"Charity may not be a rational activity. So perhaps what they were measuring was not selfishness, but rationality."
What grounds do you have for thinking that charity (and presumably altruism in general) is irrational? Are you assuming that only self-interested actions can be rational?
There could be an element of self-interest in poor people's support for charity:
> They found that both real lower-class participants and those temporarily induced to rank themselves as lower class felt that a greater share of a person’s salary should be used to support charity.
They could on some level see themselves as beneficiaries of charity, and be more charity-minded themselves to avoid cognitive dissonance.
That's true, but it doesn't imply that charity is irrational.
If you derive utility from giving money to charity (e.g., you enjoy warm fuzzy feelings) then it is completely rational to do so. Charitable giving is a consumption good just like video games, playing soccer or shopping for clothes.
Indeed but "economic rationality" is a narrow subset of rationality as a whole. And the lines I quoted above seemed to imply that charity is irrational, not just "economically irrational."
Agreed - "economic rationality" is an extremely narrow concept. As an example, it's "rational" to buy yourself a car or an ice cream cone, because you get utility or enjoyment out of it. It's "irrational" to give money to others, because... you don't get enjoyment out of it? Wait, what if you do? A giant problem with the definition, methinks.
I don't think swombat was trying to argue that. It seemed to me like he was just using it as an example of another plausible, though not necessarily true, explanation for the data. The article says that "Statistics show X, obviously Y is the cause" and swombot is saying "Not so fast, there could be many explanations for X. Z would result with the same statistics"
My argument (which you may not believe in) is that charities, like governments, are very inefficient at spending the money donated to them effectively.
What efficiency would a charity need to have to be acceptable for you? Get a number in mind then move on to the next paragraph.
Ok, now, I submit for you consideration the possibility that you just picked a number quite inconsistent with your own behavior, that is, the other efficiencies which you accept as a matter of course. As an example, the efficiency of internal combustion engines.
What grounds do you have for thinking that charity (and presumably altruism in general) is irrational? Are you assuming that only self-interested actions can be rational?