First of all, be it "self-modification". We all have some hopes about that, if we care enough. (Self-evolution implies playing with genes as species, which is a dangerous business.)
As I personally caught the last chance to see a country promoting the selfless version, my stance is that the quote is spot on.
We all have some hopes about altruism, if we care enough. But then you look around and 90% of people don't care enough. By default we want dollars to buy ourselves coca-cola and american jeans. That's how everyone was in kindergarten, and maybe <10% will attempt self-modification after they grow up. That's not enough for a system to work.
First off, you are right about the "90%". The breakdown is that ~90% of that 90% are the uncommitted "confused by confusion" folks. who have neither committed to trying to be virtuous, or have committed themselves to selfish evil, which account for less than 10% of that original 90%. The uncommitted (~80%) vacillate from virtue to vice in their actions depending on how their day is going; ultimately, overall, they end up acting out of selfishness, as that is our default baseline state, which is a result of our body's mammalian heritage, with its packs and squablles for power and pleasure.
Still, the odds what they are, with the negative momentum of the selfish, by either their ebbs and flows, or by their deliberate selfishness, we must become good within ourselves for our own peace and happiness and for the ripple effects our goodness will have on those around us. It does not matter that those ripples will likely not progress very far out into the populace, because we need to do it for our own peace and happiness; that is why the universe's sublime Law of Karma exists (only for we humans with our free will, conscience, and mind) to give us internal feedback as to how our treatment of others affects their happiness, positively or negatively. That is why regime dictators are never happy or peaceful, as the unhappiness of the countless folks they have oppressed comes back into their being as a force of unhappiness. Stalin may have died in his sleep, but he was NOT happy.
The most important thing to understand is that, as evidenced by our knowing of but not in-any-way understanding Dark Matter and Energy, we live in a universe we don't understand very well yet. Our souls, minds, and free wills, are parts of our multi-dimensional selves that have no direct observability in this physical world -- we can only see some bits of their effects, and only if we are very open-minded and observant. So, when I talk about self-transformation, you must understand that our soul ("energy/astral body" that we dream with and resides within our physical body's 3-space while we are conscious) is what the spiritual path evolves/changes from vice-eousness to virtue-ousness, from selfishness to selflessness, from callous disregard to compassionate, caring service.
The spiritual self-evolution of human morality happens on that plane, not in our physical body. Yeah, that's quite a leap from where common human understanding currently is, at this point in history, but the destructively selfish ignorance is so deep and pervasive in nearly every culture on Earth that an open-hearted person should wonder how deep this willful ignorance goes, and what is its source. Read my other comments to find the explanation, if you are bold enough, that is.
As I personally caught the last chance to see a country promoting the selfless version, my stance is that the quote is spot on.
We all have some hopes about altruism, if we care enough. But then you look around and 90% of people don't care enough. By default we want dollars to buy ourselves coca-cola and american jeans. That's how everyone was in kindergarten, and maybe <10% will attempt self-modification after they grow up. That's not enough for a system to work.