Philosophy discussion

Which philosophical explanation of the origin of evil works best for you?

I believe there is no such thing as good or evil. The brain is built to think the way it thinks. I have a difficult time believing in the idea of free-will because what I perceive as good another may perceive as evil. Yes, there are moral questions of the actions of some but, however it is because of the fact that they're whole heartedly doing what they desire.
So, now we stem it to desire. What is desire? What fixates people on desire? Unfortunately, what drives desire is a question that may never be answered for sex and desire stems from the same abyss of the mind that really has not been explored, yet.

I don't have an answer, but I've always wondered why the origin of evil is a problem, but not the origin of goodness. Most of the time, I tend to think that evil is the norm, and goodness is the exception.

In answer to Matthew, I wonder if he thinks that things that are solely the creations of the human mind, in general, don't exist. Marriages? Contracts? Laws? Countries? If there are marriages, then surely there is also evil.

The difficulty of an answer to the question of "What is the origin of evil?" is not the term "evil", but "origin".

The concept of evil can be looked at from both religious/philosophical and scientific point of view, whereas the concept of origin is rather of scientific nature.

This is way, it is difficult to assert any meaning to origin from a religious point of view. Even if God created the evil, the concept of creation is to vague -- perhaps, for humans incomprehensible -- such that one can infer from it that God is the origin of evil. Such a step would be scientific, but not religious.

On the other hand, when one treat the question from a scientific point of view, then evil will be subjective and its origin means, the one recorded in the past and for what it meant in the past. Thus, the question of the origin of evil transforms in the one regarding the evolution of the concept of evil as it was felt by human kind.

Duffy: I don't have an answer, but I've always wondered why the origin of evil is a problem, but not the origin of goodness.

Good point!
I have had always problem understanding the question. Is evil some phenomenon we could grasp by means of causal reasoning? Is it like A causes B causes C causes evil? I don’t think so. As I see it, evil is matter of fact. It abruptly breaks into existence. It is just here. For me, the problem is not the origin of evil, but evil itself. Asking the question of origin requires distancing oneself, as if we were not most intimately involved, as if we could stand out beyond good and evil, look around and judge who is to blame. But we live inside the tension and cannot step out of it. Can we causally explain being or time?
I don’t know whether the question has any meaning outside the framework of theodicy. But for this, I find the most profound approach in the gospel of John. There is a blind man and the disciples ask: „Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?“ Jesus answers: „It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.“ And heals him. We are looking for causes and origins, while the real question might be not who sinned, but what we can do about it. The answer lies not in the past, but in the future.

I dont have idea if this book of profesor Boguslaw Wolniewicz translate into english but i highly recommended ''Rzeczy i Fakty'' where profesor defines origin of evil. Very, very interesting thing ;)

There are a lot of ways of looking at this question, but a common and ancient way of asking where does evil come from is to ask whether there is a natural law that defines good and evil or whether it is a convention made by men that defines good and evil.

Plato thought the former and he was joined by many, many others. I think that most people conclude that there is a natural law that defines good and evil.

The leading minority view is that humans have defined good and evil. The sophists of Plato's time seemed to hold this view. A more sophisticated version of that view can be found in the American Pragmatic movement.

I don't know which is right, but I do think that for purposes of conducting government - not religion necessarily - the minority view has great advantages.

"I think that most people conclude that there is a natural law that defines good and evil."

Since most people have a religion i will guess you are right.. For them their religion probably IS the "natural law of good and evil"..

Most people interested in philosophy, i would guess, consider values (like good and evil) something subjective and thus varying from person to person and from culture to culture..
But maybe i just think that because that is my own opinion..

@Duffy: Surely everything exist only in the mind. Everything we create is imaginary. Marriage? What is the need of marriage? Marriage exist only through Catholicism because in the bible it states a man must "companion" one woman. Why? Who came up with that concept? Monogamy is not for everyone. Even, though we excepted it as conformity my point is that one single person imagined it in their mind and made it real by striking the fear of hell in their minds which, makes me question to ability of most humans sadly...

This all ties in with the question of free will. Does it really exist? I don't think so. How does one know what their interest are from the start? How does one know their sexual preference right from childhood?

Simply put, neurology teaches us that we inherit our neuron receptors from our parents and ancestors so, we basically inherit their "memories" if you will. How do you think it's possible that we always end up like our fathers or mothers? lol.

