Evil

Evil

Evil is profound immorality, especially when regarded as a supernatural force, for example in religious belief. Evil is usually perceived as the dualistic opposite of good. Definitions of evil vary, as does the analysis of its root motives and causes; however, evil is commonly associated with conscious and deliberate wrongdoing, discrimination designed to harm others, humiliation of people designed to diminish their psychological well-being and dignity, destructiveness, motives of causing pain or suffering for selfish or malicious intentions, and acts of unnecessary or indiscriminate violence. The philosophical question of whether morality is absolute or relative leads to questions about the nature of evil, with views falling into one of four opposed camps: moral absolutism, amoralism, moral relativism, and moral universalism.

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Famous quotes containing the word evil:

    Others apart sat on a Hill retir’d,
    In thoughts more elevate, and reason’d high
    Of Providence, Foreknowledge, Will, and Fate,
    Fixt Fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute,
    And found no end, in wandring mazes lost.
    Of good and evil much they argu’d then,
    Of happiness and final misery,
    Passion and Apathie, and glory and shame,
    Vain wisdom all, and false Philosophie:
    John Milton (1608–1674)

    To do good is like ascending a mountain; to do evil as easy as following an avalanche.
    Chinese proverb.

    This spirit of mob-law is becoming as great an evil as a servile war.
    Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)