Self-Motivation
David Goggins
Former Navy Seal
Career Development
Bryan Cranston
Actor
Critical Thinking
Liv Boeree
International Poker Champion
Emotional Intelligence
Amaryllis Fox
Former CIA Clandestine Operative
Management
Chris Hadfield
Retired Canadian Astronaut & Author
Learn
from the world's big
thinkers
Start Learningfrom the world's big
thinkers
Common investing mistakes that beginners should avoid
Knowing the pitfalls is the first step to making smarter money decisions.
12 February, 2020
Photo by Adeolu Eletu on Unsplash
- Taking control of your money and making better financial decisions is something that everyone can and should do.
- There is a bit of a learning curve when it comes to investing. A big part of making money is learning how to avoid common mistakes.
- Buying cheap stocks instead of smart ones, being too reactive to news headlines, and thinking short term are a few of the things that new investors often get wrong.
<p><br></p></div>
<p>You want to start making better choices and take control of your money, but how? For those new to the world of investing, taking that first step can feel daunting and confusing. Helpful acronyms, numbers, and terms to learn are written in a language you don't yet speak. With a little time, the right resources, and a willingness to learn, the dream of one day managing your money smarter can become a reality. For beginners and seasoned investors alike, a big part of making money is being able to identify and avoid making common mistakes.</p>
M1 Finance
<p>A useful (and free) personal finance tool for investors at all levels is <a href="https://m1finance.8bxp97.net/76BPy" target="_blank">M1 Finance</a>. It's a commission-free investing and money management app that was recently rated #1 for Sophisticated Investors and #1 for Socially Responsible Investing by Investopedia, beating out competitors like Personal Capital, Vanguard, and Betterment. Available for Android and iOS devices, M1 Finance lets users create a portfolio of stocks or exchange-traded funds (ETFs) for free. Investors can also borrow from a flexible portfolio line of credit with a low base rate, and M1 is currently beta testing FDIC-insured checking accounts with debit cards that investors can use instead of their existing checking account. To find out more about how it works and to sign up today, <a href="https://m1finance.8bxp97.net/76BPy" target="_blank">click here</a>.</p><p>As you set out on your investing journey, here are a few common mistakes to avoid:</p>Don’t focus on the short term.
<p>Treating the stock market like placing a bet is a strategy that probably won't work out for you. Successful investor Warren Buffett warns new investors against day trading. "If you aren't willing to own a stock for 10 years, don't even think about owning it for ten minutes," <a href="https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/1996.html" target="_blank">Buffett wrote</a> in a letter to shareholders back in 1996. Buying and selling stocks quickly may get you a few dollars, but making a smart investment in a good company and sticking with it over a long period of time could make you exponentially more. </p>Don’t buy what you don’t understand.
<p>Never buy a piece of a company when you don't understand how it makes money. Do your research and learn about the industry and the mechanisms that move it, otherwise the money you invest could disappear and you would have no idea why.</p>But don’t only buy what you know.
<p>According to <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/articles/stocks/07/beat_the_mistakes.asp" target="_blank">Investopedia</a>, novice investors (and those with experience) should probably stick to the principle of diversification. In poker terms, you don't want to "let it ride" on one big stock in the hopes that your money will double or triple. Create a portfolio and spread the money around. As a general rule according to the experts, never allocate more than 5-10% to any one investment.</p>Don’t use your retirement money.
<p>Risking your livelihood on investments is dangerous and ill-advised. If losing the money you are thinking of investing would ruin your life or the lives of those around you, then you absolutely should not do it.</p>Find good investments, not cheap ones.
<p>In the same vein as the first tip, it's important for new investors to learn that just because they can afford to buy a stock, that doesn't mean they should. The idea of investing early in the next Google and riding the wave to wealth is enticing, but that's not a realistic strategy. Tried and true is often better than shiny and new.</p>And lastly, don’t overreact based on the news.
<p>Hearing about a tanking stock on the news can be scary if that company is a part of your portfolio, but experts warn against letting your emotions get the best of you. Consider the history of the stock and whether or not the reason for the dip is something that could soon pass. If you panic and sell because of a headline, you could regret it next month when that dip turns into a spike.</p><p><em><em><em><em>When you buy something through a link in this article or from <a href="https://shop.bigthink.com/" target="_self">our shop</a>, Big Think earns a small commission. Thank you for supporting our team's work.</em></em></em></em></p>
Keep reading
Show less
Birthplace influences adult income, new research suggests
A new study finds that factors influencing where you're born continue to affect your earnings throughout life.
