What is the difference between heaven and hell?
There is a charming story that tells of two rooms in which there is a delicious banquet on the table.
In the one room, there are wails and anger as the people all have long knives and forks attached to their arms and can't eat the wonderful food as they can't bend their arms to get it into their mouths.
In the other room, there are smiles and laughter. Everyone is eating to their heart's delight even though they also have long knives and forks on their arms. The difference is that everyone is using the knives and forks to feed the person on the other side of the table.
It's the same situation, but a profoundly different result because of a different attitude of mind. It's more complicated in the real world, but there are lots of examples where a cooperative self-interest is best for everyone.
Elinor Ostrom shared this year's Nobel Prize for Economics for her refutation of "the tragedy of the commons" fable that was popularized in the late 1960s by wildlife biologist Garret Hardin. According to Hardin, the problem is that it is in every individual's interest to have as many cows as possible graze on common land, but the outcome is that over-grazing eventually ruins it.