I have a philosophy about my own life: I am, by nature, a hypocrite. I have done many bad deeds (certainly by your categorization of evil), and I do not live up to the moral standards I hold dear. But, in the same way that one fights entropy, I should endeavor to be a little less hypocritical every day. Likely this is a fight that will last me a lifetime. In holding this belief, I can at least be a little kind to myself (and, hopefully, grant others the same benefit) and know that I am flawed but will strive to be better.
This seems to relate to the Fundamental Attribution Error. For ourselves, and for our in-group, when somebody does something bad, well, that's just a mistake they made; it's not because of _what they're like_, or _who they are_. When a member of the out-group does something, well, that's just what out-groupers do.
If you at least _try_ to expand your conception of the in-group to include all thinking beings, it becomes easier to remember that none of us is merely the worst thing we've ever done. There are people who demonstrate through a pattern of repeated behavior that they cannot be trusted, and may even merit punishment (for reasons of incapacitation of the individual perpetrator, and deterrence of others who might be tempted to perpetrate in the future). But consigning them to the out-group, exacting "eye for an eye" retribution, and ceasing to consider their actual motivations, will make it harder, not easier, to correctly structure a system of justice that optimizes for reducing future harm.
Re childhood physical abuse, as one example. You see, if evil is what does harm, the problem is, that harm is not an objective thing in many cases, but relative to what the harmed person considers normal, acceptable, got used to etc. There is the literature Nobel Prize winner novel from Imre Kertesz, Fatelessness, which is about a Jewish kid who is in a Nazi concentration camp, and he is *happy*. This sounds like the craziest thing ever! But the author used to be that child personally, it is a personal account. How is that even possible? Well he just got used to those horrible conditions and considered them normal.
In the past, many, many children considered the occasional spanking as a completely normal part of growing up, simply because it was socially accepted, expected, normalized and they were used to it. Then it was turned into something not socially accepted and rebranded as "physical abuse", that is, using the same word for it, as, say a parent brutally beating a child with a baseball bat. We can no longer tell the difference between the two, because we use the same words "physical abuse" "beating", "violence". These words got inflated.
My point is changing norms change what is considered harm, hence evil. Those self-reported childhood physical abuse rates are, I am sure, the questioner asked "were you spanked?" and if yes checkmarks "physical abuse". But if they would have asked "did you have a happy, loving childhood?" the answer would be yes. If they would have asked, what about the spankings, the answer would have been "a minor unpleasant thing, one learns how to avoid them"
It is hard to define evil when it is hard to define harm.
"Corporal punishment, such as spanking, was deliberately not included as a form of abuse, although it was measured separately. There may be a substantial number of false positives driven by over-expansive definitions, but it’s reasonably tightly done, and it would be pretty clear to the respondent that the scale is talking about abuse."
It's not that hard to define harm in this limited case.
If you were spanked, you may have had a parent who was clear and consistent about boundaries, regretful when you transgressed, and careful while administering a measure of pain. If you did, you were fortunate, and if you say you were not harmed by it, I am willing to credit your claim. Although your sibling, treated identically, might have been harmed - people vary in character and sensitivity.
You might also have been spanked by a parent who enjoyed inflicting pain and fear, who relished dominating a child completely under their power, who used you as a proxy for others that they would have liked to "spank".
The two situations are very different, even if the blows are identical. As with other uses of force, the ugly truth is that most violence is done by people who are yielding to evil, even (maybe especially) in settings where there is a plausible pretext for it and it can be re-framed as something else.
"Although your sibling, treated identically, might have been harmed - people vary in character and sensitivity."
Yes, I agree, and this is actually my main point. That we cannot really measure evil because we cannot really measure harm, because people vary in sensitivity. This is my story about the Jewish child who felt happy in Nazi concentration camp is about. That was clearly obviously 100% evil, yet apparently not every victim sensed it as so.
