Superfreakonomics By Levitt And Stephen Dubner

Doing good for others has been an act of kindness that countless humans have done. Being a person that is genuinely kind to others permit a person to sense a better feeling about themselves because they know that they have done a good deed, which the good could come back to assist them in the future. Even so, according to the novel, Superfreakonomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, they address different situations about the people who do good for the world, which is known as altruism; however, most will only do good deeds for a prize or an incentive. Usually, a person will do good because they wish to be known as helpful or they know that if they were to do something delightful, they might be recognized. Unlike these people, there are …show more content…
If people had an option to either do good for money or do good without anything in return, they would do good for money because of how human beings’s mind are easily manipulated and how we easily want something. We are influenced by our surroundings; an example of this would be in social media. If we have more money, we can be more successful like the celebrities; however, if we are poor we are unable to do much with our lives. People are inherently selfish beings because they want things for themselves instead of sharing with others. This is most likely because in order to survive in the society, you must follow the “survival of the fittest” rule; that is, your own self must take first priority above all else. Through this, it can be seen that incentives are powerful because it symbolizes a reward at the end of the task and gives the person something to look forward to. In my case, I wished to keep to myself and use the time of the day I had left to work on other assignments. Although rewards were offered, they were not guaranteed, so I did not jump to help my fellow students, but rather chose to selfishly study for other classes. Others share this viewpoint such as in the novel Superfreakonomics, where the authors stated that, “How can we know whether an act is altruistic or self-serving? If you help rebuild a neighbor’s barn, is it because you’re a moral person or …show more content…
No matter the situation, most people will only reach out to help if there is something that they can gain by the end. Even something as simple as helping with homework often, in today’s society, usually require a prize after for compensation. This is a large problem in today’s world because as the generation grows older and begins to have kids, they will pass this mentality onto their offspring as well. That is, the mentality that in order for someone to help, they need to be paid with something. As such, it could create a generally uncharitable society in which no one helps each other just to be nice, thus making people almost unbearable to live