The Origin of evil
- Harris
- Posts: 54
- Joined: February 25th, 2015, 12:17 am
The Origin of evil
Animals normally are considered in conscious states but with the lack of capacity to be introspectively aware of themselves. Apparently, they do not form beliefs about what conscious states they are in, for they lack the requisite concepts to do so. Therefore, they are thought to be blind with respect to their own self.
Man, on the other side has an introspective awareness of his own conscious state that is made up of a belief that emerges out of the direct acquaintance with conscious state.
Introspective awareness of the conscious self plays a unique cognitive role in the understanding of morality. Morality can be seen as relationship between pleasure and pain, goodness and evil, and sensations of right and wrong. These ideas serve a fundamental concept of self which is usually different from the conceptions of other individuals.
The power of introspective awareness is basically the cause of feelings of self-respect that render fulfilment of any desire as contribution to self-interest. Every man respects the authority of his own individual in determining which experiences make his life go better. If narrowly thinking, a life of pleasurable sensation is better for the person even if one does not prefer it. This idea, in general, tempts people to overwhelm generally accepted moral standards using their alluring desires and consequently get involve in wishful thinking and believing in something about themselves that lacks adequate evidence because they want their seductive beliefs to be true. Being under the influence of tempting and attractive desires people try to avoid any discomfort from conflicting thoughts about their own self-image by turning their attentions to other matters or in sceptical thinking they try to construct hypotheses on the fly to prove weakness of the evidence that conflicts with their self-image. Arguably, they can practice self-deception about their motives and reasons to favour their dear desires.
When a person lacks control over his desires, inner conflict often results in the victory of evil over good. His actions may stem from appetites or desires that are not properly ruled by some higher part of the self.
As there is a propensity to evil deep in all people therefore, in some cases people are too quick to make up their minds to take an unjustified action because their appetites are too strong. The wicked among such people neglect the incentive of respect for moral law altogether; even when they act in accord with the moral law, they do the right thing for the wrong reasons and so are corrupt in their cast of mind.
Uncontrollable desires can easily lead people to hedonism which is the doctrine that pleasure is the good. Hedonism has usually been viewed as self-indulgence so the behaviour of a hedonist is morally susceptible. Unscrupulous hedonism is the cause of immoral acts such as theft which brings pleasure to the thief but pain to the victim.
Intentional activities of hedonists and their motivated processes of avoiding unpleasant truths result in their mental states of ignorance, false beliefs, unwarranted attitudes, and inappropriate emotions which are objectionable because that give hedonists a way to camouflages and support their greed, cruelty and other forms of wrongdoings. Their tactics also include rationalization, wilful ignorance, and systematic ignoring. Another strategy that unscrupulous hedonists may put into action is the distortion of standards of rationality for a false belief by exaggerating favourable evidences for what people want to believe, disregarding contrary evidences, and resting content with minimal evidence for pleasing beliefs.
Collective of unscrupulous hedonists share false beliefs and unwarranted attitudes that are provocative and contentious. Such collective tends to abuse and degrade morality by the use of debauchery as rhetorical weapon that undermines tolerance. They encourage insult for moralists based on malice and endanger commonly accepted standards of morality. When motives and consequences are evil that reduce unscrupulous hedonists into representatives of cruelty and callous moral negligence.
A lack of perception or feeling for others, lying off the scale of the ethical, in the form of a brutality or beastliness virtually falls out of the category of the human. Disrespect is inherently vicious and emphasizes the animal aspects of human life. Among evil or vicious motivations, a basic type is cruelty which is the desire to cause suffering a disposition which contrasts markedly with brutality. Such cruel behaviour is directly an attempted expression of power.
Maliciousness is another form of evil which is the desire that other people’s happiness should not exist. Normally, people in this state of mind get pleased if others come to grief, even though they do not bring it about themselves.
