Question

a- How does an individualist (selfish) conception of human nature affect an economic system of thought?

b- Compare two authors/economist’s notion of the source of “Value” and weight out whose more right.

Answer 1

(a) How does an individualist (selfish) conception of human nature affect an economic system of thought?

The thought  that selfishness motivates human depends upon the view that selfishness is beneficial.

• People behave in such manner also varies from person to person.It is thought process and many external factors that affect the way an individual thought and  behave.

e.g - people who are selfless tend to have less money or time for themselves rather than people who protect their money and time have more money or time for themselves.

• Also in today's scnerio , the person with rational feelings or behaviour is considered dumb or less adventerous than the person who does things without being empathatic.
• Many times psychological well-being, physical health, and interpersonal relationships of the selfish person is also affected. And when shared resources are limited, selfishly taking shared resources hurts everyone in the long run, including the selfish person.
• Selfishness is not a genetic. It is a learned behaviour . Children are suppose to be selfish up to a point since they are learning from their environments. It's important to make them understand the thin line between selfishness and selflessness.
• Because individuals are part of a larger human community, their actions have unexpected or unintended consequences at the system level.
• Individuals take into account only their self-interest, yet their choices affect others and trigger a chain of interactions that eventually affect society as a whole, well beyond their original intentions.
• Strikingly enough, Smith argues that this spontaneous process does not lead to chaos but to harmony: Self-interest may not seem a noble motivation, yet it triggers consequences that benefit society even more than those arising from benevolence.