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Glite Dictionary
🙋 Selfishness 📚 Self-interest theory
egoism

egoism

1 7.7
The idea that people should act to benefit themselves even when deciding right from wrong
  • noun
  • /ˈiːɡoʊɪzəm/
  • Formal
translation icon : egoísmo
  • But religion, remember, had served as a restraint on egoism.

We might summarize them as might makes right or egoism or virtue ethics.

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Examples

  • Many argue that a healthy dose of egoism is necessary for personal happiness and fulfillment.

  • Marx not only rejected all hitherto existing morality but also the belief in the naturalistic foundation of egoism.

    Academic text (1991)

  • So, it is the level of egoism that determines the world's population size.

    Blog text (25)

  • But Marx's understanding of egoism is his own.

    Academic text (1991)

  • According to Marx, egoism, no less than morality, is a historical product.

    Academic text (1991)

  • A society can survive pervasive egoism; indeed, a market economy relies on it.

    Academic text (1991)

  • Politics itself has become an instrument of naked greed and egoism.

    Academic text (1991)

  • Hence, the linking of democracy to egoism did not originate with the present author.

    Academic text (1991)

  • Any freedom in which the chains of slavery to my own egoism remain intact is a deficient freedom.

    Academic text (1991)

  • Marx regarded politics in general and democratic politics in particular as manifestations of class conflict rooted in egoism.

    Academic text (1991)

Synonyms

selfism
vsegoism
9.5

Putting your own needs before the needs of other people

is a moral theory that makes self-interest the basis of right action

Antonyms

altruism
24 6.5

Caring about other people's needs more than your own

selflessness
14 3.9

To care more about other people's needs than your own

How Selfish

selfishness
50 3.0
selfism
9.5
self-interest
49 4.0
egoism
  • Formal
1 7.7

Surface Forms

egoism singular
egoisms plural

Morphology

egoism = ego (transparent) = ego + ism

Formed by 'ego' + the productive suffix '-ism' meaning doctrine or tendency, so the sense as a theory is a regular nominalization.

Etymology

The word egoism comes from ego 'I' and the ending -ism 'a belief or practice', and you see the same ego in words like egotism. So egoism is the idea or theory that 'I' and my own good should come first, even as a rule for what is right.