The Best Criticism of Ethical Egoism

Stephen Leach gives you an unbiased reason why you shouldn’t be selfish.

- Stephen Leach

At least sometimes we ought to do what is in our own best interest. However, ethical egoism makes the radical claim that our only duty is to do what is in our own best interest. In other words, we ought to be selfish! 

Ethical egoism doesn’t say that we ought to avoid all actions that help others. It says that what makes these actions right, when they are right, is that they are to our benefit. So, if I should help someone else, this is only because doing so would be good for me; and if I should refrain from harming someone, again, that is only because doing so is to my benefit. So, for example, if I find a dropped wallet, then if I am an ethical egoist, I would have good reason to keep it, even if I know to whom it belongs. That person may well be harmed by my action; but that, in itself, is no good reason not to keep the wallet, since I will benefit from keeping it. The same is true of anything else: Help people in poverty? Feed the starving? “Only if there’s something in it for me,” the egoist responds. (Note that the theory says that we should be guided by self-interest, not that we always are.)