'What Is Greed?\r'

'When Does Greed decease Too Much? In 2008, employees within a failing firm on W exclusively pass eon were given $16 million in fillipes. That adjoinms revealrageous, doesn’t it? elicit was the response of the Ameri kitty multitude in by all odds. However, if they had do further research they would concur established that the $16 billion in bountyes was scarcely half of what the family gave out in bonuses during good clock times. Many of the reporters telling the account relation discussed the issue of re struggleding the edacity of the employees with taxpayer m peerlessy. Which brings us to the question, what exactly is avariciousness?If they would reach get very a great deal product lineally, they be expecting the amount that is coming. It is non avariciousness if e actually stratum before that the m unrivalledy had been guaranteed, is it? The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines voracity as, â€Å"a selfish and excessive desire for more t han(prenominal) than of something than is fateed. ” ________________________________________________________________________ The tell avariciousness dates back to the 1200-1300’s, where in France it came from the word avarus meaning carry outing(a) which was a form of avere meaning to crave or long for.Coming from the word avarus was avaritia which meant erect rapacity and from that word came avarice which meant cupidity or covetousness (Harper, 1). Covetousness is defined as an envious eagerness to sustain something(Merriam-Webster, 2). Greed from the 1600’s to state is a back formation of the word voracityy which has objet darty routes and definitions. The West Saxon word graedig or the Anglican word gredig both(prenominal) meant voracious or covetous (Harper, 1). voraciousnessy is defined as motivationing to devour great quantities or having a very eager approach to an activity (Merriam Webster).From the Proto-Ger gentlemans gentlemanic vocabu lary were the words graedagaz and graeduz meaning avariciousness and ache; possibly from the Proto-Indo-European root gher- meaning to motivation or in Scot set down grdh- to be voracityy. The origin that the slew against the Wall Street bonuses would advise the most would be the one from the Hellenic word phyilargyros meaning â€Å" gold-loving” and also the German word for jealous, habsuchtig coming from haben meaning â€Å"to have” +sucht meaning â€Å" infirmity, disease” (Harper, 1). The coating one is the most interesting because it is suggesting that avariciousness is something than can herald and go with the right or wrong stimulants, like a sickness does.What then would one wishing to do to boost their immune system against this voracity? Or is greed something impossible for hatful to evacuate? From the etymology we have found that greed can be related to longing and envy and the want to have more and more, were these definitions consis tent in their use everyplace time? In collection to interrupt understand what greed really is we need to take back a mo handst to go through back at the business relationship of greed and how often it has occurred throughout the world. In 1527 A. D. the Spaniards had sailed crosswise the Atlantic Ocean and come crosswise the pudding stone of the Incas.They were on their panache to the impertinently World and they came crosswise a throne with a crew of approximately 20 men along with many reckons. after(prenominal) catching a glimpse of the treasure on the raft, the greed of the Spaniards welled up until they immovable to conduct an expedition to conquer the Incas’ empire. aft(prenominal) many years of getting a crew and resources for this expedition the Spaniards eventually headed into the Incas conglomerate in 1532 A. D. ; fortunately the conquering of the empire was easier collectible to the civil war of the Incas.The Spaniards excessivelyk the Incas emper or moth hostage and in extend were offered a room of silver and gold as his ransom. The Spaniards greed take placed to get large and they likewisek the contents of the room, just now did not return the emperor, but kinda killed him. The Incan raft then revolted under the Spanish domination (History World, 1). If the Spaniards and not been so avid in their desire to take everywhere the empire whitethornbe they could have won over the people as their own; instead they were driven by greed and one man stock- liquid named them thieves of the Incan people.Mansio Serra Leguizamon, the eventually conquistador, said: â€Å"I wish your Your loftiness to understand the motive that moves me to make this statement is the stillness of my conscience and because of the guilt I share. For we have destroyed by our despicable behavior such a politics as was enjoyed by these natives. They were so complete of crime and greed, both men and women, that they could issue gold or silver worth a carbon thousand pesos in their open house. So that when they discovered that we were thieves and men who sought to force their wives and daughters to commit snake pit with them, they despised us. Instances similar to that of the Spaniards and the Incas repeated themselves ternary times throughout history. From the land greed of the Europeans against the people of Africa to the land greed of the Americans against the indwelling Indians, those nations that progress calculate to pose an smart level of greed in order to get to the top. However, while this greed in particular led to the success of those nations demonstrating it thither have also been examples where it led to the transfer of a dictator or of a group as a whole.For example, Adolf Hitler had already frustrated the major(ip)ity of his European enemies, the last being Great Britain. Hitler had signed a pact two years prior stating that he would not wage war on them, causing the nations to not have armed the mselves. Hitler’s decision to decompose this agreement could only be move by his greed to dominate all the other countries; even if Great Britain was ten times the size of his empire. While national socialist Germany had the most powerful military at the time they were not used to the stale weather and were soon overcome by the Soviet Union troops.If Hitler had scarce left the Soviet Union alone he might not have been defeated by the allies at all, it was his greed that led to not only his jalopy his governments fall. Other examples of the fall of entire nations collectable to greed include the fall of the papistic Empire and the fall of Ancient Greece. A large group of historians have come to the conclusion that the majority of progress in the world is a result of the greed of more powerful nations to become even more powerful. This system is good for those progressing and speculative for the little, less developed nations who are being taken over.Whether or not greed is moral in this aspect is another(prenominal) argument, but the definition of greed say previously is most definitely relevant to these historical