The Problem With Evil

The first problem is that we don't have a good definition of Evil.  It seems situational, relative to our surroundings, arbitrary, and subject to interpretation.  Folks who do nothing but sit around and think about these things trace the origin of Evil to the Creation Myth stage of human development.  They suggest that Evil comes from 2 different sources.  One comes from a titanic struggle between Good and Evil, where Good is represented by creative forces, loving forces, compassion, caring, etc.  Evil is destructive, hating, death oriented, trouble-making, and opposed to the Good in some fundamental way. The second is that Evil is on one end of a spectrum of existence, and Good on the other.  Every act, everything that happens, can be placed on a continuum of Good and Evil, and at some point we can say that things below this line are Evil, and above this line are Good.  There are lesser and greater Goods, and lesser and greater Evils.

Is Evil pain and suffering, or can Evil be not being able to find a parking space when you need one?  Is bad luck Evil?  Is good luck Good?  Is Evil an innate feature of the human condition?  Freud thought so, calling it the Death Drive, and attributing to the human character a battle between Love and Death.  Having lived through Nazi Germany (yes, I invoked it!) as a Jew, Freud was convinced that the Death Drive was alive and well in the human psyche and could not be suppressed.

I just read Hear of Darkness by Joseph Conrad.  Published in 1902, this book describes the mentality of European colonialists who are seeking fortunes in the Belgian Congo in the 1880's and 1890's.  The conditions of depravity and suffering by the natives at the hands of the Europeans, and from the ravages of disease in the Congo are appalling and certainly warrant the title of Evil.  The demented condition of Mr. Kurtz, the pivotal character in the book who "goes native" in order to secure the greatest amount of ivory the company has ever seen, reflects on his condition and what he has seen and mutters, "The horror, the horror..." on two occasions, hinting at the extent of Evil that he has seen, and has created with his actions.  He certainly seems Evil, but can his actions be judged without putting them into context?  Are the inhuman acts that take place between the natives as a normal part of their culture any less Evil?  After all, this would seem to be Man in a natural condition, would it not? 

Evil is a problem.  What is it?  How can we define it?  How can we elevate it to a status of more than a superficial black-and-white comparison between Good and Evil?

The Nature of Evil

The topic of the existence of Evil in the world has been a hotly contested issue since the dawn of time. What is Evil? Why does Evil exist? How could a loving and caring God create a world in which Evil could exist? These and many other questions have plagued thinkers and theologians through the ages. What we have to do is avoid a naive approach to the question. We need to take a step back, see the big picture, and go through the philosopher's process of taking a simple question and analyzing it like a prosecuting attorney. We can start with the obvious question: What is Evil?

It is attractive to say, Evil results the suffering and death of people for no apparent reason. Earthquakes, tsunamis, terrorist attacks, deranged killers, child molesters, serial killers, and diseases all fall into this category. People killed or maimed without reason or sense, random suffering, innocents suffering and dying, etc. What better example of Evil could there be? The suffering that occurs at the personal level of the sufferer is Evil from their perspective, certainly. From our Objective Observer perspective it also seems senseless and pointless, and therefor Evil.

Philosophers who have considered this point of view have sometimes concluded that these processes might just be part of the normal human condition, and might be chalked up to Bad Luck, or something akin to Karma or Fate. Some people do well, and some suffer. Life is a continuum of Good and Evil, and defining a point along the line that separates Evil from the rest of the Human Condition is a bit arbitrary, and can be hard to defend. One man's suffering is another man's pleasure at times, in this age of masochism and marathons. The senseless death that occurs at time of natural disasters is certainly bad luck for the ones affected and killed, but isn't the shifting of the Earth's crust a normal, natural process that we recognize as a geologic process? How can that be Evil?

Terrorist attacks are a form of warfare, are they not? True, the targets are not "military" in nature and there may not be a declared War between political entities that we like to see when War is declared, but the act of aggression is one typical of warfare, and one many of us play out everyday on the myriad electronic games we (and our children) play on their game consoles. Warfare is a military action taken to support a political purpose or end, in the correct sense of war, and the conclusion of warfare is the establishment of a new political scheme, not a new military one. When War is over the armies go home and the politicians step in and clean up the mess they created.  In that sense War is not Evil, is it? War is a human activity that is planned, executed, and resolved, albeit in a context of human suffering and death, and destruction of property.