And add that the chemicals in our bodies responds to what the mind tells them to respond too. The universe is a magical place and the atoms in our bodies responds to the universe and the universe is in all of us and every living thing across the galaxies.

God is innocent, a big child.

Fun topic.

William Golding gives an interesting twist to the idea of 'demons' and 'devils' in his book, 'The Inheritors'. The way he suggests it is that when Homo sapiens evolved past the Neanderthals, the diminishing pockets of Neanderthals must have looked very demonic to the Sapiens. There were a thousand years or so when they could have crossed paths as they traveled along their evolutionary paths. Thus, a ready-made set of puppets for our nightmares.

But nevermind. As stated in an earlier message above, where to start sifting among the myriad of theories? They're numberless. How to proceed so as not to simply find oneself back at some sort of monadism or dualism? The idea of 'flaw' or 'fault'? Its a wholly unsatisfying area to wind up in.

In monadism, there's a lot of frustrating talk about how 'if an idea is perfect, it does not need to split off copies or versions of itself'. Grrrr. So how can you trace any opposing pairs of values farther back than that? Yes the material incarnation of any idea is bound to be imperfect, got it, understood--but where does that leave discussion? Sigh. It all becomes ontological: why is the universe filled with 'many' things rather than just 'one' thing. I don't know, why? To ask whence comes evil, you have to have answer for the cause of anything. Dualities always lead back to the 'one'; but there's the rub. Why didn't 'the one' stay 'one' if it was perfect?

As Hegel says, consciousness has a need to 'reflect' itself, apprehend itself, in order to 'be'?

In regards to this periodic Goodreads debate over the source of evil, I’d like to offer a statistical version. There are about 7.5 billion humans currently on this planet. If 1 in 1000 people do something foolish today, that will be 7,500,000 foolish things today alone, or about 2.7 billion foolish things per year. Those foolish things will span a broad range from simple idiocy to malevolent evil, so some small fraction of 7.5 million things per day will be evil. What percentage of those things qualify as evil will vary by definition, but if we assume, 1 in 100,000 foolish acts are evil, there will be 75 evil acts today worldwide (this sounds far too low from my witness to humanity), or about 27,000 evil acts per year.

Some of these evils will be multiplicative, breeding more evils. I.e. Hitler’s industrial scale murder in the camps required raw materials, distribution, and what they called “processing,” all of which served to grow more tendrils of evil throughout the Reich, scaling the magnitude of evil. Another more common multiplier will be knock-on effects. After a few beers, a boy runs a stop sign. Spotted by police, he spontaneously turns down an alley. He accelerates. People shout, “Slow down!” He turns his head to shout back an obscenity. He runs over a girl playing with her dog.

Other knock-on effects can be argued for drug use, theft, infidelity, and a thousand other initiators. Who needs to invent a devil? Humans are not only supremely capable of evil on their own, it’s a matter of habit that some of us engage in acts that are or become evil. Which is not to say humans are evil, only that we are its origin. No need for supernatural assignment.

The concepts of good and evil arose with us, and the power that they hold over our minds has driven us to create supernatural surrogates on whom we can shift the blame for our actions.

The natural world beyond us seems to have few qualms. Predators actively stalk, dismember and devour the children of other specie. Yet, while the parent/s of some of the victims may mourn for a time, there is no moral outrage over the matter. The mother seal may feel loss at the sight of the blood stained snow which was once her pup, but only man calls the polar bear a monster.

The curious bit is not from where the idea of evil arose. It is how a concept so irrelevant to the universe can be so essential to the survival of civilization.

@ Feliks
Golding's assertions would seem to be at least partially disproved by genetic evidence that Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalis interbred for some time.

Duffy wrote: "I don't have an answer, but I've always wondered why the origin of evil is a problem, but not the origin of goodness. Most of the time, I tend to think that evil is the norm, and goodness is the ex..."

Please explain how the existence of evil follows from the existence of marriages.

I do like your comment on why people are not as worried about where goodness come from.

I think Matthew has a point. It sounds like its basis can be found in the subjectivism view of moral facts, which I was recently introduced to reading The Truth about God. According to the author it is an option distinct from the other views of moral facts - objectivism and relativism. Where objectivsim, which the theist must assert, but the atheist can also assert, is that there are moral facts, and relativism grants moral facts, but they are dependent on the culture where they are found, subjectivism claims there are no moral facts. According to the author this does not have to lead to nihilism. He also asserts that what seems like moral facts are acutally moral feelings, where there is a lot inter-subjectivism, so we are not morally cast offed from others.