Both brutality and maliciousness are parts of the character of unscrupulous hedonists. People who cleverly conceal their dishonesty, there is no argument the moralist can provide is likely to change their minds.
Wealth, possession, and power which were acquired by means of deceptive deeds mainly cause superiority complex and arrogance in the behaviour of unscrupulous hedonist. However, in reality, posh lifestyle of a deceiver is only a hollow ostentation because at the foundation unscrupulous hedonist remains a cunning wicked thief who masters in stealing by exploiting forbidden practices. The main secret behind his successes in fact is the antipathy of general public against immoral, harmful, and notorious activities that leave no rival in the field who may compete the unscrupulous hedonist in his destructive activities. Without facing competition culprit is the king of felonious world.
In this article, I have brought to light only few aspects to elucidate why people turn into detrimental beasts. I recommend you to watch following two videos which make emphasis on what strokes and tactics the culprits or unscrupulous hedonists embrace by neglecting the conventional moral standards to make their success ultimate.
“Human reality is the pure effort to become God without there being any given substratum for that effort, without there being anything which so endeavours. Desire expresses this endeavour.”
Page 576
Being and Nothingness
Jean-Paul Sartre
“Thus, my freedom is a choice of being God and all my acts, all my projects translate this choice and reflect it in a thousand and one ways, for there is an infinity of ways of being and of ways of having.”
Page 599
Being and Nothingness
Jean-Paul Sartre
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Re: The Origin of evil
But, why covet, at all; what's the engine driving covetousness? The difference between I-am, and I-am-not runs deeper than mere envy, which is only a symptom of evil. The true root of evil lies in the split between I-am, and I-am-not. We grieve the loss of that which lies on the other side of the split. That which lies on the other side is mourned as a lost self.
If Jean-Paul Sartre is right, and the ego is in the world, as an object of consciousness, then we know ourselves as being in the world. But, the ego is separate from everything else, a stranger and sojourner in a strange place. It has no home; every footfall echoes as a recrimination, saying You don't belong here! The world is wide and the ego is small, too small and ephemeral to find peace.
The split between I-am (i.e., the ego) and the world (which isn't the ego) is painful to the ego. It, therefore fantasizes that it encompasses the whole world, which of course, it doesn't. The pleasure which the ego takes in the fantasy turns to resentment and angst, as it begins to remember the truth. The evil of being alienated from the world drives the ego to covet that which it isn't, and that which it doesn't have.
I believe the social imperative to learn represents the ego's need to be in the world. Learning about the world is the ego's way of becoming greater than itself, and thus repairing the evil of alienation. Being able to say I-am this, or I-am that assimilates a part of the world; but, it also reinforces a language-of-alienation. Evil, thus goes hand-in-hand with self-awareness, which is the origin of evil.
- EvaHawk
- New Trial Member
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- Joined: December 10th, 2016, 4:46 pm
Re: The Origin of evil
The origin of evil is, in my opinion, in the minds of men seeking to control other men through fear. I do not believe that any one person in the world commits evil actions for the sake of their simply being evil. I believe they perceive the world in a twisted way in which their 'evil' actions are right in accordance to their experience of social mores and/or are designed to give themselves pleasure. I think if I were to define evil it would be more along the lines of that malicious nature you described, but with no pleasure or benefit in any way to the person committing the evil. That is what it means to me. No self-aware, self-conscious being would knowingly do evil by this definition.
I see the quotes you provided as being somewhat archaic since Sartre lived in a time where it was common to accept that 'being God' meant something more than a biased abstraction. However, I respect the nobility of purpose and only mean to decry its practicality.
All of my complaints being said, I agree that morality is the relationship between pleasure and pain, and that, at its very core and by all of your definitions, is the origin of evil. But I ask you this: Has there ever been a moral man? Has he ever graced us lowly hedonists with his presence? I am just not sure such a completely 'non evil' person could ever be self aware or conscious.