09 August, 2019
Image source: bysora / Shutterstock
- Children born, raised, and working in big cities tend to be more successful.
- A mountain of British demographic data reveals the correlation.
- Are more successful families created by cities, or are they more likely to move there?
<p> A new study, published in March in the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0094119019300117?via%3Dihub" target="_blank"><em>Journal of Urban Economics</em></a>, finds that the location in which you're born is likely to correlate to the amount of money you earn as an adult. It's not magic, but rather the continuing influence of factors that resulted in your mother giving birth to you where she did in the first place. Since living in a big city can mean earning higher wages, being born in one — and growing up there — is likelier to lead to a lifelong economic advantage.</p>
The study’s data
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMDU1NTg1NS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1NDg2NDc3MX0.y4C2poh2-udJUM1yyv_8lR6f0yP-YJitnXksm39MCpw/img.jpg?width=1245&coordinates=0%2C0%2C0%2C0&height=700" id="de80a" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="fe3bc4caac49620f5057509291dafbcc" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />Image source: Sean Pavone/Shutterstock
<p>The authors of the study, <a href="https://voxeu.org/users/clementbosquet0" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Clément Bosquet</a> of the University of Cergy-Pontoise in France and <a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/geography-and-environment/people/academic-staff/henry-overman" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Henry G. Overman</a> of the London School of Economics, derived their conclusions from an analysis of highly-detailed demographic data collected for the U.K.'s <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/economics-econometrics-and-finance/panel-study" target="_blank">British Household Panel Survey</a>. The information it contains was sourced in 18 waves from 1991 to 2009 from interviews with everyone 16 and older residing at a specific address. Individuals who moved from these residences to other locations were also tracked. On average, participants were interviewed 7.4 times over the course of the project, and Bosquet and Overman discarded individuals not interviewed at least twice.</p><p>After factoring out data that the researchers felt would skew clear results — including periods of unemployment, study, and retirement, for example — they were left a baseline data set of 55,382 observations for 75,00 individuals. (This data set was expanded as necessary for deriving insights into certain specific demographic characteristics.)</p>Why this happens
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMDU1NTg3Ni9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1NDUxNjc5Mn0.p7AYyBHC_Mgjem0efrnx3D1fW3YtrQaO-s7AJG9B_-0/img.jpg?width=1245&coordinates=0%2C144%2C0%2C1&height=700" id="25ca0" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="86131846e01d9e19289b093ca60afd9f" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />Image source: Flystock/Shutterstock
<p>Previous <a href="https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/10/what-neighborhood-in-your-city-is-an-opportunity-bargain/571381/" target="_blank">research</a> has documented the reasons that residents of affluent areas in big cities wind up with higher incomes — the downside being the unfortunate fact that those who live in areas of urban poverty find it harder to climb the socioeconomic ladder.</p><p>It's believed that the advantages of living in a big city come from the greater number of benefits available, among them abundant amenities and opportunities for employment, wider educational choices, and robust social networks.</p><p>Large urban centers also perpetuate the <a href="https://bigthink.com/robby-berman/stunning-new-paper-explains-how-inequality-keeps-growing" target="_self">growing gap</a> between the well-off and everyone else in terms of potential success, especially as the U.S. population is increasingly moving into such expensive places to live. They attract more well-off residents in the first place, and it's their children who are the focus of this study. About 80 percent of children born to professionals, finds the study, are born in large urban areas. Even more significant is that urban kids are more likely to get a good education, a characteristic they share with their well-educated parents, a majority of whom favor city life.</p><p>The study asserts that nearly half of us — a whopping 43.7 percent never move out of the areas in which we're born, and indeed, the effect of birth location is strongest for these children. They benefit from urban advantages throughout their childhoods, teen years, and adulthood, and in general enjoy the increased odds for success that all big-city dwellers enjoy. People who move to big cities as adults also do better than those remaining in birthplaces having fewer economic advantages.</p>
Keep reading
Show less
Alan Watts was overzealous in his basic income prediction — but he wasn't wrong
A guaranteed basic income is an old solution to a new problem of labor automation.
12 February, 2019
Image: Big Think
- Economist Robert Theobald coined the team 'basic living guarantee' in the 1960s.
