes thus destroys any semblance of altruistic behavior at the biological level.

Altruism in social science and ethics

The assumption of the primacy of self-interest that dominates sociobiology has been questioned in the social sciences with research into altruism and helping behavior, and yet here too the self-interest assumption remains strong. The favored alternative to a self-interest reading involves a calculative or caring mutuality, for which expectations of altruism may be more detrimental than self-interest. Altruism represents a morality of service and self-sacrifice. Critics point out that such a noble and self-deprecating approach has often been expected of other people; even when its advocates have taken it seriously themselves, it can constitute an individualistic heroism that deflects attention and action from the real possibilities of mutuality inherent in the actual social relations in which people find themselves. Approaches as diverse as the justice procedures of John Rawls (which challenge one to imagine one is designing a society in which one does not know where one will be placed so that one will have to take into account the state of those on the lowest rungs of the social and economic ladders because one might be one of those people) and the alternative stance of feminist care morality (which sees a focus on individual moral action, even, and perhaps especially, the most heroic, as misguided neglect of the social relations of give and take that daily lives actually involve) agree on the superiority of social mutuality over allowance for, much less expectations of, altruism.

Limitations of the concept

Altruism does carry the liabilities of its origins. As a social concept, meant to counterbalance the excesses of self-interest, altruism is finally only intelligible in relation to the self-interest with which it is contrasted; it is concern for others, rather than what is taken to be the natural and virtually inevitable concern for self. Because it carries this legacy, altruism bears the liability of undermining itself through its own deliberateness. Deliberate focus on the other as the object of one's concern may represent an implicit interest in the self as the source of this concern—a consideration that prompted the nineteenth-century American writer Henry David Thoreau to allow that he would run for his life if he knew that someone was coming to see him with the deliberate intention of doing him good. It is this lack of attention and openness to the other that bothers many contemporary critics of the loss of mutuality in the focus on altruism. That such dangers warrant a dismissal of the whole notion, however, is another matter. Without the moral heroism that altruism entails, reliance on the mutuality of social relations may amount to a frightening leveling down of moral expectations and results. The saints, the philosopher William James contended, are the impregnators of culture, raising it to higher levels through their risking ways of living that hold no obvious benefit for themselves. The philosopher and ethicist Edith Wyschogrod has nominated altruists as the saints of secular culture.

Religious altruism

Suspicion of altruism may be a reflection of the secularization of contemporary culture, and the concept itself may be indicative of a lingering religious sensibility in Comte, who still expected a religion of humanity to develop. As such, it suggests that concern for others is finally only feasible through the deliverance from self that is offered by and celebrated in religion. This allows for the indirection that makes the aims of altruism possible, without the short-circuiting of a focus on altruism itself, and hence on the altruist. Of course, this in no way entails that devotees of religion exemplify the reality to which altruism points. Fortunately, religion also offers forgiveness along with the altruistic vision. This could represent the counsel of complacency that advocates of mutuality fear, but it could also represent the heroic initiative and extravagant saintliness that the realism of social mutuality threatens to undermine.

See also ANTHROPOLOGY; BEHAVIORISM; CHRISTIANITY; EVOLUTION; SELF; SELFISH GENE; SOCIOBIOLOGY

COLIN GRANT