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- Joined: July 19th, 2014, 9:58 pm
Re: The Origin of evil
Evil isn't merely a mistake in judgment, nor is it simple nihilism. There are certain behaviors which are proscribed by society. And yes, different societies have different moral strictures. But, cultural relativism aside each society does proscribe certain behaviors, even if following them might serve a higher good.
Those who commit, or practice evil in no way imagine that they are, in fact evil. Theirs is usually a tragic tale, inasmuch as they ultimately don't succeed in their schemes. Regardless whether it's on behalf of themselves or others, evildoers vail their schemes in secrecy, not that they believe they're wrong, but so they won't get caught before their schemes reach fruition.
Such secrecy breeds a romantic disposition. And, despite the opprobrium we may heap upon them, evildoers always have our grudging admiration. They fly like Icarus, too close to the sun, and fall alongside their schemes upon a very hard ground. There is never an alter-of-evil, only the desire to do good, and damn the consequences.
I've already given my opinion as to the origin of evil. What I'm doing now is giving an apology of evil. I don't believe it's something we can educate out of people, nor is it something we can evolve out of. We practice evil, in secrecy and in the misguided belief we're doing the good which others have no stomach for. So, is there such a thing as evil, or is it the practice, thereof?
The question of evil as a Platonic universal is probably intractable. But, we're usually able to recognize evil, when we see it. Not, as I said because there's an alter-of-evil, but, rather because we eventually see those proscribed behaviors being violated. And then, we go from shaming the evildoers to clamoring for their deaths.
We know evil, we fantasize about it like a teenager's wet dream. If only we had Plato's Ring of Gyges, and could thereby become invisible. What evil we would spawn! We'd avenge ourselves, or maybe the little twerp from down the street, who keeps getting beaten up. (Then maybe we'd beat him up ourselves, just because he's such a weakling. It's surely a good thing to edit him out of the gene pool).
But, regardless of why we'd do what we could, with Plato's talesman, we ultimately commit evil because it feeds our egos. We want to see goodness triumph so badly, we'll do anything to make it happen. And so, we hatch our plans, in private. We nefariously recruit various dupes to carry out those plans; and, we finally strike at the right moment, in the name of whatever good we're trying to accomplish.
Our strike can be big, or small. And when it does, eventually fail we believe deep in our hearts that we're the victims. O' what good we might have done, had fate just been kinder! The Ring of Gyges can only render us invisible, it can't render us immaterial. We eventually face public opprobrium. We're judged by lesser mortals, who certainly wouldn't have had the stones to dare take the forbidden fruit. And so, our evil schemes die, only to be reborn in someone else.
- Lark_Truth
- Posts: 212
- Joined: December 24th, 2016, 11:51 am
- Favorite Philosopher: Brandon Sanderson
Re: The Origin of evil
Maybe try it this way: Evil is not innate in humans, it has to be taught.
While we are young, we are extremely susceptible to exterior influences. Sometime in the years of our first decade in life, we are developing ourselves. Our modes of though, our behaviors, our early knowledge, etc. Often times we try to mimic what we see older people doing. We speak certain vocabulary words (kids seem to like picking up swear words), we want to watch certain TV shows or movies, we like dressing up certain ways. It is within these early years of our life that most parents try to teach their kids to do good (or receive a spanking!). But if our parents and guardians don't teach us, they are by default encouraging bad habits that lead us into taking up lifestyles which are not good. Pornography, sex, dishonor, murder, drugs, alcohol, none of that was apart of the human life at the very first. As babies we are innocent, when we learn we loose that innocence and someone--whether they do it directly or indirectly--takes advantage of that. If you're looking for the origin of evil, don't look inside, look outside.
- Harris
- Posts: 54
- Joined: February 25th, 2015, 12:17 am
Re: The Origin of evil
In the above scenario, the important part is the innate knowledge that tells the new born on how to react when encountered with certain sensual bother. As if there is a set of instructions embedded in his cognizance that tells him when to react and how to react. Another example is his instinctual act of seeking and sucking of the breast.
