George H. Smith talks about what Comte meant by altruism here. Excerpts below. Assuming his summaries are accurate and his quotes are selected charitably, this is not what most people mean nowadays by altruism.
Comte's altruism went far beyond the conventional moral beliefs that we should exercise benevolence and charity toward our fellow human beings. Altruism, for Comte, was the absolute duty of humans to subordinate all personal interests (other than eating and other rudimentary necessities of physical survival) to the interests of others, and ultimately to "humanity" as a whole.
[...]
Consider Comte's reaction to the Golden Rule, which many philosophers had cited as exemplifying the principle of justice, "Do to others as you would be done unto." This will not suffice as a guide to social interaction, Comte argued, because it introduces "a purely personal calculation" and is therefore inherently egoistic. Even what Comte called "the great Catholic formula: Love your neighbor as yourself" retains the "stain of selfishness" and is therefore inadequate. One should love one's "neighbor" more than oneself.
Only Comte's doctrine of altruism, according to which we should "live for others" exclusively -- again, with the "sole limitation" of basic life-sustaining activities, for only the living can live for others -- can satisfy "the definitive formula of human morality." "Live for others" is the "motto" of human beings at their highest stage of moral development. This is why Comte condemned suicide; to kill oneself, say, to escape intolerable pain is a selfish act that eliminates one's potential service to humanity: "For our life is less even than our fortune or any of our talents at our arbitrary disposal, since it is more valuable to Humanity, from whom we hold it." There can, after all, be no self-sacrifice without a self to sacrifice.
According to Comte, love, not the desire for personal gain, should be "the sole source of voluntary cooperation." [...]
[...]
In appealing to happiness as the consequence of exercising our altruistic sentiments, Comte might be accused of introducing an egoistic element into his altruistic scheme, so he set the record straight. Although altruism is the only possible source of true happiness, happiness may or may not result from altruistic acts. In no case, however, should personal happiness be the motive for altruistic acts. Whether or not we "gain" happiness from serving humanity is irrelevant. To behave altruistically because we want to be happy is to taint altruism with an egoistic motive; it is to degrade our duty to serve humanity to the level of a selfish desire for personal happiness.
[...]
[...] We are born loaded with obligations of every kind, to our predecessors, to our successors, and to our contemporaries. Later they only grow or accumulate before we can return any service. [...]
So, first of all, none of that indicates even slightly that "altruism" ever meant anything like "reversed survival instinct". (Which, to me, implies an outright preference for death.)
Secondly, it is not necessarily right to assume that Comte intended "altruism" to mean "the entirety of what Positivism says people should think, feel and do". It looks to me, from an admittedly cursory look at his book, as if he took "egoism" to mean "acting for oneself" or "caring about oneself" and "...
Diana Hsieh interviews Dr. Doug McGuff about avoidable injuries and deaths.
He's an emergency room physician in South Carolina, so he's pretty much just talking about what he's seen-- different regions have different characteristic injuries.
He says that you're safest in the largest car you can afford, which raises some interesting ethical issues.
There's a fair amount about the risks of getting overfocused on getting something done. This adds tremendously to the hazards of using ladders.
Also, did you know trees can go sproing? One of hazards of chainsaws is that a good bit of energy might be stored in a twisted tree trunk. Don't just know your physics, apply it!
More generally, there are machines and situations (ATVs, chainsaws, airplanes, skiing, etc.) which tend to make people feel more competent than they are.
On the other hand, injuries from rock climbing and horseback riding are less common than you might think. I don't know why the ancestral environment didn't give people a reflexive distaste against diving into water. Perhaps people back then had too much sense to dive much.
One of the pieces of advice-- to get out of stressful relationships-- is too general. This is mostly a good idea, but from what I've read, leaving a violent relationship can lead to more risk of violence. It's still a good idea to leave, but it's important to leave cautiously.
Both McGuff and Hsieh are objectivists, so some of the discussion might be in mind-killer territory.
Edited to add: It's possible that objectivism would be better discussed under a new post. It's certain that there's a bunch of interesting material in the podcast, and avoidable accidents are worth discussing.
Topic list: