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1. A note on terminology. In this entry the terms “egoism”and “altruism” are used for descriptive views about thenature of human motivation. Other authors prefer to call these views“psychological egoism” and “psychologicalaltruism” to distinguish them from “ethical egoism”and “ethical altruism,” which areprescriptiveviews about how people should behave.

2. Interpretation of historical texts is, of course, often less thanstraightforward. While there are passages in the works of each ofthese philosophers that can be interpreted as advocating psychologicalegoism, scholars might debate whether these passages reflect theauthor's considered option.

3. For example, Mill suggests instilling “hope of favor and thefear of displeasure from our fellow creatures or from the Ruler of theUniverse” (Mill 1861 [2001: ch 3]). Another proposal was toinstill a feeling of conscience:

a pain, more or less intense, attendant on violation of duty ….This feeling [is] all encrusted over with collateral associations…derived from…fear; from all the forms of religiousfeeling; from self-esteem…and occasionally even self-abasement.(ibid)

4. For more on the history and philosophical implications of the debate,see Broad (1930), MacIntyre (1967), Nagel (1970), Batson (1991: Chs.1–3), Sober and Wilson (1998: Ch. 9), and Dixon (2008).

5. At first blush, the complex definitions of altruism offered byKitcher (2010, 2011) seem rather different from the standard account.But those differences diminish when one focuses on the commentary andconditions Kitcher provides.

6. For a classic statement of this account of practical reasoning, seeGoldman (1970).

7. For further discussion, see Cialdini et al. (1997), Sober and Wilson(1998: ch. 7), Stich et al. (2010), May (2011a,b,c) and Slote(2013).

8. Similar concerns are discussed by Sober & Wilson (1998: ch. 7)and by May (2011c).

9. Whether the desire that someone else be harmed is ever anultimate desire is another, harder, question. For discussion,see Clavien and Klein (2010).

10. The authors are grateful to Prof. Schramme for some very helpfulcorrespondence on non-standard accounts of altruism.

11. Giving a more precise account of fitness would raise some of thedeepest issues in the philosophy of biology (see, for example, Beatty(1992), and Ramsey (2006)). Fortunately, for our purposes no moreprecise account is needed. The evolutionary notion of altruism can bemade more precise in a number of different ways (see, for example,Kerr et al. (2004), and Ramsey & Brandon (2011)).

12. Though most arguments in this area try to show that evolutionaryconsiderations make psychological altruism unlikely, Sober and Wilson(1998: Ch. 10) have offered an evolutionary argumentin favorof psychological altruism. For a critique, see Stich (2007); for aresponse, see Schulz (2011).

13. Schulz (2018) also combines the accounts of sections 2 and 3 to arguethat traditional altruism can be selected for on efficiency grounds.

14. For useful reviews of the literature see Batson (1991, 1998, 2011,2012), Feigin et al. (2014), Piliavin and Charng (1990), and D.Schroeder et al. (1995). Broadly speaking, this literature iscognitivist in its orientation. There is also some consideration givento the egoismvs. altruism debate in the behavioristtradition. For an insightful discussion of the relevance of literaturein that tradition to the philosophical debate, see Slote (1964).

15. In more recent work, Batson (2011: 11–20) distinguishes hisconception of empathy from a number of related psychological stateswhich other authors have labeled “empathy.”

16. Stotland’s instruction to imagine how the target feels, and avariety of similar requests, are often described as “perspectivetaking” instructions. In one way or another, they directsubjects to take the perspective of the target. Until recently, it waswidely accepted that perspective taking instructions increase empathy.But McAuliffe et al. (2018) present evidence that perspective takinginstructions may do little or nothing to increase empathy. Rather, itis theother instruction that participants in theseexperiments often receive—the instruction to “remainobjective” or to watch the target’s movements—thatlowers the level of empathy that subjects experience.

17. For overviews of Batson's research, see Batson (1991, 2011, 2015);for a detailed critique, see Stich et al. (2010).

18. This idea, which has been widely discussed in the social sciences,has venerable philosophical roots. InBrief Lives, writtenbetween 1650 and 1695, John Aubrey (1949) describes an occasion onwhich Thomas Hobbes gave alms to a beggar. Asked why, Hobbes repliedthat by giving alms to the beggar, he not only relieved theman’s distress, but he also relieved his own distress at seeingthe beggar’s distress.

19. Batson (1991), Part III provides a detailed account of Batson’searly work on the empathy-altruism hypothesis. Batson (2011), Part IIis a valuable update that responds to numerous objections.

20. The importance of this distinction in debates about altruism is notedby Slote (2013); the theme is developed further by May (2011b).

21. For further discussion of the Demjanuk case and of the moral andpractical importance of numerical identity, see Stich & Donaldson2019: Ch. 11.

22. Batson offers a very similar conclusion, including the SherlockHolmes quote, in Batson 1991: 174.

23. For some experimental evidence of the impact of religious beliefs,and thoughts about God, on prosocial behavior see Shariff &Norenzayan (2007), Shariff et al. (2016), Purzycki, Apicella, et al.(2016) and Purzycki, Henrich, et al. (2018). Fear of divine punishmentmay be more potent than hope for divine reward (Yilmaz &Bahçekapili 2016).

24. Recall that a parallel assumption, that people think social sanctionsfor not helping are more likely when the target engenders empathy, wasmade for the social punishment hypothesis.

25. It is surprising that the God’s punishment hypothesis, orsomething in that vicinity, has not been explored by Batson and hiscollaborators, since they have done quite a lot of work aimed atdetermining whether religious orientations of various sorts fosteraltruism. See for example Batson, Oleson, et al. (1989) and Batson,Schoenrade, et al. (1993). An intriguing conclusion of that work wasthat, among Christian participants, two common religious orientationsare associated with increased helping behavior, but “theunderlying motivation is egoistic.” The helping behaviorassociated with a third common religious orientation was consistentwith altruistic motivation, though alternative explanations could notbe ruled out (Batson, Oleson, et al. 1989: 882–883).

26. The context suggests that by “upholding justice” Batsonmeansacting in accordance with a principle of justice.

27. The term “action guiding principle” is borrowed fromFrankena (1967).