Greed is a basic part of animal nature. Being against it is like being against breathing or eating. It means nothing.

The remark frames greed not as a moral aberration but as an innate, evolutionarily rooted drive akin to biological necessities. By likening opposition to greed to opposition to breathing or eating, it argues that condemning greed in the abstract is futile unless one addresses the underlying incentives and constraints that channel self-interest. The implication is pragmatic rather than celebratory: because acquisitiveness is a persistent feature of human (and animal) behavior, social systems should assume it and design rules—markets, laws, norms—to harness or limit it, rather than relying on moral denunciation alone. It also invites debate about whether “greed” is being conflated with ordinary self-interest or desire.