This innate knowledge is the fundamental foundation of the apprehension of pleasure and pain and it is not the outcome of any former sensory experience. The innate human knowledge is not the acquired knowledge the same way as birds, termites, spiders, etc. have not acquired the knowledge on how to engineer their dwelling places.
Based on these observations, many prominent thinkers have supported the idea of innate knowledge. For example:
Plato argued that humans know many things and have many concepts, which they have not learned or acquired on earth. Hence, humans must have learned them in a previous existence.
(Phaedo 73a-78a and Meno 81b-86b)
Leibniz put it this way:
“This fits in with my principles, for nothing naturally enters our mind from outside; and it is a bad habit of ours to think of our soul as receiving messenger species, or as if it had doors and windows. We have all these forms in our mind and indeed always have had; because the mind always expresses all its future thoughts, and is already thinking confusedly of everything it will ever think clearly. We could not be taught something unless we already had the idea of it in our mind, the idea being like the matter out of which the thought is formed.”
Section 26.
Discourse on Metaphysics,
trans. G. Montgomery, La Salle
The knowledge of good and evil is directly proportionate to the awareness of pleasure and pain but because awareness is the inherent quality of human construct therefore the knowledge of virtue and vice is innate in its basic form. In my opinion, any attempt to eradicate any inherent quality of human construct is in itself an immoral act.
-
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Re: The Origin of evil
So in the end Evil is a label that the conscious awareness can recall from memory, as those set of A&B's that are recognizable, and respond accordingly. Really nothing more or nothing less. Of course all of this assumes that the brain has no free will. If you adhere to the belief that humans have free will and are able to make choices than all bets are off. We also have the capacity of denial that will protect you from evil. and that's a good thing
- The Philosopher
- New Trial Member
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Re: The Origin of evil
By the way, nice to meet you all, this is my first comment in this interesting forum.
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Re: The Origin of evil
- Phenomexistentialist
- New Trial Member
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Re: The Origin of evil
Adam and Eve ate the apple.Harris wrote:Every living being is a conscious independent being which has senses of pain and pleasure. Bodily sensations of pain and pleasure can be seen as a form of awareness of the states and properties of one’s own body. Such awareness makes people capable to analyse behaviour of a living being in terms of seeking pleasure and avoiding pain.
Animals normally are considered in conscious states but with the lack of capacity to be introspectively aware of themselves. Apparently, they do not form beliefs about what conscious states they are in, for they lack the requisite concepts to do so. Therefore, they are thought to be blind with respect to their own self.
Man, on the other side has an introspective awareness of his own conscious state that is made up of a belief that emerges out of the direct acquaintance with conscious state.
Introspective awareness of the conscious self plays a unique cognitive role in the understanding of morality. Morality can be seen as relationship between pleasure and pain, goodness and evil, and sensations of right and wrong. These ideas serve a fundamental concept of self which is usually different from the conceptions of other individuals.
The power of introspective awareness is basically the cause of feelings of self-respect that render fulfilment of any desire as contribution to self-interest. Every man respects the authority of his own individual in determining which experiences make his life go better. If narrowly thinking, a life of pleasurable sensation is better for the person even if one does not prefer it. This idea, in general, tempts people to overwhelm generally accepted moral standards using their alluring desires and consequently get involve in wishful thinking and believing in something about themselves that lacks adequate evidence because they want their seductive beliefs to be true. Being under the influence of tempting and attractive desires people try to avoid any discomfort from conflicting thoughts about their own self-image by turning their attentions to other matters or in sceptical thinking they try to construct hypotheses on the fly to prove weakness of the evidence that conflicts with their self-image. Arguably, they can practice self-deception about their motives and reasons to favour their dear desires.
When a person lacks control over his desires, inner conflict often results in the victory of evil over good. His actions may stem from appetites or desires that are not properly ruled by some higher part of the self.
