Just how evil are we?

Ethics, Morality, and Sin

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Dimmesdale
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Just how evil are we?

Post #1

Post by Dimmesdale »

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Agree or disagree? Just how far can sin compromise us really?
"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." - Albert Einstein

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Re: Just how evil are we?

Post #2

Post by Aetixintro »

[Replying to Dimmesdale in post #1]

Some disagreement. Bad people are more likely to do more wrongdoing and the worst people may not be able to do any good at all because of their tendency to do what's bad not to say utter evil. Good people on the contrary are more likely to do good and the best people may be unable to do the blatant wrong unless threatened with (more) torture. Isn't it typical that when the child-torturer sees a child and thinks of opportunity to torture more? Do I sense a tendency to do evil in bad people? Integrity is probably more real than people commonly realize.

Evil can deprave people to the very rock bottom, in the end, with nothing else to do than die. People should learn more about the evil personality than what is commonly known now. Mask of Sanity, anyone? I have earlier written about the Slippery Slope of Evil and it's worthwhile to beware!
I'm cool! :) - Stronger Religion every day! Also by "mathematical Religion", the eternal forms, God closing the door on corrupt humanity, possibly!

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Re: Just how evil are we?

Post #3

Post by Purple Knight »

I actually agree, but for a reason you might not expect.

I have learned through observation that individual people are either evil or good, and it has nothing to do with their acts, but with their inner selves and perhaps their motives, motives being the usual explanation.

The morality of an act is judged by who happens to be doing it, not the other way 'round.

For example, let's suppose a healthy man walks into a doctor's office for a checkup. The doctor slaughters him and uses his organs to save six other people.

If the doctor is evil, then murder will be in the spotlight. Murder is inexcusable. That will be absolute. The doctor murdered a man and is therefore evil. That will be what people say, but they actually work backwards from the conclusion.

If the doctor is good, then the fact that he saved lives will be in the spotlight. Sure, murder is inexcusable, but good people sometimes break the rules if the need is great enough. Those six people all have families, they will say, and that made the difference, though whether they had families or not will not come into play for the evil doctor.

The evil person will never receive "motivation credit" but the good person always will, even if that isn't really his motivation. The story will be, the evil doctor broke the morality rule, he is evil, no mitigating factors, but the good doctor, well, good people sometimes need to break rules to serve the greater good. Motivation is a convenient excuse because 1) we don't have Psi-Corps to check for us, allowing people to always assign the good motivation to the good person and 2) the evil person often helps this along by admitting his true motivations since he's more honest - since he'll never get away with it he has little reason to lie.

So evil is as evil does? Absolutely. Because whatever act the evil fellow does will be evil.

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Re: Just how evil are we?

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Post by Tcg »

Dimmesdale wrote: Wed Jun 09, 2021 11:48 am Just how far can sin compromise us really?
Sin? The belief in sin is perhaps one of the most corrupting ideas one can hold onto. People compromise themselves by believing they are flawed by it. What a shame.


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Re: Just how evil are we?

Post #5

Post by nobspeople »

[Replying to Dimmesdale in post #1]

I wouldn't put 'evil' and 'sin' in the same category, every time.

What is perceived as 'evil' often times, changes over time much more than things considered 'sin' changes.
Evil is also dependent on whom is asked, and when, more so then sin.

How much sin compromises us? That depends on whom is asked. Ask an atheist, they'll probably eye roll and chuckle. Ask a believer and you'll probably get besmirched by their 'witness' and 'facts' about how true that is.

For me, I think sin is two things:
1) a means of control and
2) human characterization of things we perceive as 'bad' to help understand the world.

How much we allow that to compromise us depends on the individual.
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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