So many pointless comments in here talking about how this cannot be objectively discussed. You are contributing nothing to the conversation. Of course it’s subjective. Do you see a thread called “what’s the best movie?” and respond like “☝️😏 actually there’s no such thing as a best movie because it’s all subjective.” Come on, the subjectivity is implied. You agree to a subjective discussion when you answer the question.
I find that the second model in your image is more accurate from a utilitarian perspective. At the most basic level, I think the origin of goodness is in pleasure (/happiness/whatever). Evil is the opposite: someone taking away your pleasure. Therefore goodness exists first, and then evil emerges as the absence of good.
Anything that’s evil, even pain and suffering and illness, is only evil because it’s preventing good. Why does this count as the absence of good instead of the presence of a novel concept of evil? Why not, rather, do we think of pain coming first with pleasure as its absence? I would argue that pain and suffering are not inherently bad; in a world without good, pain and suffering wouldn’t mean anything. On the other hand, pleasure is good even without the existence of suffering.Neither.
The universe itself is neutral as fuck.
Good and evil are man-made distinctions that constantly change depending on who happens to define them.
“Nature does not make mistakes. Right and wrong are human constructs.” –Frank Herbert
Just because they’re man-made distinctions doesn’t mean that they cannot be discussed or don’t have beginnings.
Sure.
But the beginning is a hen/egg discussion per definition.
And for the distinctions… There are currently about 8 billion different ones.
Discussing those as if there was an absolute answer doesn’t make sense.
Good and Evil are ideas that help perpetuate the idea of Society. Good can be considered as “anything that helps my people” and Evil as “anything that hurts my people”.
I would argue that they are some of the earliest memes, in the original sense of the word - they are ideas that spread through imitation and story that helped early people (likely at least as far back as protohumans) maintain themselves as coherent groups.
This feels reductive and semantically confused. 🤷
good and evil are just ideas. id say this image has negative value.
What is good for the bird is evil for the worm
Do they have concepts of good and evil?
Maaaybee the bird, at least some birds are pretty high on the self-awareness scale.So in this case the bird-worm-relationship consists only of pure evil-free good.
Good and evil are subjective interpretive constructs, they exist only conceptually, there is no “truth” to good and evil, or binary dichotomies of existence, ethics, and morality in general.
It’s all just wishy-washy childish nonsense.
“Good” and “Evil” are human concepts. They’re the product of higher cognitive ability and intelligence making judgments on things based, usually and generally, on how those things affect survival and the ability to pass on one’s own genes.
Our definition and understanding of those concepts varies from person to person, and society to society.
Neither of these models are capable of accurately representing either concept for these reasons.
Whichever makes the story more interesting
Torah teaches that God created human beings with both good and evil impulses. Human beings uniquely have knowledge of our drives and impulses and can learn to master them. The same needs that drive us to consume can lead us to overconsume or do so unethically. Our animal drive for safety and security can also lead us to attack perceived threats.
According to this philosophy, evil comes from people misdirecting divinely given attributes.
The idea of good and evil as absolute “powers” independent of human choices is foreign to many philosophies and theologies.