I have just started to explore this notion of moral facts, but prima facie it is attractive for me. So, Matthew is correct under this view that evil does not exist. However, I would not say that evil is just a part of the human imagination. Certainly, evil is a word that we can label actions in the world. The same goes for goodness or any other moral term.

So I propose that the origin of evil as a fact, need not be accepted. Therefore, the question seems ill posed. What we feel as evil is the result of are biological and social evolution. Does this amout to morality as an invention of humans? Is morality just imagined? I cannot accept that without further reason. Could we all be solipist? Maybe, but I doubt it.

Does this divorce all facts from moral dileberations. I think not. If my moral feelings leads me to believe it is a good thing to help feed the hungry, than certain facts about the world should figure into how I would go about meeting that moral goal.

As I said, I have just started to explore subjectivism, so this should not be seen as a frim beleif.

J. wrote: "Golding's assertions would seem to be at least partially disproved by genetic evidence that Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalis interbred for some time...."

This doesn't disprove the basis for his novel. That they co-existed at all, and perhaps met --this is the grounding for his idea. The last chapter of the tale has the sapien tribe adopting some of the children of their lesser predecessors.

Duong wrote: "I just wanted to know if we discussed the origins of evil from a subjective/objective point of view, should it be from the act or the consequences perspective. I know I probably have convoluted or ..."

I think it should be whatever you are more comfortable with. In a philosophy discussion I don't think it matters what point of view you discuss as long as it is clear. What's your take on it?

Evil is essentially the lack of order, i.e. the subjection of superior realities to inferior realities, it arises when an individual subjects the faculties of the mind to ephemeral goods, when appetites aren't subject to reason.

It is the aversion of free will to immutable goods, and its conversion to mutable goods. Since this is not forced but voluntary, free will is the source of evil.

I see evil as being a lack of good, in the way that darkness is the absence of light x

I see it sometimes as either an a priori idea, or an idea that has developed into a human construct which becomes handed-down in an instinctual manner, from each set of human individuals down to their heirs.

Said another way: no matter how we receive the idea; we hold it out before us as a 'standard' via which to judge all experience and sensation. It is like a shore where 'waves' of phenomenon routinely fall: how they fall is judged either 'good' or 'bad' by us, as we sit here watching the repetition of the tides.

It has been suggested that free will is the source of evil. I would like to add my 5 cents (death of the penny) and suggest that evil is an abuse of free will. We all have the capacity to do good or do evil. That's what free will is all about. Without it, we are no better than automatons.
Also, how many villains claim that they are evil? They are doing, to their mind, the best or only thing they can do. Society does its perceiving bit - if that 'best thing' had negative repercussions, then it's definitely evil.
Then you have your Joker types - the guy that just wants to see the world burn. Is he evil or just perverse? All depends on what society perceives and records, I guess.

really interesting insight about it

https://www.ted.com/talks/philip_zimb...

"Eichmann and his staff became responsible for Jewish deportations to extermination camps, where the victims were gassed. After Germany invaded Hungary in March 1944, Eichmann oversaw the deportation of much of that country's Jewish population. Most of the victims were sent to Auschwitz concentration camp, where 75 to 90 per cent were murdered upon arrival. By the time the transports were stopped in July 1944, 437,000 of Hungary's 725,000 Jews had been killed. Historian Richard J. Evans estimates that between 5.5 and 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis. Eichmann said towards the end of the war that he would "leap laughing into the grave because the feeling that he had five million people on his conscience would be for him a source of extraordinary satisfaction."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_E...

Stano28 wrote: "Which philosophical explanation of the origin of evil works best for you?"

The Philosophy of Broader Survival explains it the best: Good and Evil are goal-driven - good works for your goal, evil against it (unless your goal is evil, then the opposite is true). You can see the problem with humanity - they are still universally clueless, so they live by subjective value - to each their own, so good and evil are wishy-washy, and each person has their own notions, since they have no clue as to what the Ultimate Value of Life is, or its associate Goal, which doubles and the Ultimate Determining Factor between Good and Evil. It works like this: you have identified the Ultimate Value of Life (not all values being equal, so one will be the Ultimate), and the Ultimate Goal of Life is to secure that value. Since you are dealing with the Ultimate Goal, you have the Ultimate Determining Factor. You really need to read the philosophy.