For much of this poem's history, readers viewed Ulysses as resolute and heroic, admiring him for his determination "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield".[1] The view that Tennyson intended a heroic character is supported by his statements about the poem, and by the events in his life—the death of his closest friend—that prompted him to write it. In the twentieth century, some new interpretations of "Ulysses" highlighted potential ironies in the poem. They argued, for example, that Ulysses wishes to selfishly abandon his kingdom and family, and they questioned more positive assessments of Ulysses' character by demonstrating how he resembles flawed protagonists in earlier literature.

He had never had apricotjuice in his life. She stood facing him with her salver flat against her apron,trying to make out his reaction as he quaffed it down. He said nothing atfirst. Then, probably without thinking, he smacked his lips.

we also challenge in the book The Very concept of selfishness itself

from aggression and international conflict to overpopulation and the destruction of the environment, people display a capacity for great selfishness and antisocial behavior. Can an evolutionary perspective – with its inherent focus on the functionality of human behavior – help explain the occasionally self-destructive and maladaptive side of human nature?

the neo-Darwinists were practically driven to their conclusions by their initial assumption: that science demands a rational explanation, that this means attributing rational motives to all behavior, and that a truly rational motivation can only be one that, if observed in humans, would normally be described as selfishness or greed.

You will lend him your car or your coat -- but your books are as much a part of you as your head or your heart.

We need ways to detect and suppress parasitic gains — for example, massive corporations like Amazon that pay zero taxes towards the upkeep of the infrastructure their profits depend on, or likewise billionaires who pay lower tax rates than nurses.

And contrary to that science-denying slogan of Margaret Thatcher’s, that “there is no such thing as society,” no human has ever survived or thrived without a tribe or society.

And protecting life-supporting cooperation requires suppressing certain kinds of selfishness. Biologists, unlike many economists, grasp when the “greed is good” ethos gets deadly.

“!e ‘projecting’ of‘futurologists’ uses the future as the safest possible context forwhatever is desired; it binds one only to selfish interest. But makinga promise binds one to someone else’s future.”

When she reached the end they were hysterical