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active goals. That is,
X
not only expects an
adoptive goal
by
Y
but an
adoptive decision and
intention
.Asimple
regularity
based prediction or an expectation simply based on some role
or norm prescribing behavior to
Y
, are not enough - we agree with Hardin - for characterizing
what he calls 'trust in strong sense', the 'central nature of trust', what we call 'genuine social
trust'.
However, in our view, Hardin is not able to realize the broad theory of goal-adoption, and
provides us - with his notion of
encapsulated interests -
a restricted and reductive view of it.
The various authors searching for a socially focused and more strict notion of trust go in
this direction, but using a non general and not well defined notion, like:
benevolence, good-
will, other-regarding attitude, benignity
(Hart, 1988),
altruism, social-preferences, reciprocity
,
participant stance
(Holton, 1994).
And even the strange and unacceptable notion proposed by Deutsch (Deutsch, 1985) (we
discuss this in Chapter 1 and Chapters 8) and repeated several times (for example, Bernard
Barber 'to place the others' interests before their own') where in order to trust
Y
one should
assume that he is altruistic or even irrational.
What
X
has to believe about
Y
is that:
i)
Y
has
some
motive for
adopting X
's goal (for doing that action
for X
; for taking care of
X
's
interest); and that he will actually adopt the goal.
ii) Not only
Y
will adopt
X
's goal (that is, he will formulate in his mind the goal of
X
, because
it is the goal of
X
) but also that this goal will become an
intention
, so that
Y
will actually
do as desired.
If (i) and (ii) are both true we can say that the adopted goal will prevail against other possible
active goals of
Y
, including non-adopted goals (selfish).
More precisely we can claim that the motives
X
ascribes to
Y
while adopting
X
's goal are
assumed to prevail on the other possible motives (goals) of
Y
. Thus, what
X
is really relying
on in genuine trust, are
Y's motives for an adoptive intention.
The fact that a genuine social trust is based/relies on
Y
's adoption should not be misinter-
preted. One should not confuse
goal-adoption
with
specific motives
for adopting. Claiming that
X
counts on
Y
's adoptive intention is not to claim that she counts on
Y
's altruism, benevolence,
good will, social preferences, respect, reciprocity, or moral norms. These are just specific
sub-cases of the reasons and motives
Y
is supposed to adopt
X
's goal.
X
might count on
Y
's
willingness to be well reputed (for future exchanges), or on his desire to receive gratitude or
approval, or of avoiding blame or sanctions, or for his own approval, etc. In other words:
Y
can be fully self-interested
.
To realize this it is necessary to keep in mind that the usual structures of goals are means-
end chains: not all goals are
final goals
; they can be
instrumental
goals, simple means for
higher goals. Thus, on the top of an adoptive and adopted goal there can be other goals, which
motivate
the goal-adoption. For example, I can do something
for
you, just in order to receive
what I want for me, what you promise me.
'
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our
dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity
but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages
'
(Smith, 1776); however, when I ask the brewer to send me a box of beer and I send the money,
I definitely
trust
him to give me the beer.
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