- He believed that we were going to suffer problems because of an overabundance of resources.
- Philosopher Alan Watts spoke about the possibility of an economic utopia through a universal basic income.
<p><span></span>The perceived threat of labor-ending automation, a stratified elite class, and increasingly complex occupations have left some worried about the fate of their livelihoods and jobs. It's feared that a seemingly useless class may be the end sum of this unfettered march of technological and economic progress.</p><p>The answer to this problem, from some corners of academia and governments, has been an enthusiastic call for a basic income – also referred to as Universal Basic Income (UBI) or Guaranteed Basic Income (GBI). This solution to a potential economic catastrophe has actually been floating around for <a href="https://bigthink.com/natalie-shoemaker/people-have-been-talking-about-universal-basic-income-for-a-long-time-what-makes-this-time-different" target="_blank">quite some time</a>. In the 1960s, a few philosophers and economists foresaw in the tea leaves this far-off solution for a still growing problem.</p>
Early proponents of a guaranteed income
<p>Economist and futurist Robert Theobald first rang the alarm bells on this economic threat, which at the time didn't have a name to it. Theobald believed that the threat to the American and subsequently world economy wasn't one of scarcity but abundance. His views were in direct contrast to the traditional strain of economics worrying more about scarcity. Theobald looked at the technology of the time and realized that the promise of future development would lead to even greater automated abundance in the future. </p><p>In his essay, <em>Free Men and Free Markets, </em>Theobald argued that technological progress would free surplus labor and capital in such a way that it would eventually prove detrimental to the society if this excess human capital wasn't fully utilized. He predicted that the mass of wealth would be transferred largely to the rich, which would fuel dissent and resentment among the lower classes. <em></em>To avoid the looming disaster, he called for a "basic living guarantee<em>". </em><em></em>Theobald states:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"Unemployment rates must…be expected to rise. This unemployment will be concentrated among the unskilled, the older worker and the youngster entering the labor force. Minority groups will also be hard hit. No conceivable rate of economic growth will avoid this result."</p><p>Philosopher Alan Watts, who at the time called Theobald "an avant-garde economist,"<em> </em>took the idea one step further and tried to imagine what sort of psychological and sociological issues a basic income would rile up. Not only did he imagine what the after effects of this radical change would bring, but what kind of psychic change would be needed to also bring about a new<a href="https://bigthink.com/personal-growth/philosopher-alan-watts-on-the-difference-between-money-and-wealth" target="_self"> way we think about money.</a></p>Automation and basic income
<p>Alan Watts believed that we still place an unjustified fixation on the notion of a job or employment, which he said predates back to our pre-technological days. </p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"Isn't it obvious that the whole purpose of machines is to get rid of work? When you get rid of the work required for producing basic necessities, you have leisure – time for fun or new and creative explorations and adventures."</p><p>The problem is we don't see that as the case. If you follow the outcome of automation to its logical end, you'll realize that the whole purpose is to eventually eliminate any human interference in rote menial tasks. But if the casualties of this instead creates a new invalid serfdom class, our entire capitalistic structure will become severely strained. </p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"... we increasingly abolish human slavery; but in penalizing the displaced slaves, in depriving them of purchasing power, the manufacturers in turn deprive themselves of outlets and markets for their products," writes <em></em>Watts in <em>Does It Matter?: Essays on Man's Relation to Materiality</em>.</p><p>Those that lose their jobs will live in a more diminished and impoverished state. All the while, there is a surplus of cheap consumer goods being created by the automated factories. On the subject of who should pay for the basic income, Watts said that the machine should – something <a href="https://bigthink.com/paul-ratner/bill-gates-proposes-that-if-a-robot-takes-a-human-job-it-should-pay-taxes" target="_self">echoed by Bill Gates in recent years</a>, who suggested a robot tax.</p>Theoretical outcomes for a universal basic income
