[Antonello]

Ping just in case you're interested.

[aynrandfreak]

Oh, then it must not be virtuous.

[Iam1ru1-2]

altruism? All-true-ism? There is no truth at all to evilution. It takes a Neandrathal to believe it exists.

[sayfer bullets]

Well, then that settles it.

No more need for taxes.

[socialismisinsidious]

Here is the same story written by someone else:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1589430/posts


Interesting. I wondered on the other thread and again when reading this story: What must Peter Singer be thinking? Hopefully whatever it is it will cause enough of a conundrum to make his head explode.

[bvw]

Altruism may have evolved six million years ago in the common ancestor of chimps and humans, the study suggests

A conclusion that is a leap of faith. Religious in toto.

[Old Professer]

This was up earlier and all I can see is that it begs the term, altruism; supposedly this neutral researcher provided no rewards while staging very elaborate displays of clumsiness and a group of 25 18 month-old toddlers came rushing to the klutze's rescue.

What is carefully avoided as a control on the toddler's behavior is the first 17 months of their lives and the situations already experienced therein.

Who's to say the kids didn't expect a pat on the head?

[TWohlford]

John Galt speaks:


(clearing throat)

There is no such this as altruism. Dagny was right. Everyone has some reason for their actions, even if it is self-gratification, or to please God, or out of some sense of love.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Beware of altruism. It is based on self-deception, the root of all evil.
If tempted by something that feels "altruistic," examine your motives and root out that self-deception. Then, if you still want to do it, wallow in it!
Being generous is inborn; being altruistic is a learned perversity. No resemblance.

ROBERT HEINLEIN

[Myrddin]

Altruism and collectivism are the underlying tenets of socialism and communism. In this context the state mandates altruism and confiscates every resource from an individual until all that is left is disposing of an exhausted shell.

Leave it to the BBC to lionize a putrid concept and confuse it with a volitional act of charity.

[JCEccles]

Must be true. "Science" says so. Stay tuned for next week's offering of sappy, sloppy surmisings and mushy thinking from the darwinist priesthood.

[WestVirginiaRebel]

I think it's mostly learned behavior. Chimpanzees can be extremely violent towards one another and are highly territorial. Concepts like altruism are taught. The instinct of self-preservation is probably more what we're about, although we have the free will to choose to help somebody else.

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

"The moral cannibalism of all hedonist and altruist doctrines lies in the premise that the happiness of one man necessitates the injury of another."

AYN RAND

[6SJ7]

"...toddlers helped strangers complete tasks such as stacking books. Young chimps did the same..."

Dr Ray Stantz: Symmetrical book stacking. Just like the Philadelphia mass turbulence of 1947.
Dr. Peter Venkman: You're right, no human being would stack books like this.

[Graybeard58]

See also:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1589454/posts

[Socratic]

Doing something to stave off boredom or to learn smething new is altrusitic just because one interacts with another while doing it? I don't think so.

[Candor7]

Altruism? After you.

[gusopol3]

oh, for gosh sake, Life magazine was reporting on interspecies "altruism" around African watering holes 40 years ago.

[VOA]

In experiments reported in the journal Science, toddlers helped strangers
complete tasks such as stacking books.

Looks more like "primate see, primate do".

[Intolerant in NJ]

Now let them go to work on how my year old daughter can mimic so accurately the funny facial contortions I make for her sans mirror.....