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CLAREMONT, Calif. —The line between altruism and egoism is blurred, according to John B. Cobb Jr., co-director of the Center for Process Studies.

Cobb, who spoke at the Altruistic Love and Science Course Competition research conference in April, said the difference between the two is fuzzy because of the way process thought defines what it means to be a “self.”

“Strictly speaking, the self is momentary, and in the next moment there is a new self,” said Cobb, who considers process thought a philosophy of love. Process thought, inaugurated by Alfred North Whitehead, is the belief that God is intimately involved in the details of everything in the universe.

“To be completely self-interested is virtually impossible. It would mean to care nothing for the consequences of the way one constitutes oneself moment by moment,” said Cobb.

Cobb said that in one sense, all concern for the future is a matter of altruism. Altruism is love for another, even one’s own personal future. Process thought maintains that each person’s future well-being depends on the well-being of those around them. Therefore, to contribute to the enjoyment of those around us is to contribute to the enjoyment of our future selves, said Cobb.

However, tension between acting for the good of the near future and the distant future may arise.

“Addicts place self-interest — the aim to attain, in the moment, a craved satisfaction — ahead of all consequences,” said Cobb. “And adolescents seeking thrills may ignore the consequences of their risk-taking for even a quite proximate future, with horrendous consequences for themselves and others.”

At the other end of the spectrum, some people may focus excessively on future benefits at the expense of present enjoyment.

“Some become so fixed on subordinating present enjoyment to future goals that they lose the capacity for enjoying life as it comes,” said Cobb. “Their altruism harms them.”

The goal for humans should be to reduce the tension between immediate self-interest and altruism, he said.

Christians’ tendencies to focus on the love of others, or agape love, has obscured the importance in the Bible of another form of love: compassion.

Agape has sometimes become associated with “do-goodism,” which imposes one person’s idea of what is good on others who may not want it, said Cobb. Process thought, however, emphasizes love as mutuality and reciprocity.

Religion plays an ambiguous role in extending compassion to outsiders, he said. On one hand, religions call upon their followers to vow loyalty to their own group, which has led to strong distrust of those on the outside. On the other hand, however, many religious traditions teach that members must extend compassion to all God’s creatures, especially all other human beings.

“One main task of pastors, theologians and all people of faith is to show that participation in one religious community, if it is deep and perceptive of the meaning of that community’s faith, will counter the tendency to define one’s community as over others,” said Cobb. “Many of us identify ourselves as Christians or as Muslims precisely because we see in these traditions the call and, to some extent, the power to transcend loyalty to any particular group and direct it to the whole of creation.”

God is the only one who always extends empathy toward all others. Cobb said, “God is the supreme instance of the love that is to be found everywhere.” The word “love” can be applied literally to God, he added, and it is that purer, all-inclusive love to which we should aspire.

Thomas Jay Oord is a professor of theology and philosophy at Northwest Nazarene University in Nampa, Idaho.