<p>Watts was a bit premature on his basic income prediction, but the picture he paints is still one that proponents of UBI look to as the future. Watts said:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"I predict by AD 2000, or sooner, no one will pay taxes, no one will carry cash, utilities will be free, and everyone will carry a general credit card."</p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"This card will be valid up to each individual's share in a guaranteed basic income or national dividend, issued free, beyond which he may still earn anything more that he desires by an art or craft, profession or trade that has not been displaced by automation."</p><p>Inflation arguments abound when talking about basic income. Watts understood at the time that the way people thought about money would prove most of these arguments true. </p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"The difficulty is that, with our present superstitions about money, the issue of a guaranteed basic income of, say $10,000 per annum per person would result in wild inflation. Prices would go sky-high to "catch" the vast amounts of new money in circulation…"</p><p>Watts found inflation arguments to be null if people would simply realize the symbolic nature of currency instead of confusing it with true wealth. </p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"The hapless dollar-hypnotized sellers do not realize that whenever they raise prices, the money so gained has less and less purchasing power, which is the reason that as material wealth grows and grows, the value of the monetary unit goes down and down."</p><p>While this idea has gained both supporters and detractors in the years since, the main point still stands: Automated abundance is at risk of disrupting the status quo of the past few hundred years. </p><p>Later on in his life, Theobald looked back on the foresight he had and its unnerving validity. </p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"What's startling to me is that when I started talking about ideas like these 30 years ago, they were so new and strange that people looked at me as if I had two heads. In retrospect, I think I was looked on as something of a cultural clown – a "crazy" who was fun to listen to. The reaction I get now worries me a lot more, because what most people say is, "Bob, today you're right, but we're not going to do anything about it."'</p>Facebook's co-founder wants middle-class workers to get a $6,000 raise
<div class="rm-shortcode" data-media_id="KWC1Nxkq" data-player_id="FvQKszTI" data-rm-shortcode-id="1bb90bb93906579bcaf2c3da57b4225f"> <div id="botr_KWC1Nxkq_FvQKszTI_div" class="jwplayer-media" data-jwplayer-video-src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/KWC1Nxkq-FvQKszTI.js"> <img src="https://cdn.jwplayer.com/thumbs/KWC1Nxkq-1920.jpg" class="jwplayer-media-preview" /> </div> <script src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/KWC1Nxkq-FvQKszTI.js"></script> </div>
Keep reading
Show less
Dear Jeff Bezos, what are you going to do with all that money?
Economist Jeffrey Sachs discusses how the megarich can help millions of children by donating 1 percent of their wealth.
29 September, 2018
- In 2006 there were about 700 billionaires with a total net worth of about $3 trillion. Today there are 2,208 billionaires with a total net worth of $9.1 trillion. A tiny fraction of that wealth could keep millions of kids alive and in school.
- Jeffrey Sachs, who argues that the world economy isn't "exactly fair," proposes the ultra rich give 1 percent of their collective wealth — about $100 billion — to help meet everyone's basic needs. "What I know — as an economist that has worked all over the world, including in the poorest places in the world— [is that] little bits can save lives and make futures for the children of this world..."
- If plutocrats don't give voluntarily, Sachs recommends putting an SDG levy, a Sustainable Development Goals levy, on 1 percent of their collective wealth. "We're going to get this job done. We're going to get every child healthcare. We're going to get every child into school."
Is Philanthropy Driven by the Human Desire to Cheat Death?
George Bernard Shaw quipped that a rich man ‘does not really care whether his money does good or not, provided he finds his conscience eased and his social status improved by giving it away’. Was he right?
20 November, 2017
Bill and Melinda Gates watch their daughter Jennifer perform during The Hollywood Reporter Trophy class at Longines Los Angeles Masters. (Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images for Masters Grand Slam Indoor)
In Socialism for Millionaires (1896), the Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw quipped that a rich man ‘does not really care whether his money does good or not, provided he finds his conscience eased and his social status improved by giving it away’. Was he right to be so cynical?
