| Re: What is the Nature of Evil?
Nature itself isn't evil, but nor is it good. Good and evil are things people do; specifically when they know they shouldn't do something and do it anyway. A person that tries to do good and uknowingly does evil hasn't done evil (though the results are tragic, and people may call him or her evil, and if he could reasonably be expected to have foreseen the consequences, he's guilty of negligence), and the person that harms another, but with unexpected good consequences, hasn't done good (he can't be called a hero).
Shakespeare said it well, when he said: "There is nothing good or ill, but thinking makes it so." (I'm paraphrasing) This at first seems like a statement of moral relativity, but it's rather ambiguous, because it also means that good and evil are properties of the mind.
Anyway, my 2c. |