Table Of Contenta dvance praise for
pathological altruism
“What a wonderful book! Th is is one of the few books in evolutionary biology
I’ve read in the past ten years that taught me something completely new. It
demonstrates how medicine, biology, and evolutionary theory can be brought
together to illuminate an important part of the human condition.”
— Edward O. Wilson
Pellegrino University Research Professor Emeritus and Honorary Curator
Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University
“Be careful what you wish for’ might be one way of summing up the take-home
message of this strikingly original book, highlighting the fact that ‘more is
not always better’ when it comes to either being the altruist or the recipient of
altruism.”
—J ay Belsky
Professor of Psychology, Birkbeck
University of London
“A hugely valuable and important contribution to a strangely neglected area of
both individual psychopathology and our thinking as a society—a book that
deserves to be very widely read, and should inform and stimulate discussion not
just in psychiatry and psychology, but in our culture at large.”
— Iain McGilchrist
Former Fellow, All Souls College, Oxford
Author of Th e Master and His Emissary
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“While other-regarding actions are rightly deemed the moral alternative to self-
ishness, and while a new biological science of generosity shows that such proso-
cial actions are in general associated with fl ourishing and health in the agent,
there is always the problem of a good thing going bad. Barbara Oakley and her
colleagues have addressed the dark side of altruism, for the altruistic personality
can be manipulated by nefarious ideologies and overwhelmed by excessive
expectations, can ignore the due care of the self and be unwise in its application.
Pathological Altruism surveys the dark side of a human capacity that is
otherwise one of our saving graces. In this regard, altruism, hope, forgiveness,
creativity, purpose, and so many positive human assets can easily be distorted.
It is good to have such discussions available.”
— Stephen G. Post
Director, Center for Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care, and Bioethics
Department of Preventive Medicine, Stony Brook University
Editor, Altruism and Health: Perspectives from Empirical Science
“Pathological altruism? Sounds like an oxymoron, but this fascinating book
quickly convinces you that altruism can go seriously mad and bad. Th e great
breadth and quality of contributors to this book from psychiatry, psychology,
and philosophy—and that’s just the ‘P’s’—shed light on the dark side of our
evolutionary propensity towards altruism, which can be subverted to a wide
range of pathologies such as survivor guilt, drug co-dependency, personality
disorders, and eating disorders. When within-group altruism is exploited to
between-group hostility, it can lead to suicide martyrdom and genocide.”
— Robert Plomin
MRC Research Professor and Deputy Director
Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre
Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London
Past-President of the Behavior Genetics Association
Author of B ehavioral Genetics (now in its 5th edition)
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pathological altruism
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A new perspective regarding altruistic actions and their consequences.
Image © Kevin Mendez-Aracena and Barbara Oakley
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pathological
A L T R U I S M
EDITED BY
Barbara Oakley
Ariel Knafo
Guruprasad Madhavan
David Sloan Wilson
FOREWORD BY
Francisco J. Ayala
1
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1
Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further
Oxford University’s objective of excellence
in research, scholarship, and education.
Oxford New York
Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur
Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto
With offices in
Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy
Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam
Copyright © 2012 by Barbara Oakley, Ariel Knafo, Guruprasad Madhavan, and David Sloan Wilson
Published by Oxford University Press, Inc.
198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016
Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior permission of Oxford University Press, Inc.
Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this volume are those
of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the organizations they represent.
—The Editors
______________________________________________
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Pathological altruism/Barbara Oakley . . . [et al.].
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978–0-19–973857–1 (hbk.)
1. Altruism. I. Oakley, Barbara A., 1955–
BF637.H4P38 2011
155.2’32 — dc22 2010041920
______________________________________________
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
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To the late Fred Preston
Whose contributions to this volume are sorely missed
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faust: All right — who are you, then?
mephistopheles: Part of that force which would do ever evil, and does
ever good.
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Description:The benefits of altruism and empathy are obvious. These qualities are so highly regarded and embedded in both secular and religious societies that it seems almost heretical to suggest they can cause harm. Like most good things, however, altruism can be distorted or taken to an unhealthy extreme. Pat