<p>The reality today is that private wealth finances only a tiny fraction of social needs. According to Arton Capital and Wealth-X’s philanthropy <a href="https://www.wealthx.com/report/the-wealth-x-and-arton-capital-philanthropy-report-2015/" target="_blank">report</a> (2015), ultra-high net-worth individuals in the United States (those who have $30 million and above in net assets) gave $49.2 billion to charities in 2015 – or 19 per cent of all individual philanthropic donations in the US. But if we bring in <a href="https://www.urban.org/research/publication/nonprofit-sector-brief-2015-public-charities-giving-and-volunteering" target="_blank">data</a> from the Urban Institute, which puts the total revenue for US charities at $1.73 trillion in 2015, the super-rich contribute less than 3 per cent of the total.</p> <p>At least we can console ourselves that non-profits will probably trundle on without donations from the very wealthy. But can the wealthy ‘survive’ without giving? What needs are fulfilled by philanthropy? Do we give to make the world a better place, to give back to the community? Or is charity motivated by reasons that are far less noble – peer pressure, social status, a version of <a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/conspicuous-consumption-is-over-its-all-about-intangibles-now" target="_blank">conspicuous</a> consumption? </p> <p><a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/record/2013-04859-001" target="_blank">Studies</a> show that, in general, people who feel good, do good – and likewise, people who do good, feel better. The rich are no exception. Giving to charity activates parts of the brain related to reward and pleasure. Yes, the rich do have some distinctive reasons for giving to charity, such as the desire not to ‘morally corrupt’ their heirs. But like others, they also give to strengthen their identity – and probably, to relieve their guilt. As Shaw said, with typical epigrammatic acuity: ‘One buys moral credit by signing a cheque, which is easier than turning a prayer wheel.’</p> <p>The first person to attribute the act of charity to improving one’s public image was the 18th-century Scottish economist Adam Smith, who claimed that people make moral and ethical decisions based on how an impartial observer would judge them. This idea harks back to a dialogue about justice in Plato’s <em>Republic</em>, in which Glaucon tells Socrates that people behave ethically only when they think others are watching. </p> <p>Fast-forward to 2009, when Dan Ariely, a behavioural economist at Duke University in North Carolina, co-conducted a <a href="https://www.bostonfed.org/publications/research-department-working-paper/2007/doing-good-or-doing-well-image-motivation-and-monetary-incentives-in-behaving-prosocially.aspx" target="_blank">study</a> evaluating the motive of outward appearances in giving to charity. The research found that appearances are so important that they even trump financial incentives. In the experiment, participants were divided into two groups, where each group was asked to type a combination of letters on a keyboard. They were told that if they typed the combination correctly, some money would be donated in their name to the Red Cross, although never more than a few dollars.</p> <div class="video-callout-placeholder" data-slug="dan-ariely-on-the-science-of-motivation-and-pursuing-happiness" style="border: 1px solid #ccc;">
<div class="rm-shortcode" data-media_id="0VA5NfkF" data-player_id="FvQKszTI" data-rm-shortcode-id="68eae14e9c3611c29857c5ad0d11ade9">
<div id="botr_0VA5NfkF_FvQKszTI_div" class="jwplayer-media" data-jwplayer-video-src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/0VA5NfkF-FvQKszTI.js">
<img src="https://cdn.jwplayer.com/thumbs/0VA5NfkF-1920.jpg" class="jwplayer-media-preview">
</div>
<script src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/0VA5NfkF-FvQKszTI.js"></script>
</div>
</div> <p>In the ‘private’ group, members were exposed only to their own ‘giving’ scores, whereas in the ‘public’ group, each member was asked to publicly announce his or her donation to the others. In the end, members of the public group got the letter combination right twice as often as members of the private group. At a later stage of the experiment, researchers decided to test whether people would forgo a financial reward to look altruistic in the eyes of others. In the public group, adding a personal financial incentive had only a small effect on its success rate, whereas it increased the private group’s success rate by 35 per cent.</p> <p>There’s no doubt that outward appearances help to explain the rise of modern philanthropy. In the early 20th-century US, giving was a way of gaining status for those who had recently acquired a fortune. ‘New’ and ‘old’ money competed for large-scale public projects, such as the American Museum of Natural History in New York and the New York City Opera. One can find the names of individual donors splashed across the programmes of philharmonic orchestras, in university brochures and on hospital walls. If donors were not concerned with their personal brand, these displays would be meaningless. In several documented cases at US universities, only around 1 per cent of donors requested to remain anonymous – a <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/2118317?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents" target="_blank">statistic</a> often cited by those who argue that cachet and publicity are the main reasons that the rich give to such institutions. And when donations are publicly listed by category, most people donate <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047272797000625" target="_blank">equal</a> to or slightly above the minimum amount required to secure their spot.