bjacobscrouse's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
jtisgreen's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
3.25
lexmcgnns's review against another edition
4.0
a very interesting little book and a lovely little self-evaluation on us as people!! I learnt so much about mankind as individuals: survivalism vs nurture, the varying lengths of humankind's altruism, what we consider duty and why others feel it more and why do we all hold ourselves to different moral and ethical standards.
We are all, at the end of the day, different, and the real person accounts — or rather, the chaptered snapshots into the various do-gooders' lives (enjoyably written btw!!! and gave a rather novella feel to what is essentially a scientific and analysing book), gave us a fully-formed look at how some people simply feel a stronger sense of needing to help or making a change — whether it be with admiration at their willingness to aid above all else, or unease at which a life lacking in base-pleasures may not be all that appealing to live.
We are all, at the end of the day, different, and the real person accounts — or rather, the chaptered snapshots into the various do-gooders' lives (enjoyably written btw!!! and gave a rather novella feel to what is essentially a scientific and analysing book), gave us a fully-formed look at how some people simply feel a stronger sense of needing to help or making a change — whether it be with admiration at their willingness to aid above all else, or unease at which a life lacking in base-pleasures may not be all that appealing to live.
treyhunner's review against another edition
I'm not sure what my takeaway is from this book. I assumed this would be a critique of the effective altruist movement. It mostly wasn't. But I'm not entirely sure what it was.
A lot of these stories are about people whose lives seem like a mess, but who (hopefully?) left a positive impact on the world, obsessively.
I don't want to be any of these people. But I do want to help enrich the lives of humanity (plus more?), both alive and dead as much as I can. Maybe this is simply a series of cautionary tales.
A lot of these stories are about people whose lives seem like a mess, but who (hopefully?) left a positive impact on the world, obsessively.
I don't want to be any of these people. But I do want to help enrich the lives of humanity (plus more?), both alive and dead as much as I can. Maybe this is simply a series of cautionary tales.
bbqrplanting's review against another edition
When I checked out this book, I thought it was about compassion fatigue, moral injury, etc. The chapter I read was good, but the book was due back and I didn't feel compelled to listen to the full thing before it was due.
mschlat's review against another edition
4.0
It's not in the title, but MacFarquhar's book is all about do-gooders, those people whose lives revolve around helping others. So she has a number of chapters on different do-gooders, nobody particularly famous, but all of them extraordinarily committed to helping. We read about the family that adopted so much they ended up with 22 kids, the man who started a home for lepers with almost no resources, and the individuals who give away almost all of their money (or live on subsistence wages) so that others can have more.
And if you read all this and feel uneasy, well, that's intentional. MacFarquhar wants to explore why we as a culture often feel skeptical about do-gooders and mistrust their motives. So, interspersed among the character pieces are histories of how we view altruism. The two most compelling chapters cover the economic view of altruism (seen at loggerheads with the selfishness thought to drive capitalism, e.g., the need for self interest in [b:The Wealth of Nations|25698|The Wealth of Nations|Adam Smith|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348433328s/25698.jpg|1373762]) and the psychological views of do-gooders (where Freudian thought assumes they are masochists). There's also some intriguing material on the effective altruism movement and the philosopher Peter Singer, whose argument that distance (either geographical or relational) shouldn't matter in altruism forms the focus of the first half of the book.
I found it a compelling but tough read. If you are like me (often motivated by guilt/duty/service --- pick your description), it's tough to read the character pieces without thinking you could do more. But MacFarquhar also deftly points out the downfalls of do-gooders, especially in those cases (like the effective altruism movement) where helping appears to turn into solving an optimization problem rather than connecting to the people you want to help. As a whole, I found the work very helpful in understanding where my altruism boundaries are and what serving others means to me.
