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From: debray@sbcs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.philosophy,net.religion
Subject: what IS evil
Message-ID: <390@sbcs.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 16-Jun-83 14:59:39 EDT
Article-I.D.: sbcs.390
Posted: Thu Jun 16 14:59:39 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 17-Jun-83 05:42:59 EDT
Lines: 33



Here's a question that arose in a discussion with a friend over lunch the
other afternoon, and I thought I'd toss it onto the net.

The question is, What is evil?

Consider, for example, the construction of a torture device. My friend
contends that this act, of itself, is evil. *My* opinion is that the
evil is in the actual use of the device for torture.

In this case, the act of constructing the torture device might be labelled
evil because the intention in constructing it was evil (I'm being a little
loose here: we really haven't defined "evil" yet - but that's what the
question is about! For the time being, let's begin with some intuitive
notion of "evil" and try to refine the idea.), but what about actions
where the intentions are not clearly defined, or whose consequences can
have either good or bad implications?

Consider, for example, nuclear fission. Was Fermi's act of constructing a
self-sustaining chain reaction good, or evil? It seems to me that the
consequence of that act - atomic power - was not, of itself, necessarily
good or bad; it's good if used for a "good" purpose, e.g. generating power,
as a power source for space vehicles like Pioneer-10, and bad if used
for "bad" purposes, e.g. for killing people.

I myself believe in a "relative value system" (as opposed to an "absolute
value system"), where things (objects, actions) are not good or evil of
themselves, but become so only when evaluated in a context. I'm interested
in hearing what others think about this.

Saumya Debray
...philabs!sbcs!debray