We all know the argument that profit motive is part of human nature is false. Yet I’m still not sure why capital owners pursue profits. Is it the difference of self-interest vs collective interest? If so then wouldn’t that enforce the argument on human nature? Or am I missing a crucial aspect of the Capitalist system? I’m genuinely wondering.

Edit: Sorry for not being able to answer all of the comments, the blocklist of my instance sadly won’t let me see all of the comments.

  • The thing to understand is that there is a feedback loop between social structures and the way people behave within a particular society. Capitalism creates pressures that select for particular types of behaviours. Then people who become successful under this system ensure that it continues working in their favor.

    The mistake is to extrapolate that behaviours people exhibit within the capitalist system are intrinsic to human nature. It’s akin to assuming that juggling is a natural elephant behaviour based on seeing a juggling elephant in a circus.

    This is an excellent essay on the subject incidentally https://www.jamesherod.info/Getting_Free.pdf

  • I do think that motive towards profit is indeed part of human nature. Denying so dehumanizes capitalists and hence alienates them, which isnt very productive in the study of capitalism given that they are just humans. Shitty humans most of the time, but humans nonetheless.

    That is also to say that even with an element of profit motive as part of human nature, its existence as such (in the form of a desire) doesnt justify its constant exercise and normalization on a grand societal, collective scale.

    To your second question, Yes, I do believe that capitalistic pursuits are purely from selfish and self-preservative motive, with a skrewed perception of the idea of “survival of the fittest”, it is a desire to build a small empire of your own self. The only reason a capitalist may grow their scope of the share of capital is because they need people to collaborate with them in their pursuit of acquiring capital, and people wont collaborate without their own self interest being met. In that sense, a capitalist, however empathatic they may be, “tolerates” their workers to atleast some degree and will never be able to see them as their equals. The workers are just that, workers. A part of the capitalist’s machine that is expendable at will.

    • Semi-related, this fantastic talk (mainly about racism) makes a great point on how systems we participate in (often not being able to not participate in them!) can make certain characteristics of our psyche more pronounced than they would otherwise be.

      tl;dr when playing Monopoly, it’s very easy to be greedy, as that’s what the system of the game promotes.

      Same with capitalism.

    •  vxnxnt   ( @hamborgr@feddit.de ) OP
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      31 year ago

      So profit motive is a part of our nature but the Capitalist system tends to bring forth and immensely intensify this characteristic beyond any sort of reason? Perhaps greed shouldn’t be confused with the pursuit of profit here. Thanks for explaining, I think I have a better understanding of it now!

        •  vxnxnt   ( @hamborgr@feddit.de ) OP
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          11 year ago

          For me, there is no way ethical justification other than to avoid to collapse of the business so that the workers don’t lose their jobs. However, profits in a Capitalist system may be well justified by the capital owners as they are often used to stay competitive. But then again the whole system is entirely unethical and unjustifiable.

  • The capital parasites get told that they win when they get profits. It’s propaganda. The goal of propaganda is manipulating the human mind. Normally, humans hate being a parasite, so they have to be manipulated.

      • To my knowledge, profit only exists in systems that produce commodities to be sold in markets. While markets predate capitalism, they were largely optional. In capitalism, there is no choice but to participate in markets and commodity production.

        If a society does not produce commodities, there is no profit. If there is no profit, there can be no profit motive. The profit motive cannot be a part of human nature because it was absent from almost every human society that ever existed.

        The profit motive may not be a part of human society once it develops beyond capitalism, either. Even in the transitional Soviet Union and China, which had/has a form of state capitalism (depending on who you ask and how they define it), their planned economies undermine commodity production and made/make inroads into profit. In these two examples, the profit motive did/does not drive the state.

        Even in capitalism proper, it is only the capitalists who seek profit. By definition, profit is what remains after paying wages and overheads. Some workers benefit from profit. These are labour aristocrats and petit bourgeois. But on the whole, workers are not motivated by profit.

        There is no way that the profit motive is part of human nature if: most human societies were not driven by profit; the vast majority of workers living within a system driven by profit do not seek profit; and states that move away from commodity production in a world governed by profit try to live according to other motivations.

        If you were asking about why capitalists, specifically, are profit seekers, I’m happy to go into that.

        • When we make a statement like “profit motive isnt a part of human nature”, I think we need to distinguish between human instincts that are a product of isolated individual academic instincts and introspecions vs the kind of instincts and motive that are inspired in an individual by a system that takes a grand scale.

          I say that because it is quite obvious by empirical means that a profit motive does exist in the human occupational pursuit, whatever the source of its existence may be, and hence i believe that its existence and its association to capitalism and other forms of economic system need to be considered and realized as an axiom before developing a dialogue on the issue.

            • Im speaking from a psychological perspective, even if a motive is a result of a sociological condition, it still exists and has a legitimate psychological base for its existence. Which directly implies that its part of the human nature and nothing alien to it.

              We can make an argument that it is an immoral part of the human nature, but denying its very existence and association serves no purpose.

              • Then I’m afraid we’re talking at cross purposes. I was talking about profit as a political economic category. I wasn’t making and moral claims when I said that the profit (and so the profit motive) only exists where commodities are produced.

                I thought the OP was also asking about profit as a political economic category, because this is the sense in which the word would be used when asking, to paraphrase, ‘why do capitalists seek profit if the profit motive is not part of human nature?’

                • The issue begins when bringing in the “Human Nature” in the field and use it as a starting point to study capitalism. How do we assess the human nature if not psychologically? Whether it is philosophical or scientific psychology.