And if you read all this and feel uneasy, well, that's intentional. MacFarquhar wants to explore why we as a culture often feel skeptical about do-gooders and mistrust their motives. So, interspersed among the character pieces are histories of how we view altruism. The two most compelling chapters cover the economic view of altruism (seen at loggerheads with the selfishness thought to drive capitalism, e.g., the need for self interest in [b:The Wealth of Nations|25698|The Wealth of Nations|Adam Smith|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348433328s/25698.jpg|1373762]) and the psychological views of do-gooders (where Freudian thought assumes they are masochists). There's also some intriguing material on the effective altruism movement and the philosopher Peter Singer, whose argument that distance (either geographical or relational) shouldn't matter in altruism forms the focus of the first half of the book.
I found it a compelling but tough read. If you are like me (often motivated by guilt/duty/service --- pick your description), it's tough to read the character pieces without thinking you could do more. But MacFarquhar also deftly points out the downfalls of do-gooders, especially in those cases (like the effective altruism movement) where helping appears to turn into solving an optimization problem rather than connecting to the people you want to help. As a whole, I found the work very helpful in understanding where my altruism boundaries are and what serving others means to me.
divyasudhakar's review against another edition
4.0
I came to this book at a very confusing time in my own life, a time when I've been wondering if I do enough to lead a meaningful life. So it didn't get my most objective reviewing self. That said, this is an excellent book. I appreciate the format of it, interweaving stories of extreme do-gooders with short essays of how society views do-gooders.
The essays didn't move me as much as the stories themselves. While it was interesting to see how society's views on altruism have evolved over the ages, it was more illuminating to read these stories of people who grew up in different conditions (some come from broken homes, others don't), with different religious leanings (some are deeply religious and others are not) and even different views on how to best help people struggle (some try to maximize their impact on the world while ignoring or underplaying the emotional trappings of altruism and others choose to help a small group of children in their homes) to answer their personal calls of duty. It goes a long way in fleshing out the complexity of these people while most of us would tend to stick them in a bucket for slightly mentally ill, saint figures.
While Larissa never criticizes her subjects, she does point out some of the criticisms they've received, like the man who donated his kidney to a stranger being criticized for playing God and deciding who gets his kidney. Or the couple that adopt 22 children most of who end up getting pregnant in school, dropping out and living on welfare. These are criticisms I might have come up with myself. But placed in the context of this book (or in my reading of it), they seem petty and churlish, the complaints of armchair critics who do nothing themselves and are quick to dismiss the attempts of those that do. In showing that her subjects struggle with these ideas themselves and question their work and deal with self-doubt, Larissa makes them attainable and more human.
The essays didn't move me as much as the stories themselves. While it was interesting to see how society's views on altruism have evolved over the ages, it was more illuminating to read these stories of people who grew up in different conditions (some come from broken homes, others don't), with different religious leanings (some are deeply religious and others are not) and even different views on how to best help people struggle (some try to maximize their impact on the world while ignoring or underplaying the emotional trappings of altruism and others choose to help a small group of children in their homes) to answer their personal calls of duty. It goes a long way in fleshing out the complexity of these people while most of us would tend to stick them in a bucket for slightly mentally ill, saint figures.
While Larissa never criticizes her subjects, she does point out some of the criticisms they've received, like the man who donated his kidney to a stranger being criticized for playing God and deciding who gets his kidney. Or the couple that adopt 22 children most of who end up getting pregnant in school, dropping out and living on welfare. These are criticisms I might have come up with myself. But placed in the context of this book (or in my reading of it), they seem petty and churlish, the complaints of armchair critics who do nothing themselves and are quick to dismiss the attempts of those that do. In showing that her subjects struggle with these ideas themselves and question their work and deal with self-doubt, Larissa makes them attainable and more human.
rhyslindmark's review against another edition
4.0
Good way for do-gooders to make themselves feel less weird, or to share with a friend to help them understand the do-gooder mindset :)
dkrane's review against another edition
4.0
Provocative book that’s asking just the kinds of questions I wanted to be thinking about right now: “what are our bigger moral obligations in this connected world?” “How much of my life can be for me?” etc. It doesn’t offer easy answers, and its history of the undermining of do-gooders felt less cohesive to me than its portrayals of its subjects, but highly recommended nonetheless.