wolf was responding to a common dichotomy in human psychology: humans are motivated by self-interest or objective elements (such as reason, duty, morality) or both. she proposes that this understanding of human psychology is weak for it does not take into account love or meaning.
wolf thinks that meaning involves both subjective (self-interest) and objective (morality) elements. something needs to be reasonably good-to-you (thereby satisfying the subjective component) and good-to-something-outside-you (thereby satisfying the objective component) in order to be properly considered as meaningful.
the point is that it is not reducible to either. when we want to explain why one helps his friend move house, it is not sufficient to say that he does it out of self-interest and/or morality (e.g. impartial duties towards friends). it would not be accurate to say that one helps his friend because he thinks it is in his interest to do so. he may certainly agree that it is in his interest, broadly conceived, to help his friend (because the sofa is not heavy enough to have a good chance of causing serious damage to his spine, and if he doesnt help his friend he may lose his friendship/lose an opportunity to deepen the relationship), but that need not be why he did it. to understand his real motivation for helping his friend, we need to understand the nature of love or meaning (i.e. what his friend means to him).
Well, one can deny both sides of the dichotomy, and say that conscious motivations are frequently post-hoc rationalizations - particularly in matters relating to social relationships and status. The conscious actor is simply not the prime mover. Where this is the case, speculation about possible motivations is likely to be unproductive.
wolf thinks that meaning involves both subjective (self-interest) and objective (morality) elements. something needs to be reasonably good-to-you (thereby satisfying the subjective component) and good-to-something-outside-you (thereby satisfying the objective component) in order to be properly considered as meaningful.
the point is that it is not reducible to either. when we want to explain why one helps his friend move house, it is not sufficient to say that he does it out of self-interest and/or morality (e.g. impartial duties towards friends). it would not be accurate to say that one helps his friend because he thinks it is in his interest to do so. he may certainly agree that it is in his interest, broadly conceived, to help his friend (because the sofa is not heavy enough to have a good chance of causing serious damage to his spine, and if he doesnt help his friend he may lose his friendship/lose an opportunity to deepen the relationship), but that need not be why he did it. to understand his real motivation for helping his friend, we need to understand the nature of love or meaning (i.e. what his friend means to him).
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