Trollheart

Maybe we're all just scum and predisposed towards being evil (I know I am: see my music tastes if you don't believe me) but assuming there is an underlying reason or reasons for such behaviour, and discounting psychos who just kill for the fun or thrill of it, what would you consider the principle reason people commit evil acts? And before anyone like Batty asks, let's say murder, rape, violence against children, hate crimes - anything that could be generally characterised and categorised by most right-thinking and sane people as being evil?

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Psy-Fi

I voted for power. Power over others usually seems to be the main motivator.

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She's a Brick House

rubber soul

To me, it's a tossup between money and religion but a lot of good can come out of religion (Feeding the hungry, that sort of thing). There doesn't seem to be anything that comes to any good when it comes to greed. Money is why we're in the climate crisis that we're in presently for example.

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Marie Monday

I think none of these things are the root of evil, they are just means through which evil is brought out. Without money, people would also act greedy and exploitative, for instance

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Guybrush

It's selfishness. It's built into every organism and influences them in some way. It's why male lions will kill a lioness' children, to remove future competition and make her fertile again quicker so she can help him sire his own children. It's why the cuckoo chick will try to push its step siblings from the nest or why a rat mom may eat the runt of the litter.

Life is competitive and the genes that we have today are the ones that managed to ensure their own survival by putting themselves first, the ones they rely on second and everyone else behind.

From this perspective, humans are actually extremely nice. Cooperation is something we're extraordinarily good at.

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Frownland

Is selfishness a biological factor?

Not to mention that evolutionary psychology anthropomorphizes outcome, is unfalsifiable, promotes hierarchy, flattens diverse factors to make them traceable, presumes correlation as cause, and is flat out racist yo.

Certainly interesting as a thought experiment but should in no way be treated as scientific.

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Queen Boo

Ignorance.

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music_collector

I'd say power is #1, but it's close.

Selfishness is up there. The person who drives like a slalom skiier on the highway causes a pileup. Can you really call it an accident? I say the person meant to do it.

Of course religion plays a part.

There's the social aspect of it too. The sick person who can't afford their treatment. The person who has hit financial rock bottom.

For some, it's almost hereditary. Violence often begets violence.

Trollheart

yeah I'd argue with you on that one, Guybrush. What animals do is in their nature: they can no more control it than the sun can stop spinning around the Earth (sssh! They're already watching us! Act normal - ooh! Look at this lovely non-banned and approved religious text! How interesting!) - they have not the capacity to stop and say "meh, will I kill that other lion? What are the ramifications if I do? You know, maybe I won't: the guy has enough troubles already with those six cubs of his and his lioness always wanting the best gazelle at her table."

Humans are the only ones who can consciously decide to be evil, so it's I think unfair to equate our freedom of choice with the natural instincts of an animal, who does what it has to survive and endure.

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Guybrush

Evil is a human concept that we define. If you want to, you can extend it to explain non-human animal behaviour. I actually wouldn't, but then I also don't believe evil is real. It's just a way of saying something is bad without being specific as to the whys. Generally, we are able to be specific to the whys so "evil" is mostly appropriate for comic book villains and the like. Satan is evil. He also doesn't exist.

Humans are instinctively selfish, just like other animals. If a serial killer kills for sexual gratification, that for me is an example of extreme selfishness. If you keep eating meat despite a conviction that the world would be a slightly better place If you became a vegetarian, then that, to me, is also an example of selfishness. Being stingy about the price of clothes when you know textile workers suffer is selfish.

Democracies work for people because they let most people get what they want in a way that seems reasonably fair. But it also gives our selfishness a lot of freedom, f ex. to make choices that are good for our own comfort, but that will add to the suffering of other people or future generations.

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