The Good Vs Evil Delusion
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Culture exists in order to provide simple narratives about how the world works — or rather how we think it works. We are inherently lazy and can get easily distracted. This is why we like to keep things simple. Why bother with shades of gray when you can have black and white right? Dualities such as "good vs evil" exist due to this lazy oversimplification about how the world actually operates.
There are many good vs evil stories. God vs Satan, Jedi vs Sith, black vs white, left ring vs right wing, you name it. Nonetheless, It all depends on the given lens we choose to examine the subject. The more we benefit from our point of view the more the opposite view sucks. It works much like the concept of terrorism. If we are unloading the bombs on the enemy we are the heroes. If they are hitting back, they are the terrorists. Makes sense right?
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One of the most fascinating parallels of good vs evil is the one dealing with governments vs private organizations. Historically, state and religion have evolved in parallel with the one reinforcing the other. This is evident until today in Muslim cultures. It was also noticeable in Europe as of recently with the Byzantine empire and later on with Catholicism. It is important to understand here that the entirety of human civilization has been nourished based on these simple narratives that ultimately affect every branch of our lives.
Due to this co-evolution people have come to believe that the government acts much like a God which protects from the private evil organizations. Although this belief is unfounded, it still persists today on every level in our culture. If a piece of research comes from the government, then we assume that there are no vested interests and that its findings are sound. If it comes from a private organization we believe that they just issued their own research in order to generate profit. The government is there to "regulate the markets". People rarely ask who regulates the regulators because it takes one logical step ahead. I guess this is also why most people suck at chess.
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The truth is that everyone wants to generate profits and everyone has vested interests. Everywhere. God can be considered from some as good and for others evil. Luke Skywalker, shifted from good to evil and back to being good again. Things are never inherently good or evil. We all carry qualities that define specific situations that intrinsically can affect our morality. It all depends from our point of view and how we have come to judge the end result of the situation. We sum up the outcome for our emotional convenience, not that of objective judgment.
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Those who insist on the existence of good vs evil maintain a mostly dogmatic stance towards life itself. They have accepted a specific narrative from their side of the group and they are very hard to persuade otherwise. Whatever the other side is supporting becomes negative and ultimately evil.
We all like to believe that our actions are just, aiming towards the betterment of the world. Thing is, every single dictator that ever walked on the face of the earth had the exact same belief. Nobody believes that they are inherently assholes. If we do find ourselves in such a position, we somehow manage to excuse ourselves by blaming everything else around us but not us. Fuck entropy right?
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This peculiar duality might have helped us in our primitive past to evolve and function efficiently. Today, the narrative has become redundant and up to a point, dangerous. We like to believe that we are special and unique beings but choose to limit our individuality into a hasty cultural generalization. By degrading each other to entities of good vs evil, we consequently restrict our uniqueness. Sooner or later others will reflect those characteristics. Sure, they might not exist but our perceptions about them are very much real.
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nah. Killing and raping babies is evil. Evil exist and it's not a question of preference.
Ask a Spartan if it's evil to kill a baby.
"so if it's fine by them, then it is!" What an insane way to think.
The point he is trying to make is that Spartans don't find it evil.
Therefore it cannot be universally evil if some people are doing it.
I know. So Hitler's SS were not doing evil either.
Obviously for many people they were evil. For others (e.g SS) were actions to make the planet a better place.
post-modernism at it's best.
For a person who claims to want to have a philosophical conversation you use a lot of labels just to get away with actual arguments.
In Canada the Inuits might find themselves in harsh winters and sometimes resort in eating their babies in order to survive. Logic dictates that they can always have more babies but if they die then their clan will cease to exist.
This is also followed in Aboriginal cultures of Australia. If the clan grows to a number that it becomes unsustainable for their territory, they will kill their babies to maintain numbers and avoid getting into war with nearby clans (endangering their whole group).
In China people used to kill the female children in order to have male. It was culturally embraced and considered ethical since many were doing it. Ethics are a matter of democracy and hence the perception of good and evil.
There is nothing inherently evil in regards to what these people do. They just happen to rationalize it differently because their environment has set different constituents.
For example only a demented person would rape a child. There is nothing inherently evil to that person since they are sick.
yes it is evil. Killing an innocent person is evil, raping is evil. Not only demented people rape, sometimes rape is a part of the culture and it is an evil and barbaric practice. Child sacrifice is an age old practice too.
If you don't accept that there is objective evil, there is no standing for law and civilization collapse on itself. There is no up or down or any kind of point of reference and this is how evil people can justify their actions on utilitarian bases or "rational" basis.
Evil or Good is always subjective. Evil for you, not for them.
Western civilization was built on different ideas than other cultures, therefore we value and discredit different things than other cultures.
If it would collapse if our preferences towards our values would change, I don't think so. But it would be a different world, for sure.
It is evil to us, not to them. For example Aboriginals consider us evil for throwing our parents into care centers for them to die. For us is Tuesday. We just happen to rationalize it differently. They would carry the elderly on their shoulders until their last breath.
I would suggest you read the book "The World Until Yesterday" from Jared Diamond (Anthropologist). He explains a lot about these cultural differences and how people consider each other evil or good depending on their perception.
Not really. If I don't accept it, then it means that it has a subjective value and it would have to be decided by the group from which I would chose to live with. Whether I believe is evil or good would remain irrelevant since I will chose to live with the people that will judge me. Society does not need to collapse. Ultimatums don't really cut it. Also, the fact that so many cultures have so many different views about good and evil demonstrates how subjective the concepts are.
Indeed they do. Nonetheless, this has nothing to do with our subject matter.
so all you can say is: "I prefer that people don't rape and kill innocent babies...but if they do it and if they believe it's fine by them...then it is."
