I am increasingly convinced that good and evil are real psychological states. 'Evil' as I've experienced it is almost always neurotic / pathological in nature. In a very real sense it feels like an evil person 'acts out' from a place of, at the very least, insecurity. The only exception I can think of is when someone is tricked by ideology into doing evil things under the impression that they're good, but I suspect that even then some underlying neurosis is enabling that behavior (in short, for example, the Nazi leadership had issues).
>>82459940I agreebut I think super simple like too simplyI believe peoples whose hearts are dominated by fear and hatred are eviland people whose hearts are dominated by love and acceptance are good
>>82459940>considers nazis to be the epitome of evilidiot
>>82459975i think he meant that the leadership was full of schizos which it was
>>82459940I know what you mean, anonI'm an atheist but somehow I believe in the mind, body AND soulAnd if someone's soul is "evil" then the only cure is a bullet to the headHe can be redeemed sure, but it's going to take some time and a LOT of patience to save him/her
>>82459940Do you think psychopaths and sadists are insecure?I don't really understand you.
>>82460060I can't speak intelligently on them because I don't think I have a first-hand experience with any. I expressly want to avoid drawing from fictional depictions as too many people in my generation allow their perceptions of real life to be affected by fiction. That said, I think it's uncontroversial to say that psychopaths are neurologically deviant from the rest of humanity, so it's fair to exclude them. I'll go read up on a few now.
>>82460060Not them, but if by sadism you meant sociopaths. Then sociopaths have elevated rates of suicides, mood disorders, and addiction. They are incredibly insecure and their entire psychology is lacking impulse control, and acting out to cope with their past/current surroundings. While there is a genetic component like with BPD. They like people with BPD and CPTSD/PTSD primarily are the way they are due to abuse, neglect, or being surrounded by monstrous people. All three also have little in terms of emotional regulation or self-control. If you meant sadism (the trait) or the behaviour which is most commonly found in malignant narcissists. That is deeply tied to insecurity, or a lack of control.Psychopaths meanwhile generally aren't outwardly evil acting towards others like the media portrays them. They lack empathy and fear of consequences, but these factors don't make someone a sadist. Making random enemies is not beneficial, and in fact psychopaths generally try to befriend people in positions of power or who have useful talents as they are beneficial. They also tend to be quite charming, because that makes people more likely to do as they wish. The only time they will be evil is if you get in their way. otherwise they will be superficially charming towards you. They however are an abnormality to normal human functioning.
>>82460341>most commonly found in malignant narcissists.This doesnt sound right.
>>82460399That is true. Most commonly found is a misspeak on my part, what I mean is that it is the stereotypical depiction of pure sadism. Malignant narcissists are people with NPD who also score incredibly highly on the sadism scale. Being outright sadistic to others is a requirement for it. Ted Bundy would be the most infamous example of someone like this.
>>82460642>Ted BundyWasnt he a psychopath? Can you be a narcissist and a psychopath?
You're overthinking it. Evil is simply lower empathy. Can manifest in a variety of ways with a variety of personalities but it always comes down to simply not understanding or caring how their actions affects others.
For the world is Hell, and men are on the one hand the tormented souls and on the other the devils in it.
>>82460660I don't really have an answer to that. All I can tell you is that he specifically was diagnosed with ASPD, and NPD (Malignant). People often called him a psychopath though, and he was from the criminal definition (scoring over 30 on the PCL-R test, though this test mostly screens for criminal risk based on multiple traits associated with various conditions and personality types). It's unknown if he was from the clinical definition though, as in retrospect he was known to have shown empathy in some regards, though it was very limited.
>>82460848I'm not sure about including the word "understanding" there if you're referring to empathy. By the colloquial definition, you might say that a parent feeling too bad to ever appropriately discipline their child has a lot of empathy for their child, yet doesn't understand (or understands and neglects) the negative consequences of their lack of disciplining.
>>82461574Empathy is literally defined as the ability to *understand* how others feel. It's not the same as compassion. If you care about someone yet fail to realize how you hurt them, you have compassion but you lack empathy.
It's a lot more simple than thatGood is everything which's logically coherent, that is, whose principles don't destroy each other as their consequences unravel.Evil is everything which's logically autophagic, whose values contradict each other in consequence.See? Easy.
>>82461633But understanding how others feel =/= understanding the downstream consequences of your actions I'd again refer to the weakling parent case. The parent understands correctly that disciplining their child will make their child cry and feel sad, so they don't.
>>82460848>not understanding or caring how their actions affects others.These are two different things.Evil people can perfectly understand that they are hurting people (sow they have empathy as understanding) but at the same time they inflict this hurting because they find pleasure in others pain (sadism)