As there is a propensity to evil deep in all people therefore, in some cases people are too quick to make up their minds to take an unjustified action because their appetites are too strong. The wicked among such people neglect the incentive of respect for moral law altogether; even when they act in accord with the moral law, they do the right thing for the wrong reasons and so are corrupt in their cast of mind.
Uncontrollable desires can easily lead people to hedonism which is the doctrine that pleasure is the good. Hedonism has usually been viewed as self-indulgence so the behaviour of a hedonist is morally susceptible. Unscrupulous hedonism is the cause of immoral acts such as theft which brings pleasure to the thief but pain to the victim.
Intentional activities of hedonists and their motivated processes of avoiding unpleasant truths result in their mental states of ignorance, false beliefs, unwarranted attitudes, and inappropriate emotions which are objectionable because that give hedonists a way to camouflages and support their greed, cruelty and other forms of wrongdoings. Their tactics also include rationalization, wilful ignorance, and systematic ignoring. Another strategy that unscrupulous hedonists may put into action is the distortion of standards of rationality for a false belief by exaggerating favourable evidences for what people want to believe, disregarding contrary evidences, and resting content with minimal evidence for pleasing beliefs.
Collective of unscrupulous hedonists share false beliefs and unwarranted attitudes that are provocative and contentious. Such collective tends to abuse and degrade morality by the use of debauchery as rhetorical weapon that undermines tolerance. They encourage insult for moralists based on malice and endanger commonly accepted standards of morality. When motives and consequences are evil that reduce unscrupulous hedonists into representatives of cruelty and callous moral negligence.
A lack of perception or feeling for others, lying off the scale of the ethical, in the form of a brutality or beastliness virtually falls out of the category of the human. Disrespect is inherently vicious and emphasizes the animal aspects of human life. Among evil or vicious motivations, a basic type is cruelty which is the desire to cause suffering a disposition which contrasts markedly with brutality. Such cruel behaviour is directly an attempted expression of power.
Maliciousness is another form of evil which is the desire that other people’s happiness should not exist. Normally, people in this state of mind get pleased if others come to grief, even though they do not bring it about themselves.
Both brutality and maliciousness are parts of the character of unscrupulous hedonists. People who cleverly conceal their dishonesty, there is no argument the moralist can provide is likely to change their minds.
Wealth, possession, and power which were acquired by means of deceptive deeds mainly cause superiority complex and arrogance in the behaviour of unscrupulous hedonist. However, in reality, posh lifestyle of a deceiver is only a hollow ostentation because at the foundation unscrupulous hedonist remains a cunning wicked thief who masters in stealing by exploiting forbidden practices. The main secret behind his successes in fact is the antipathy of general public against immoral, harmful, and notorious activities that leave no rival in the field who may compete the unscrupulous hedonist in his destructive activities. Without facing competition culprit is the king of felonious world.
In this article, I have brought to light only few aspects to elucidate why people turn into detrimental beasts. I recommend you to watch following two videos which make emphasis on what strokes and tactics the culprits or unscrupulous hedonists embrace by neglecting the conventional moral standards to make their success ultimate.
“Human reality is the pure effort to become God without there being any given substratum for that effort, without there being anything which so endeavours. Desire expresses this endeavour.”
Page 576
Being and Nothingness
Jean-Paul Sartre
“Thus, my freedom is a choice of being God and all my acts, all my projects translate this choice and reflect it in a thousand and one ways, for there is an infinity of ways of being and of ways of having.”
Page 599
Being and Nothingness
Jean-Paul Sartre
jk. Evil is predicated on our understanding that actions we can take can be beneficial or harmful to others. Evil is action in accordance with the intention of doing some harm to another that would be avoidable or not in the service of the greatest good. As long as humanity has existed, evil has been a part of us. As has been goodness.
- LuckyR
- Moderator
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Re: The Origin of evil
In a world of two individuals who have no relationship, hurtful behaviors are, by definition not evil since the two have no relationship to defend, so any behavior can be chalked up to selfishness.