Deranged killers are pathological, are they not? They have an issue, maybe a medical one, that drives them to do bad things to other people (and maybe to themselves, too). In a sense, the pathological tag we give them is a way we can identify these people as different from us, as different than the norm we have in our society. Cannibals kill people, too, and eat them, but that is normal in their society, and they don't seem pathological to us. We can see the victim as having an Evil thing done to them, but the perpetrator may be acting on impulses that are organic and/or environmental in origin.

Through the ages thinkers have wrestled with questions of Evil, the origins of Evil, the basis of Evil, and the extent of Evil, and come up with some pretty different ways to think about it. How can we frame a discussion of Evil that allows us to come to some conclusions, to identify Evil in some way we that we can agree, and to couch a discussion of Evil in more than a strictly Christian context. This is our challenge.

Deipnosophist - Really?

Are you familair with that word?  It is based on at least one word you know.  Deipnon is the Greek word for the main meal of the day, what we would consider to be dinner.  Sophist is the term for a persuasive speaker.  Combine them and you have a term for someone who is an entertaining and enjoyable dinner conversationalist. 

I'd like to think that attending Big Questions would develop a deipnosophistic tendency in a person...

Radical Democracy

Plato hated democracy. He hated the way crowds could be influenced by artful and crafty speakers, but speakers that may not actually have a good argument, or may not have the crowd's best interests at heart. He hated the process of democratic discussion, and rule by the many (ignorant) in favor of the few (enlightened). He favored a Philosophe King, a man who ruled with absolute authority but with absolute objective reason and regard for the good of the nation. An enlightened despot, it has been called. A King, but a King you can believe in, and trust.

We have just come through an exercise of Radical Democracy in the form of our national Budget Deficit Crisis, and we have all seen the messy nature of American democracy in practice. It is partisan, political, self-centered, and riddled with what appears to be corrupt practices. We see our legislators and cringes at their antics, their alliances, and their obstinate refusal to abandon some pet project or local issue of importance in favor of compromise for the greater good. We all believe in a sort of Utilitarian Altruism, don't we? We want our national representatives to work for the good of all Americans, don't we?

What is the best form of government? Is the model we share with the world the best one? How might democracy, and representative democracy in particular, be improved?

Next meeting: August 19, 6:30 pm. You know where...

What do you own?

In our society the concept of personal ownership runs deep. We like to think we own physical objects like property, things, stuff... Tangible property ownership seems a fundamental right and is built in to the idea of self and identity.

But there are things that we possess but may not own to the degree we think we do. How about your body parts and organs? Do you own them in the same way you own a car? Can you sell them? Can you trade them? If an artist wanted to create a collage of human hands are you free to sell one of yours to contribute? In the USA it is against the law to sell you kidneys for organ transplants. You can give one away if you receive nothing for it. Can you give them both away it the result means your own life is no longer viable?

How about your life? Do you own that? Is it yours to do with as you see fit? Can you employ someone to aid you in ending your life? Under what conditions can you willingly give up your life?

Libertarians believe in minimalist involvement of government in the affairs of the people. Let free markets run unchecked, let people make deals and arrange deals that suit them. What role does the government have in restricting this free expression of trade?

The consent of the governed seems to extend to the point that the masses intrude into the realm of the idea of personal liberty and personal property. Laws we create limit what you can do with your body, to the extent that you may not own it in the way you think you do. Are you ok with that?

Meeting tonight at 6:30.

The Faces of God

I have a form that I adapted from a source I've long since lost. It is a questionnaire about God. It asks about your personal God, and his/her characteristics. I think I will pass this out at the next meeting and we can use it as a starting point for a discussion. I hope you enjoy it.

A Discussion on China?

I suppose you might understand that I have a background as an educator, and at the root of my being I remain a teacher. Judy warned me to try and keep my introductory comments to 10 minutes or less. even talking fast I couldn't do it! Sorry about that!

I thought the conversation went well, and we did cover quite a lot of territory. Qing Dynasty, Sun Yat Sen, Chairman Mao, Deng Xiaoping, and Hu Jintao were all discussed at some length. The plight of the common Chinese person, the ideology of communism, the urban/rural dichotomy of China, the Opium Wars, the Boxer Rebellion, western Imperialism, Chinese isolationism, and the historic hatred of the Japanese. There is a lot to consider in any Chinese discussion, even a casual one. Still, it went well. Didn't it?

So, what for nest time? Any Big Question suggestions?

Please comment.