It seems people are okay with absolutely crazy things if only society tells them it is somehow normal. Nature invented capsaicin so that mammals don't eat those seeds, you cannot feed hot spicy food to dogs, yet 4 years old kids in Mexico are chewing hot peppers. Yes, it hurts them. Their parents tell them basically that hurt is okay and normal, so they just like the hurt.
My argument here is ultimately social constructionism - regardless of how much or how little objective truths exist, what we think as truths are largely social constructions. The very idea of "I was harmed" is a social construction...
This is about my larger project of arguing against utilitarianism on the basis that utility cannot be measured, so ethics cannot be turned into a science, not even into a rigorous philosophy, and we just need to accept we do not have much more than opinions and intuitions.
I've been thinking quite a bit about "Cultural Christianity" because that's the core premise of Tom Holland's Dominion (the history writer, not Spiderman). Very worth a read if you're interested in the influence of Christianity on European culture, including our modern ideas of human rights, secularism and religious freedom - just be aware that like any work of history focusing on the impact of One Thing it inevitably downplays the influence of everything else. I will say as a Christian it's an uncomfortable read, characters like Gregory of Nissa do stand out as ahead of their time, but there are plenty of no-less-devout Christians throughout history that have done things I very much object to.
I think his point would be that, to the extent to which Western assumptions on human rights rest upon a Christian foundation, it only works in the absence of Christianity precisely because people take it for granted. If people are no longer Christian and are questioning these assumptions, you're going to have to either convert them to Christianity or convince them of these controversial and counter-intuitive ideas on their own merits, I agree that it doesn't really work to just defend them on the grounds of tradition.
As a Christian I can accept (not saying it's easy) that all have sinned and that mercy and forgiveness are essential virtues, which should humble even the most devout moral crusader among us, but I think a much more natural human tendency is to just draw the line of unforgivable behavior somewhere between yourself and your enemies, and make excuses later if you happen to find yourself crossing it.
I'm gonna say the paragraph about Romero at CECOT was written by an LLM because you don't use em dashes that way.
Tiny correction: your dates for Gregory of Nyssa should be AD, not BC.
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH (thanks, will fix)
I have a philosophy about my own life: I am, by nature, a hypocrite. I have done many bad deeds (certainly by your categorization of evil), and I do not live up to the moral standards I hold dear. But, in the same way that one fights entropy, I should endeavor to be a little less hypocritical every day. Likely this is a fight that will last me a lifetime. In holding this belief, I can at least be a little kind to myself (and, hopefully, grant others the same benefit) and know that I am flawed but will strive to be better.
This seems to relate to the Fundamental Attribution Error. For ourselves, and for our in-group, when somebody does something bad, well, that's just a mistake they made; it's not because of _what they're like_, or _who they are_. When a member of the out-group does something, well, that's just what out-groupers do.
If you at least _try_ to expand your conception of the in-group to include all thinking beings, it becomes easier to remember that none of us is merely the worst thing we've ever done. There are people who demonstrate through a pattern of repeated behavior that they cannot be trusted, and may even merit punishment (for reasons of incapacitation of the individual perpetrator, and deterrence of others who might be tempted to perpetrate in the future). But consigning them to the out-group, exacting "eye for an eye" retribution, and ceasing to consider their actual motivations, will make it harder, not easier, to correctly structure a system of justice that optimizes for reducing future harm.
Dio Chrysostom was the one earlier account of deeming slavery inherently unethical, albeit less forceful about it.
https://philpapers.org/rec/TRUDCA-2
Re childhood physical abuse, as one example. You see, if evil is what does harm, the problem is, that harm is not an objective thing in many cases, but relative to what the harmed person considers normal, acceptable, got used to etc. There is the literature Nobel Prize winner novel from Imre Kertesz, Fatelessness, which is about a Jewish kid who is in a Nazi concentration camp, and he is *happy*. This sounds like the craziest thing ever! But the author used to be that child personally, it is a personal account. How is that even possible? Well he just got used to those horrible conditions and considered them normal.