- Socrateaze
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- Favorite Philosopher: George Carlin
Re: The Origin of evil
Not everybody is your friend and since so many live under the guise of fairy tale hogwash, while in reality they secretly put you down or bomb you while you are asleep, I say we cannot afford to think the whole world is one happy troop of primates. As my friend once said, "do unto others before they do unto you," our governments do it in anyway. Our leaders have not forgotten the laws of nature and they live by Evil, the least that we can do is to not be so trusting and be a little selfish ourselves. "Good hearts don't win any glory."
- LuckyR
- Moderator
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Re: The Origin of evil
There is a difference between "hope for the best but prepare for the worst" as a strategy for avoiding the fallout from interacting with evil people as opposed to becoming a more aggressive evil person yourself to accomplish the same ends. One changes who you are and one does not (assuming you weren't inherently part of the problem to begin with).Socrateaze wrote:The origin of "evil" clearly dates back to the earliest evolutionary state of people, back when they still were animal. Animals are selfish, but sometimes work socially together to increase their security in numbers. Evil is selfish, like most animals and many primates attack other animals outside their group to advance territory. We still do the same for similar reasons, which is called war. Thus, to look for the origin of evil in us as intellectuals is foolish, since it has its origin in pre-evolutionary history. I say, embrace evil, it is older than our notion of morality and probably went by a different name before we could walk upright.
Not everybody is your friend and since so many live under the guise of fairy tale hogwash, while in reality they secretly put you down or bomb you while you are asleep, I say we cannot afford to think the whole world is one happy troop of primates. As my friend once said, "do unto others before they do unto you," our governments do it in anyway. Our leaders have not forgotten the laws of nature and they live by Evil, the least that we can do is to not be so trusting and be a little selfish ourselves. "Good hearts don't win any glory."
- Atreyu
- Posts: 1737
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- Favorite Philosopher: P.D. Ouspensky
- Location: Orlando, FL
Re: The Origin of evil
Evil is only possible for an unconscious man. A conscious man would never do anything he himself considers 'evil'. Only an unconscious automaton, i.e. modern man, could 'do' things that he himself regards as 'bad'.
- Socrateaze
- Posts: 132
- Joined: July 25th, 2017, 8:07 am
- Favorite Philosopher: George Carlin
Re: The Origin of evil
And what problem would that be? How is it a problem to be evil? Hitler was evil, but he drew too much attention to himself. He kept going despite the ground he won in the war and caused a cry out when he killed six million Jews. That is evil, but it is sloppy, not the kind I am interested in.LuckyR wrote:There is a difference between "hope for the best but prepare for the worst" as a strategy for avoiding the fallout from interacting with evil people as opposed to becoming a more aggressive evil person yourself to accomplish the same ends. One changes who you are and one does not (assuming you weren't inherently part of the problem to begin with).Socrateaze wrote:The origin of "evil" clearly dates back to the earliest evolutionary state of people, back when they still were animal. Animals are selfish, but sometimes work socially together to increase their security in numbers. Evil is selfish, like most animals and many primates attack other animals outside their group to advance territory. We still do the same for similar reasons, which is called war. Thus, to look for the origin of evil in us as intellectuals is foolish, since it has its origin in pre-evolutionary history. I say, embrace evil, it is older than our notion of morality and probably went by a different name before we could walk upright.
Not everybody is your friend and since so many live under the guise of fairy tale hogwash, while in reality they secretly put you down or bomb you while you are asleep, I say we cannot afford to think the whole world is one happy troop of primates. As my friend once said, "do unto others before they do unto you," our governments do it in anyway. Our leaders have not forgotten the laws of nature and they live by Evil, the least that we can do is to not be so trusting and be a little selfish ourselves. "Good hearts don't win any glory."
2023/2024 Philosophy Books of the Month
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