“Morality requires some sort of sympathy, it requires the ability to sympathise with others [Not true]. If a person only cares for themselves then such a person needs psychological intervention or institutional intervention, they re beyond the reach of reason and argumentation at that point, the worry is that such people harm others severely on their way to institutions, so recognizing the limits of philosophy hopefully promotes early intervention for those though rare that are true egoist and do not care about the welfare of others.”
My understanding is that ethical egoism isn't a coherent ethical system because it's not something that can be universally applied--if everyone in society acted like an ethical egoist, society would just fall apart.
Deferring to one's own personal gain for every decision, and having it be the guiding factor, without considering the impact one has on others is antisocial. It also has no ethical consistency.
I do think the argument is valid--an ethical egoist "wants a world in which their own benefit is maximized" so they cannot advocate for others to also maximize their benefit, as that would take away from his." It is illogical for an ethical egoist to want others to act like them--because then it would be harder to exploit them. The ethical egoist wants others to be altruistic, compassionate and giving, so that he can take advantage of them.
It's not a coherent ethical system, because ethical systems must be able to be practiced by the entire society or at least the majority. And ethical egoism falls apart because it depends on altruism of others to exploit.
I mean...isn't it in the altruists self interest then, to eliminate the ethical egoist? So how can he advocate to the altruists to follow ethical egoism, when that is advocating that he himself get eliminated from society (and so lose his resources)?
I think the problem with egoism in general is that it ignores the importance of the relationship with the rest of society. Animals don't only act in their own individual interest. There is a difference between the interest of a species survival and the interest of an individual's survival.
Species like humanity did not get ahead by stabbing each other in the back with no regard for anyone else. We aren't solitary, antisocial creatures who depend on our claws and teeth to survive the harsh world--we depend on society and each other to work together in systems we can agree with, to manipulate the external world to be more beneficial for our species.
Herd animals close around the weak and the vulnerable to protect them--not because it's the individual interest of the outer animal to protect the weak and give his life, but because it's in the interest of the
species.
Wolves don't risk being the alpha and biting down first on the hind of an animal, getting a kick to the jaw, because it is just the individual alpha's best interest--but rather because it is in the pack's best interest to have a strong leader who is willing to sacrifice for the pack.
Ethical egoism isn't reflected in biology or nature--because survival of the fittest isn't only about one individual's survival--but of the survival of the species, which is often also dependent on other species survival, because none of us (no species, no individual--none of us) is actually completely independent.
(Edit: I realized I don't actually know how wolves hunt--but large cats do bite the hind like that. Probably wolves don't b/c they are smaller. I also have almost no knowledge about philosophy--but I took a couple of classes--elementary logic and beginning ethics.)