"Homo economicus, is a creature of coldly calculated selfishness, dispassionately maximizing its best interests even if that comes at the expense of others."
For the second time today, I get to point out that in economics is neutral about "best interests" and is metaphorically happy to accommodate people whom consider happiness or other such "soft" things as part of their personal value function. If your definition of "homo economicus" is a psycopath... well, you're the one who stuck a psychopath there, so ultimately this is a circular argument in which one asserts that economics is based on the idea of a psychopath that you put there in the first place. Not exactly a surprising result there.
There is absolutely no contradiction between "most people act in what they believe to be their best interests" and "most people take care of their family", because obviously most people consider "taking care of their family" to be in their "best interests".
Homo Economicus is still a fictional being, but it's not because "not everyone is a psychopath", it's because not everyone is perfectly rational all the time, and humans do have some weaknesses on the rationality front. It was (and really is) a good approximation because on the whole, people do act amusingly rationally in a surprising array of situations. (I say "amusing" because they will often act perfectly rationally in some circumstance, then cite as their reason some astonishing bullshit reason. Nevertheless, their actions are often quite rational.)
It's still supposed to be "Homo Economicus" and not "Robo Economicus" or "Vulcan Economicus".
For the second time today, I get to point out that in economics is neutral about "best interests" and is metaphorically happy to accommodate people whom consider happiness or other such "soft" things as part of their personal value function. If your definition of "homo economicus" is a psycopath... well, you're the one who stuck a psychopath there, so ultimately this is a circular argument in which one asserts that economics is based on the idea of a psychopath that you put there in the first place. Not exactly a surprising result there.
There is absolutely no contradiction between "most people act in what they believe to be their best interests" and "most people take care of their family", because obviously most people consider "taking care of their family" to be in their "best interests".
Homo Economicus is still a fictional being, but it's not because "not everyone is a psychopath", it's because not everyone is perfectly rational all the time, and humans do have some weaknesses on the rationality front. It was (and really is) a good approximation because on the whole, people do act amusingly rationally in a surprising array of situations. (I say "amusing" because they will often act perfectly rationally in some circumstance, then cite as their reason some astonishing bullshit reason. Nevertheless, their actions are often quite rational.)
It's still supposed to be "Homo Economicus" and not "Robo Economicus" or "Vulcan Economicus".