In the past, many, many children considered the occasional spanking as a completely normal part of growing up, simply because it was socially accepted, expected, normalized and they were used to it. Then it was turned into something not socially accepted and rebranded as "physical abuse", that is, using the same word for it, as, say a parent brutally beating a child with a baseball bat. We can no longer tell the difference between the two, because we use the same words "physical abuse" "beating", "violence". These words got inflated.
My point is changing norms change what is considered harm, hence evil. Those self-reported childhood physical abuse rates are, I am sure, the questioner asked "were you spanked?" and if yes checkmarks "physical abuse". But if they would have asked "did you have a happy, loving childhood?" the answer would be yes. If they would have asked, what about the spankings, the answer would have been "a minor unpleasant thing, one learns how to avoid them"
It is hard to define evil when it is hard to define harm.
From the essay:
"Corporal punishment, such as spanking, was deliberately not included as a form of abuse, although it was measured separately. There may be a substantial number of false positives driven by over-expansive definitions, but it’s reasonably tightly done, and it would be pretty clear to the respondent that the scale is talking about abuse."
It's not that hard to define harm in this limited case.
If you were spanked, you may have had a parent who was clear and consistent about boundaries, regretful when you transgressed, and careful while administering a measure of pain. If you did, you were fortunate, and if you say you were not harmed by it, I am willing to credit your claim. Although your sibling, treated identically, might have been harmed - people vary in character and sensitivity.
You might also have been spanked by a parent who enjoyed inflicting pain and fear, who relished dominating a child completely under their power, who used you as a proxy for others that they would have liked to "spank".
The two situations are very different, even if the blows are identical. As with other uses of force, the ugly truth is that most violence is done by people who are yielding to evil, even (maybe especially) in settings where there is a plausible pretext for it and it can be re-framed as something else.
"Although your sibling, treated identically, might have been harmed - people vary in character and sensitivity."
Yes, I agree, and this is actually my main point. That we cannot really measure evil because we cannot really measure harm, because people vary in sensitivity. This is my story about the Jewish child who felt happy in Nazi concentration camp is about. That was clearly obviously 100% evil, yet apparently not every victim sensed it as so.
It seems people are okay with absolutely crazy things if only society tells them it is somehow normal. Nature invented capsaicin so that mammals don't eat those seeds, you cannot feed hot spicy food to dogs, yet 4 years old kids in Mexico are chewing hot peppers. Yes, it hurts them. Their parents tell them basically that hurt is okay and normal, so they just like the hurt.
My argument here is ultimately social constructionism - regardless of how much or how little objective truths exist, what we think as truths are largely social constructions. The very idea of "I was harmed" is a social construction...
This is about my larger project of arguing against utilitarianism on the basis that utility cannot be measured, so ethics cannot be turned into a science, not even into a rigorous philosophy, and we just need to accept we do not have much more than opinions and intuitions.
I've been thinking quite a bit about "Cultural Christianity" because that's the core premise of Tom Holland's Dominion (the history writer, not Spiderman). Very worth a read if you're interested in the influence of Christianity on European culture, including our modern ideas of human rights, secularism and religious freedom - just be aware that like any work of history focusing on the impact of One Thing it inevitably downplays the influence of everything else. I will say as a Christian it's an uncomfortable read, characters like Gregory of Nissa do stand out as ahead of their time, but there are plenty of no-less-devout Christians throughout history that have done things I very much object to.
I think his point would be that, to the extent to which Western assumptions on human rights rest upon a Christian foundation, it only works in the absence of Christianity precisely because people take it for granted. If people are no longer Christian and are questioning these assumptions, you're going to have to either convert them to Christianity or convince them of these controversial and counter-intuitive ideas on their own merits, I agree that it doesn't really work to just defend them on the grounds of tradition.
As a Christian I can accept (not saying it's easy) that all have sinned and that mercy and forgiveness are essential virtues, which should humble even the most devout moral crusader among us, but I think a much more natural human tendency is to just draw the line of unforgivable behavior somewhere between yourself and your enemies, and make excuses later if you happen to find yourself crossing it.