The Myth of Selfless Interaction: Why Every Human Exchange Is Transactional

Introduction: The Comforting Myth of Selflessness

Many people claim that they meet others without expectations - that they act altruistically, without seeking anything in return. This belief is comforting. It sustains the illusion that kindness can be pure, untainted by self-interest. Many people desire this illusion because they wish to see themselves as kind, yet the very feeling of moral purity or goodness they experience is the internal reward they seek instead of the positive effect they could have on others - a dopamine-fueled sense of righteousness that makes the belief self-contradictory. But when examined through the lens of neuroscience, psychology, and sociology, this idea collapses. Every human interaction, no matter how gentle or noble, involves exchange. It may not be an exchange of objects or favors, but of energy, emotion, validation, or dopamine. The currency may be invisible, but the transaction is real.

• The Biology of Exchange: Reward Loops and Energy Economics
• The Invisible Rulebook: Intuition vs. Explicit Logic
• The Collapse of Deontological Purity: Neuroscience vs. Kant
• The Hidden Energy Economy of Social Life
• Why the Illusion Persists
• Conclusion: Conscious Reciprocity
• Related Books

The Biology of Exchange: Reward Loops and Energy Economics

Human beings evolved as social organisms whose survival depended on reciprocal behavior. Cooperation, the feeling of empathy, and communication are not arbitrary moral inventions but deeply wired feedback systems. Each interaction triggers reward mechanisms in the brain:

• Dopamine for novelty, attention, and social approval.
• Oxytocin for bonding, touch, and trust.
• Serotonin and endorphins for stability and shared emotion.

For most neurotypical individuals, this biochemical economy forms the basis of pleasure in social contact. Meeting friends, chatting, or sharing laughter releases these chemicals – an internal payment for participation. Thus, when someone claims to act without expectation, they overlook the reward that sustains their behavior and that they are chasing. Without it they would never perform those activities on a regular basis.

In contrast, for many neurodivergent people, the same processes do not yield equivalent reinforcement. Social ambiguity and high cognitive load make interactions energetically costly. Where the neurotypical brain receives a reward, the analytically structured mind often experiences depletion. Socializing even when desired or liked becomes work, not rest. Yet both sides are still part of the same exchange: one trades energy for dopamine, the other expends energy to reach understanding.

The Invisible Rulebook: Intuition vs. Explicit Logic

A major source of misunderstanding between neurotypical (NT) and neurodivergent (ND) individuals lies in the implicit nature of social rules. NTs often say, “There is no recipe for friendship or love”. This statement, however, is demonstrably false; it is a lie that they are deliberatly using to not touch uncomfortable sides of society. If there were no rules, psychology and sociology could not exist as sciences. The existence of consistent, predictable patterns - studied, modeled, and experimentally verified – proves that social interaction follows regular laws rather than randomness.

People bond through mechanisms that can be described:

• Reciprocal disclosure: relationships deepen when self-disclosure occurs symmetrically (a symmetry often hard to achieve for neurodivergent minds).
• Social mirroring: similarity and synchronized behavior produce trust and affinity (often hard to achieve for neurodivergent minds due to better pattern recognition but sometimes slower processing speed and thus slight delays).
• Reward prediction: consistent but slightly unpredictable feedback sustains attention (a problem for many neurodivergent minds since unpredictability introduces often stress and anxiety).
• Attachment patterns: predictable relational styles (secure, anxious, avoidant) shape responses.

Neurotypicals internalize these mechanisms unconsciously, treating them as intuition. When asked to explain them, they usually refrain claiming there are no rules and no reason, because they operate from procedural rather than declarative memory. The ND mind, seeking fairness and structure, asks for the rules explicitly. The NT mind, unaware of their existence, perceives this request as unnatural or intrusive and reacts aggressive and repelling. But the rules exist – their invisibility to some does not negate their presence.

The Collapse of Deontological Purity: Neuroscience vs. Kant

Immanuel Kant argued that moral actions only have worth when they are free from desire or reward. From the standpoint of neuroscience, this position is untenable. Every decision, even those motivated by duty, produces measurable neural reinforcement. Performing an action deemed “good” activates the dopaminergic system, generating a feeling of satisfaction.

The idea of selfless morality thus contradicts biology. A person who helps another for the sake of goodness still receives an internal reward - which is the actual reason they perform an action. Even guilt avoidance is a form of reward: the brain reinforces the behavior that maintains moral equilibrium, people want to feel moral and being good, not evil. Therefore, Kantian deontology, while elegant in abstraction, collapses under empirical scrutiny. Morality may still exist, but it cannot be independent of feedback and reinforcement.

The Hidden Energy Economy of Social Life

Every interaction modifies the energetic and emotional state of those involved. People unconsciously manage their internal resources through social contact. Neurotypicals seek stimulation and replenishment through conversation, touch, or companionship. Neurodivergent individuals often seek clarity, structure, and predictability. Both pursue homeostasis - the restoration of internal balance - but by exchanging different currencies. When these currencies mismatch, friction arises: one side feels emotionally starved, the other exhausted.

The refusal to acknowledge this exchange often leads to breakdowns in fairness. When people claim to expect nothing, they exempt themselves from responsibility for the implicit transaction. They continue to receive rewards (validation, pleasure, attention, having someone to dump their random thoughts to) without admitting their dependence on them. This self-deception perpetuates imbalance and misunderstanding.

Why the Illusion Persists

The myth of selflessness persists because it sustains social comfort. Believing that kindness can be pure maintains moral cohesion and shields individuals from the discomfort of self-awareness. The existence of this invisible reward system also explains why many neurotypical people focus more on how goodness is perceived than on its actual impact: they may ignore a homeless person nearby or social struggles in their own environment while enthusiastically joining distant causes such as global protests, charity campaigns, or inclusion panels. These acts provide a feeling of righteousness and social approval at minimal personal cost, sustaining a facade of virtue while avoiding genuine engagement. Yet this denial has consequences: it prevents fair negotiation of emotional labor and invalidates those who need explicit frameworks to participate equally in social life, and it also prevents actual change since meaningful action is avoided wherever one could truly make a difference.

Recognizing the exchange does not make humanity cynical; it makes it honest. Understanding that kindness and cooperation are built on reinforcement allows us to design fairer, clearer, and more inclusive social systems. When we acknowledge that even altruism has structure, we replace myth with insight.

Conclusion: Conscious Reciprocity

Every interaction is an exchange - of attention, validation, emotion, or energy. Denying this truth hides the mechanics of human connection behind moral theater. True morality is not found in pretending to act without reward but in being aware of what we exchange and ensuring the exchange is fair.

Related Books

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• Kant, Immanuel. Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten. Vol. 28. L. Heimann, 1870.