</p> <p><span class="ld-dropcap">S</span>ome researchers explain donors’ behaviour with an economic rationale: donors reap benefits from their contributions. When a person donates to a university, perhaps they expect their child to study there. When they donate to a hospital, they’re thinking about the day they need its services. However, in 1990 the economist James Andreoni at the University of California, San Diego showed that this model, like that of pure altruism, doesn’t capture all the reasons why people give. Perhaps donors enjoy a ‘warm glow’ from giving, he <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2234133?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents" target="_blank">suggested</a>. Art benefactors, for example, want to perceive themselves as art lovers, as much as they want to contribute to art.</p> <p>Sometimes people donate when they’d rather not – simply because it’s hard to refuse. Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley conducted an <a href="https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/127/1/1/1832520/Testing-for-Altruism-and-Social-Pressure-in" target="_blank">experiment</a> in which they asked for donations door-to-door. Some of the houses got a flyer that announced an arrival time for collections, and the others got flyers without a fixed time. In the end, the sum collected from those notified was 17 per cent lower than from the others. The experiment was repeated, except this time the advance-notice flyer was accompanied by an optional ‘do not disturb’ tick box. The money raised from the group who ticked the box was 35 per cent less than that raised from the group who received no notice.</p> <p>True, the majority of donations made by the very wealthy are not handed to anonymous fundraisers who knock on doors. Rather, many are made to colleagues and friends who are hard to refuse, especially when they ask for donations to the charities that they champion.</p> <p>Let’s remember, too, that the problems philanthropists want to solve are frequently the result of government decisions, <a href="https://aeon.co/essays/if-your-pay-is-not-yours-to-keep-then-neither-is-the-tax" target="_blank">resource allocation</a> and the status of human and property rights. If philanthropists were to commit to deeper and more meaningful action – if they joined governments or other institutions – they could affect public welfare in a more enduring way. Instead philanthropists are often slow to get involved in public policy, and prefer to make donations that counteract the government’s shortcomings. This reveals where their priorities really lie.</p> <p><span class="ld-dropcap">I</span>t’s probably impossible to find one explanation for all these patterns. They operate in an intricate web of motives and interests, both altruistic and egoistic. The extent of egoistic motives varies across donors (due to individual diversity), but is linked to donation amount (size matters). Paul Schervish, a professor of sociology at Boston College, <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0899764006288287" target="_blank">claims</a> that an amalgamation of circumstances and on-the-go decisions compel the rich to give, rather than a defined set of psychological reasons. He came up with the term ‘moral biography’ to describe an individual’s personal capacity and moral compass.</p> <p>Perhaps the most original answer to the question of ‘why they give’ was offered by the psychologist Ernest Becker. In his Pulitzer-Prize-winning book <em>The Denial of Death</em> (1973), Becker explains that humans use culture to fight against our awareness of our own mortality. We try to give our life a meaning that will outlast us after death. That, or else we distract ourselves from the existential ‘terror’ by engaging in mind-numbing entertainments – which today might include reality television or social media.</p> <div class="video-callout-placeholder" data-slug="big-think-interview-with-katherina-rosqueta" style="border: 1px solid #ccc;">
<div class="rm-shortcode" data-media_id="jZoveQVz" data-player_id="FvQKszTI" data-rm-shortcode-id="a42e5915121eb96b2b997d246c9613c8">
<div id="botr_jZoveQVz_FvQKszTI_div" class="jwplayer-media" data-jwplayer-video-src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/jZoveQVz-FvQKszTI.js">
<img src="https://cdn.jwplayer.com/thumbs/jZoveQVz-1920.jpg" class="jwplayer-media-preview">
</div>
<script src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/jZoveQVz-FvQKszTI.js"></script>
</div>
</div> <p>Religious faith is one way we typically tackle the threat of mortality, but it’s certainly not the only thing in humanity’s toolbox. Hoarding (including money and assets), artistic creativity and even establishing a big family are all things that we hope will outlast us. So whether we leave a plaque with our name on a building, or tell ourselves that we promoted social change and helped the disadvantaged, are we all just trying to fulfil the human quest for meaning, a quest that might be nothing more than the defiance of death?<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xODM5NjM2NC9vcmlnaW4uZ2lmIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMjQ4NDExMH0.nmKvkZ88E25QrUX-fP5GBJgqlNrn-zUj77x0T71e6Os/img.gif?width=980" id="eccd0" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="5e4a065b8106fdb4ace19c2e9f2087e1" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image"></p> <p>Jacob Burak</p> <p>--</p> <p>This article was originally published at <a href="https://aeon.co" target="_blank">Aeon</a> and has been republished under Creative Commons.</p>
Keep reading
Show less
Popular
