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Originally Posted by Carpe Mortem
Edit: Maybe it's a matter of defining altruism. In my eyes, it is a concept that does not exist. But I do think the 'fake' altruism sometimes exhibited is admirable enough.
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I think, in general, the differences are in the semantics of altruism. I agree, to some extent, that idealistic altruism doesn't exist, though it may crop up as a social construction. The problem, in terms of falsifiable observations, is that motivations can't be directly observed like behavior can, so altruism is defined behaviorally in a biology context. The means that the intrinsic value system is neglected.
This is an interesting problem to me. Imo, marketing and propaganda research and a model similar to Maslow's Hierarchy could help to make a rational concept out of internal value systems (really, we know that sex, money, and food are up there, but then there's more complicated social rules that emerge from social value systems like religion, law, and community).