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To even claim altruism is to use the adjective to positively light one's ego, no?

No.

This reductionism has no explanatory power. You might as well say "all egoism boils down to the benefit of the other because personal benefit benefits humanity/the universe at large. Therefore all reduces to altruism." You can pick any explanation and say "in the heart this boils down to X". If you have no special reason for choosing X (which is evident if you can explain just as much with Not-X), all such explanations are equally worthless.

There are many options other than believing that a human life divided by infinite space approaches zero.