Charity
We think one great insight of Adam Smith is that Human Nature is probably far more complex and subtle than most have labelled and realised and that self-interest; self-love and sympathy could well be manifestations of the same force innate to mankind. As such, society may well be just about making the most from these two above dialetic sides of human nature.
And such insights of Adam Smith could be traced back to Francis Hutcheson who was a major figure in the Scottish Enlightenment and one central thesis of Francis Hutcheson’s moral philosophy is that the concern for others by the moral sense is natural to mankind. Hutcheson believed that moral sense is implanted in man and pronounces instinctively and immediately on the character of actions and affections, approving those that are virtuous and disapproving those that are vicious.
Our read is that Adam Smith’s idea of Impartial Spectator and the origin of human sympathy as expounded in his Theory of Moral Sentiments probably represented a further refinement of the idea inspired by Francis Hutcheson.
We think the power of “self-love”; “sympathy” and “impartial spectator” as highlighted by Adam Smith in The Theory of Moral Sentiments are still far from being fully-understood and utilised and this constitutes an area which worths a lot more attention and one way to promote such awareness could be just facilitating similar endeavours on local communities and districts which Hong Kong could well extend help to.
In many ways, we think the John Whitgift Foundation in the UK illustrates that what Adam Smith has thought of is possible – this Foundation has been quietly supporting the development of the Croydon district in the UK for some 427 years by now and one may say this came from mainly John Whitgift’s heart-felt sympathy for the people in Croydon which he visited frequently during his life time.