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Selfishness is being concerned excessively or exclusively for oneself or one's own advantage, pleasure, or welfare, regardless of others. "Selfish" , Merriam-Webster Dictionary, accessed on 23 August 2014 Selfishness – meaning, reference.com, accessed on 23 April 2012 Selfishness is the opposite of or selflessness, and has also been contrasted (as by C. S. Lewis) with .C.S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy (1988) pp. 116–17


Divergent views
The implications of selfishness have inspired divergent views within , , , , and contexts. Some early examples of "selfist" thinking are the philosophies of in and of in . Yangists followed the teachings of and might have been influenced by . , founded by Aristippus of Cyrene, were skeptics and (but perhaps nominally Greek ). , who could also be viewed as selfist, was a but also advocated loyalty to a strong government and . The views of Friedrich Nietzsche and provide a more proximate link to the modern selfists.


Classical
joined a perceived majority of his countrymen in condemning those who sought only to profit themselves; but he approved the man of reason who sought to gain for himself the greatest share of that which deserved social praise.Aristotle, Ethics (1976) pp. 301–03

Seneca proposed a cultivation of the self within a wider community—a care for the self which he opposed to mere selfishness in a theme that would later be taken up by .G. Gutting ed., The Cambridge Companion to Foucault (2003) pp. 138–


Medieval/Renaissance
Selfishness was viewed in the Western Christian tradition as a central —as standing at the roots of the seven deadly sins in the form of pride.Dante, Purgatorio (1971) p. 65

carried forward this tradition when he characterized “Wisdom for a man's self...as the wisdom of rats”.Francis Bacon, The Essays (1985) p. 131


Modern
With the emergence of a commercial society, Bernard Mandeville proposed the paradox that social and economic advance depended on private vices—on what he called the sordidness of selfishness.Mandeville, The Fable of the Bees (1970) pp. 81–83, 410

with the concept of the saw the economic system as usefully channelling selfish self-interest to wider ends.M. Skousen, The Big Three in Economics (2007) p. 29 , along with Adam Smith, was a key figure in early classical liberalism: an ideology that champions notions of and . These core themes inevitably relate to the concept of selfishness. Locke, for example, sought for people to exercise "self-government"—the idea that an individual should make his/her own decisions. This inherent right would allow individuals to pursue self-interests, rather than suffer the burdens of any altruistic obligations. Thus, unlike political ideologies such as , Locke and other classical liberals believe that selfishness is engrained in human nature. Locke arguably opened the door for later thinkers like to argue for selfishness as a social virtue and the root of social progress.P. L. Nevins (2010). The Politics of Selfishness pp. xii–xiii Ayn Rand held that selfishness is a virtue.

(1964). 9780451163936, Penguin. .

Roman Catholic philosopher opposed the latter view by way of the Aristotelian argument that framing the fundamental question of politics as a choice between altruism and selfishness is a basic and harmful mistake of modern states. Rather, cooperation ought to be the norm: human beings are by nature social animals, and so individual persons can only find their full good in and through pursuing the good of the community.

(1973). 9780268002046, University of Notre Dame Press.


Ecology
In , species sometimes would cooperate each other, which could be considered as a mutualistic behavior. But species choose to have mutualistic behaviors, because the mutualistic behaviors could provide them more benefits to fit in the environment, which ultimately is a selfishness behavior. For example, animal cooperation exists in wild dogs community. They hunt together for large mammals easier. During the hunting, each individuals would have specific roles, like chase the prey toward a cliff and make other individuals easy to hunt.

In , species understand the intensity of in nature, which requires a degree of selfishness in order to gain limited resources and survive to reproduce.


Selfism
The term "selfism" was used by in his 1977 book Psychology as Religion: The Cult of Self-Worship to refer to any philosophy, theory, doctrine, or tendency that upholds explicitly selfish principles as being desirable. The term is usually used .. Vitz deconstructs the selfist movement(s) and tries to uphold -centered altruism, and claims that all of modern-day and are essentially selfist at their core. He lays the blame predominantly at the feet of , , and other prominent psychologists of the third quarter of the 20th century (c. 1950–1975 CE).

Explicit selfishness as a desirable end and moral good had diverse manifestations during that period, for example, in the writings of , , and even among some of Rand's near-opposites, such as Erikson and Fromm. Rand called her philosophy . Later popularizers of similar positions include Nathaniel Branden, , , , and David Kelley, among others. None of these named the system they espoused "selfism" or characterized it as "selfist", although both Seabury and Rand included the word "selfishness" in the titles of books presenting their views. Many of these figures were pro- (" capitalists"), but Seabury was a , while Erickson and Fromm were prominent .

, founder of the Church of Satan and author of The Satanic Bible, acknowledges and as a source of inspiration for . This form of Satanism holds the above all else in similar fashion to Objectivism. Despite some similarities, they remain separate entities, as there are clear differences between the two concepts.


Psychology
Lack of has been seen as one of the roots of selfishness, extending as far as the cold manipulation of the .D. Goleman, Emotional Intelligence (1996) pp. 104–10

The contrast between and selfishness has become a conflictual arena in which the respective claims of individual/community are often played out between parents and childrenR. D. Laing, Self and Others (1969) pp. 142–43 or men and women, for example.

favor the development of a genuine sense of self, and may even speak of a healthy selfishness,N. Symington, Narcissism (1993) p. 8 as opposed to the self-occlusionTerence Real, I Don't Want to Talk About It (1997) pp. 203–05 of what called "emotional surrender".Adam Phillips, On Flirtation (1994) p. 98


Criminology
Self-centeredness was marked as a key feature in a phenomenological theory of criminality named "The Criminal Spin" model. Accordingly, in most criminal behaviors there is a heightened state of self-centeredness, that differently manifests itself in different situations and in different forms of criminality.Ronel, N. (2011). “Criminal behavior, criminal mind: Being caught in a criminal spin”. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 55(8), 1208–33


See also

Further reading
  • A Theory of Justice (by )
  • The Evolution of Cooperation, Robert Axelrod, Basic Books,
  • The Selfish Gene, (1990), second edition—includes two chapters about the evolution of cooperation,
  • The Virtue of Selfishness, ,
  • David Seabury. The Art of Selfishness (1990, 1971).
  • Paul Vitz. Psychology as Religion: The Cult of Self-worship (2nd ed., Eerdmans, 1994, original ed., 1977) (W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., Grand Rapids, MI)


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