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Single Idea 3263

[filed under theme 22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / f. Altruism ]

Full Idea

If no one's life has any meaning in itself, how can it acquire meaning through devotion to the meaningless lives of others?

Gist of Idea

If our own life lacks meaning, devotion to others won't give it meaning

Source

Thomas Nagel (The View from Nowhere [1986], XI.2)

Book Ref

Nagel,Thomas: 'The View from Nowhere' [OUP 1989], p.217

A Reaction

This is one of the paradoxes of compassion. The other is that the virtue requires other people to be in need of help, which can't be a desirable situation.

The 16 ideas with the same theme [placing the concerns of others before one's self]:

1590 The just man does not harm his enemies, but benefits everyone [Plato]
90 All altruism is an extension of self-love [Aristotle]
3553 Stoic morality says that one's own happiness will lead to impartiality [Stoic school, by Annas]
6244 Human nature seems incapable of universal malice, except what results from self-love [Hutcheson]
3926 The human heart has a natural concern for public good [Hume]
3717 Reverence is awareness of a value which demolishes my self-love [Kant]
3720 We may claim noble motives, but we cannot penetrate our secret impulses [Kant]
4185 Altruistic people make less distinction than usual between themselves and others [Schopenhauer]
14831 No one has ever done anything that was entirely for other people [Nietzsche]
7205 Altruism is praised by the egoism of the weak, who want everyone to be looked after [Nietzsche]
4505 How can it be that I should prefer my neighbour to myself, but he should prefer me to himself? [Nietzsche]
5316 We undermine altruism by rewarding it, but we reward it to encourage it [Wilson,EO]
5318 Pure hard-core altruism based on kin selection is the enemy of civilisation [Wilson,EO]
3263 If our own life lacks meaning, devotion to others won't give it meaning [Nagel]
21830 For Darwinians, altruism is either contracts or genetics [Flanagan]
9781 Tolerance and love are strategies to avoid encountering our neighbours [Zizek]