Individual self-interest can produce collective flourishing without intention

Evidence

It’s tempting to imagine that these three are deliberate in working together, and perhaps they are. But the beauty of the partnership is that each plant does what it does in order to increase its own growth. But as it happens, when the individuals flourish, so does the whole. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 467

Categorization

• DEFINE: Bridges to the ch4 claim that individual generosity and collective survival are not opposed in evolution: here self-interest itself builds the whole.
• XREF: connects to: Caring for another’s flourishing need not displace one’s own interest. — Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature, 569; Egoistic micro-motivation can sustain cooperation via self-interest without any general cooperative disposition. — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 199; Interdependent individual actions produce collective outcomes no one deliberately chose — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 817 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Spontaneous social order arises from uncoordinated individual choices without conscious design #corroborates (0.95) — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 748
• Egoistic micro-motivation can sustain cooperation via self-interest without any general cooperative disposition. #corroborates (0.93) — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 199
• Interdependent individual actions produce collective outcomes no one deliberately chose #corroborates (0.90) — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 817
• Egoistic motivations alone cannot sustain cooperation without plausible self-regulating structures #qualifies (0.82)