That kind of thinking gives you no intellectual grounding to defend anything that has value in this world. And when evil come knocking at your door, you will no other choice than passively accept what the culture or the zeitgeist gives you.
Sad!
I cannot dictate morality to another group nor I can help someone that doesn't ask for my help. It is tough. I witnessed some harsh things in my life but you learn to develop a thick skin.
I understand this. Never claimed I do.
Nop, I will fight for my survival. Totally irrelevant from one another
Your atheism force you in this position because it is true, you cannot dictate ehat is roght or wrong...no individual can. Theism gives a ground for objective moral value...but that's out of the real of possibilities for you it seems.
I don't believe in objective morality since it changes all the time for every culture (and individual) depending on context. This is why I guess religious people become slowly their own heresies, choosing to believe what they want from their holy texts (much like a buffet).
Atheists live much the same. Each one develops their own morals, on the go. Religious people are not more "moral" than atheists. They just happen to base their morals on a different context (fear of God) rather than doing good for the sake of good.
The definitions of of good and evil are way to subjective to begin with, which makes the argument difficult unless those words have a set definition to base an argument around. If we assume good as a positive action or positive result, then only opinion of good that matters is the actor and the recipients of the results. I think that will always be subjective. Evil I think is a poor word to use as it indicates the nature of intent, which can very from person to person with the same action. Bad is a better word I think, but cause we can assume it to be a negative result. The negative can be determined through and examination if harm is done through the action. Then the next question that comes is the circumstances surrounding the harm to see if a wrong was committed. Since doing harm can be justified, like defending yourself against an attacker, or demolishing your old home to build a new one. But then what justifies harm. You could get as many answers to that question as there are people to ask, but I think it can be worked if we can agree each life belongs to the one that experiences it. This does only work though if we accept that we are conscious, self aware and can act under our own will. If you do accept that you area self aware, its not a large step to assume other humans are self aware. Since our self is the only will that can experience the life each of us individually go through, no one can own a life other then the one they experience. I think from there you can determine whether a harm is justified or not among honest and thinking people. Which will then move into whether or not a harm, and what degree of harm, should be done even though it may be justified, which would be based on the values of the individual, which moves back to a subjective nature.
everything is subjective. e.g I can fat shame someone and through tough love they will change their ways and improve their lives. for some fat shaming is bad. In this case is good.
Is it good? What about emotional harm, possible destruction of a persons belief in their own self worth? How about a distorted perspective of body image? Sure, they my exercise, eat better, loose weight, but what if their idea of self worth is not based around their weight now? Believing if someone else believes they are over weight, their value as a person is less? You would hope that some one would be emotionally strong enough to over come such cruelty, but what is being at a healthier weight better if their ideas of self worth is damaged in such a way? Then if they were abused in such a way to cause them to loose weight, could that not then continue the cycle of abuse with that person then fat shaming others? It is the potential when one uses harm to curb another's behavior. But it really comes down to my point. Your justification to do harm to another was to change their life to how you think it would be best. But who are you to make that decision for someone else? It is their life, not yours, and by doing harm to their life, not to protect your own, but to conform their life to your will, you are in effect taking a position of ownership over that other life. I believe no one should attempt to own another, so your justification is false and the potential unintentional consequences (hoping they're unintentional) could far exceed any benefit they might gain from eating better(possibly worse) and exercising. This doesn't seem like good to me. The only justification for the harm comes from a subjective opinion, but based on incorrect or insufficient reasoning. Which makes the subjective position wrong and the value of the action bad.
When I signed up for this site, this is the kind of content I was hoping for. Not image re-posts from FB or Reddit, but this. It's so good that I'm mad you don't have a bow to put on top so we can make the world tidy and move on to other things.
This world, man...I swear that the "what" and the "why" of it is much more boggling than the "how."
thank you man. I will keep delivering.
Great article. We surely have seen the witches come out, after this past election when they wanted the people to join in their hexes and hoaxes. The problem is people want to get rid of these hexes and hoaxes that have been put in or on them via spirit cooking and/or other diabolocal rituals. Theology is great and throwing ideas around all day can be fun. However, when a qodeshiym is literally witnessing dimensions collide and darkness scatter all arguments go out the door. When a person is being set free and the qodeshiym is delivering the person out of their misery and you can feel the serpents rub against your arms and body as they exit stage left. It gets real really quick. "See, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and none at all shall hurt you" יהושע
lovely :)
awesome article.. Must upvote
gracias
aka False Dichotomy. :)
yeap :)
A lot of people kind of know better but kind of don't. They are ready to accept his kind of less biased thought process but they feel angry and helpless and dis-empowered and so they get sucked back into that narrative, sometimes with a different name.
Good and bad are concepts that we create. I think that's great, we should create concepts of good or bad because that's kind of why we are here, to create our own purpose and parameters. But then I think it's in everyone's best interest to define "good" in a way that is all-inclusive, without an "other" and without the strong desire to have others conform to a certain idea about what is "good", as long as no one is killing babies and stuff. The first step is to realize we are being manipulated, so thanks for the reminder.
yeap. and mostly by own selfs
Very awesome article. Easy on the eyes too, nice formatting.
One of my best friends and I had a very long conversation about whether anything is really inherently evil or if the entire idea is subjective. We both ended up agreeing it is subjective. I am going to share this article with her!
Thanks for getting my gears turning. :)
glad you liked it. :)
Thank you for your deep thoughts! No wonder it is said that covered with good intentions road to hell!
precisely
Nicely said! People should think about perspectives a lot more, rather than protecting their half-trues. Thank you for your post!
my pleasure.