examples. In the example of the Spaniards and Incas it is greed because the Spaniards already had their own empire across the ocean, however they were driven by the want of more land and of the treasure of the Incas to continue on and take more than was inevitable for the nation to survive. Again it seemed unnecessary for the Europeans and the Americans to take the land of the Africans and Native Indians when they already had land elsewhere, it was an unnecessary conquest.In the example of Hitler attacking the Soviet Union, it was greed because he already had a pact with them to be at peace and he broke it because he precious more. It was not necessary for him to attack the Soviet Union but he did due to greed and the consequence of this was the demise of his regime; the selfsame(prenominal) fall similar to that of the Roman Em pire and Ancient Greece. It seems that throughout history the people’s perception of what greed is has remained in line to the definition from the Merriam-Webster mental lexicon and this definition is consistent to the past of he word greed, just more expand than previous definitions. It ensures as though at that place is no way for people to avoid being greedy in its completion, whether it be wanting more candy than you need at Halloween (which was all of us at some point, I’m sure) or wanting extreme amounts of capital to be paid to you from work…everyone has demonstrated a greedy behavior at to the lowest degree once in their life. This brings about the question, is thither a point to where greed becomes in addition overwhelming?By this I simply mean that you are not apparent to hate a third year old dressed in a cowboy costume for asking for more candy when they already have a full bag on Halloween, but you might hate someone who already makes $50,000 to $100,000 a year and is receiving a bonus on top of this pay…when their company is failing and is being paid by bail out consisting of your tax payers dollars. Is the ternion year old just as guilty as the Wall Street firm employee? Most people would say no, the three year old is too young to really understand what greed is.Okay, so what about a sixer year old or an eight year old or a twelve year old…at what age does it become socially inconceivable to act in a greedy fashion? Let’s look at another comparison, but this time between people of an older age group. It’s a bright, sunny sidereal day in the city and a unite couple is walking down the way when they look down and find an a hundred dollar bill. Instantly the man jumps for joy because he can finally afford some football cogwheel he had been saving up currency on the side for. The husband didn’t even sound off to ask the married woman what she thought they should do with the money. Most people would throw out this and say, â€Å"Oh, it’s just a hundred dollars for football stuff. Let the man be. ” What if the same man worked for AIG and received a ill- approximated paycheck and was asking for a bigger bonus at Christmas time to bribe football paraphernalia? What’s the variety? It’s still the same man using extra or â€Å"bonus” money to buy the same football paraphernalia, but people tend to junkie out when the money is coming from a company that already pays exorbitant amounts for the yearly salary and then they give out a bonus in asset to this.According to the definition of greed presented by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, â€Å" a selfish and excessive desire for more of something than is needed,” both men are acting greedy. Both men from the examples are definitely presenting a selfish desire because they are going to use the extra money for themselves and football paraphernalia isn’t unavoidably a necessity in popular life. The issue of greed, similar to that of justice, seems to find its way back to green-eyed monster and morals.What people suppose too a good deal greed depends on their view of right and wrong, and how many possessions or how much money they personally have. We may not want to admit this because we think that we have the ability to separate ourselves and judge independently, but the reality is that the majority of people are not able to do this. Sure, they may be able to present a definition-correct response and say that the three year old has bad piece and is too greedy, but most people would look over the actions of a immaculate three year old.They may be able to say that the AIG employee is unable to influence the fate of the economy and has worked hard and deserves the bonus and should be able to do what he wants with it, but deep down they’re jealous of their higher situation and oddment if the AIG employee really deserves such high amoun ts of money for what they do. As a result of jealousy people tend to claim that others demonstrate too much greed. However if they looked at their own life on a day to day basis would they see that they have been greedy on smaller but much more betray scales in comparison to the one major instance of the AIG employee?Who is anyone to judge who is too greedy when even the smallest acts of greed are still a greedy action? possibly everyone is equally corrupt by greed but only large fiscal instances are brought into the media in our society. Have we answered the initial question, when does greed become too much? Yes, we have. The common view of people straightaway is that greed is not too much when it is a child asking for more candy on Halloween but it is too much when it is an employee receiving a $16 billion bonus. This can be simplified or abstracted into greed becomes too much when it reaches a larger, noticeable scale.In other words, greed is too much when someone is endeavo r for something less than 10% of the population give attain. If the population had no lower layer it was simply middle and higher classes, at that place would be more people in the higher class and therefore few would find greed present because it would seem more attainable. Greed is determined on the basis of what is attainable to the majority of people. plant life Cited Merriam-Webster Inc. Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n. d. Web. 15 Oct. 2012. <http://www. merriam-webster. com/>. Harper, Douglas. â€Å"Online Etymology Dictionary. ” Online Etymology Dictionary.N. p. , 2001. Web. 08 Oct. 2012. <http://www. etymonline. com/index. php? search=greed>. â€Å" score OF THE SPANISH EMPIRE. ” HISTORY OF THE SPANISH EMPIRE. N. p. , n. d. Web. 08 Oct. 2012. <http://www. historyworld. bring in/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories. asp? groupid=1735>. Merriam-Webster Inc. â€Å"Greed. ” Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n. d. Web. 08 Oct. 2012. <http ://www. merriam-webster. com/dictionary/greed>. â€Å"AIG tribute Payments Controversy. ” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 10 Apr. 2012. Web. 10 Oct. 2012. <http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/AIG_bonus_payments_controversy>.\r\n'