ASEBL Journal – Volume 13 Issue 1, January 2018
Yet even this combined definition does not provide necessary or sufficient criteria for altruistic behavior. I might intend to give someone a gift that benefits the recipient without behaving altruistically by violating the social norms of gift-giving. If I am under the impression that the attendees of some party are bringing small gifts, and bring a small gift myself, it is possible that I will bring a disproportionately small gift that will stand out as cheap and ungenerous.
I might also fail to understand how gift-giving, the etiquette of which depends on context, is done appropriately in a foreign culture: someone who comes to many Western cultures, for example, might be surprised that his gift of paper money is received strangely at a party where other guests bring wrapped gifts. Someone who brings expensive non-Kosher meat into a religious Jewish person’ s house is likely to offend that person, even if her intentions in bringing the gift are generous. In many cases giftgiving will not be considered altruistic, for example if a gift is given only out of etiquette-following; it is the intention attributed to the giver, either because of the generosity of the gift or the manner in which the gift is made, that determines whether the act of giving is altruistic.
In these situations – or in any similar example – it is possible that I both intend to act altruistically and have a positive effect on a recipient without behaving altruistically. This possibility suggests a flaw in the approach all three definitions take to providing necessary or sufficient criteria for altruistic behavior.
One must also have practical understanding of how to behave altruistically: my knowledge of appropriate execution of actions directly influences how my behavior is perceived. This is similar to Wittgenstein’ s( 1953) discussion of understanding, where he argues that an individual does not understand a pattern only because she is able to continue it, but because of the social circumstances under which she is learning to follow the pattern. The learner understands only when her ability to follow the pattern is recognized by others, and her ability to reproduce the pattern is alone insufficient for her saying“ I understand how to go on.”
A similar argument is valid for altruistic behavior: an agent must understand how to apply the rules of gift-giving appropriately within a particular set of circumstances. One should bring a gift appropriate for the party one is attending: a boat is an inappropriate gift for a 10-year old’ s birthday party, and yet perhaps not inappropriate from one world leader to another. The person who brings expensive meat to a religious Jewish person behaves altruistically only if she recognizes the customs the person practices.
Learning the nuances of gift-giving is contingent on understanding a culture and the practical rules thereof; the claim that altruistic intention and positive effect are together necessary or sufficient for altruistic behavior is, therefore, unsound.
V. Altruistic behavior as a signal
The preceding arguments suggest that the criteria determining whether a behavior qualifies as altruistic are distinct from intention and effect. For a behavior to be altru-
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