It is my understanding that the Madeline Albright thing is BS. The estimated death toll was a lie by the Iraqi government. Maybe the claim that the death toll is a lie is itself a lie, I don't know.
The quote comes from Albright being asked a yes or no question, for which either answer would be hugely controversial. There's an argument to be made that this wasn't a fair way to explore the topic by the interviewer.
"if Putin had to witness the Ukrainian families blown apart by bombs, if he had to explain his decision to authorize them, he would be unable to do so."
Putin's soldiers torture by hand. Do you doubt that Putin could do the same?
Whether most people believe in “evil” is an empirical question. Depending on what's meant by that, it's plausible most people would be outraged, horrified, and opposed to many of the same actions (though historically speaking many past societies may have been far less opposed to things you and I would consider monstrous today), but the sense that things are "evil" in the distinctive sense it seems to me or to you or to many of the people we know may be heavily shaped by our distinctive enculturation. How do you know what most people believe without engaging with the relevant empirical research?
To what extent has your conception of evil been shaped by enculturation? We have little cross-cultural knowledge of how most people and societies over the course of history, or in the world today, think about “evil.” Your conception of evil may be a culturally parochial and highly contingent way of thinking shaped by being steeped in WEIRD society and a culture heavily influenced by monotheistic religions. See e.g.:
Berniūnas, R. (2020). Mongolian yos surtakhuun and WEIRD “morality”. Journal of Cultural Cognitive Science, 4(1), 59-71.
Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., & Norenzayan, A. (2010). The weirdest people in the world?. Behavioral and brain sciences, 33(2-3), 61-83.
First time I've been able to read one of your posts all the way through.
Trying to take verses from a Biblical perspective and translate them to modern times is a dangerous proposition. I suspect that, if you sincerely believed that killing one person would destroy factory farming forever, it would be within your Overton Window to consider doing so.
The Canaanites, for example, sacrificed children more brutally than the Aztecs or Mayans.
It is quite easy to sit on the other end of a keyboard and criticize other people, as you yourself demonstrate. And as you point out, it's very possible that if you were there, you would be convinced.
And objective morality is, ultimately, a form of religion. So I find your post interesting, but ultimately unconvincing
One wise person's moral summary of WWII:
The windiest militant trash
Important Persons shout
Is not so crude as our wish:
What mad Nijinsky wrote
About Diaghilev
Is true of the normal heart;
For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.
-- Auden, "September 1, 1939"
It is my understanding that the Madeline Albright thing is BS. The estimated death toll was a lie by the Iraqi government. Maybe the claim that the death toll is a lie is itself a lie, I don't know.
The quote comes from Albright being asked a yes or no question, for which either answer would be hugely controversial. There's an argument to be made that this wasn't a fair way to explore the topic by the interviewer.
"if Putin had to witness the Ukrainian families blown apart by bombs, if he had to explain his decision to authorize them, he would be unable to do so."
Putin's soldiers torture by hand. Do you doubt that Putin could do the same?
You say "But most people still believe in evil."
Whether most people believe in “evil” is an empirical question. Depending on what's meant by that, it's plausible most people would be outraged, horrified, and opposed to many of the same actions (though historically speaking many past societies may have been far less opposed to things you and I would consider monstrous today), but the sense that things are "evil" in the distinctive sense it seems to me or to you or to many of the people we know may be heavily shaped by our distinctive enculturation. How do you know what most people believe without engaging with the relevant empirical research?
To what extent has your conception of evil been shaped by enculturation? We have little cross-cultural knowledge of how most people and societies over the course of history, or in the world today, think about “evil.” Your conception of evil may be a culturally parochial and highly contingent way of thinking shaped by being steeped in WEIRD society and a culture heavily influenced by monotheistic religions. See e.g.:
Berniūnas, R. (2020). Mongolian yos surtakhuun and WEIRD “morality”. Journal of Cultural Cognitive Science, 4(1), 59-71.
Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., & Norenzayan, A. (2010). The weirdest people in the world?. Behavioral and brain sciences, 33(2-3), 61-83.
First time I've been able to read one of your posts all the way through.
Trying to take verses from a Biblical perspective and translate them to modern times is a dangerous proposition. I suspect that, if you sincerely believed that killing one person would destroy factory farming forever, it would be within your Overton Window to consider doing so.
The Canaanites, for example, sacrificed children more brutally than the Aztecs or Mayans.
It is quite easy to sit on the other end of a keyboard and criticize other people, as you yourself demonstrate. And as you point out, it's very possible that if you were there, you would be convinced.
And objective morality is, ultimately, a form of religion. So I find your post interesting, but ultimately unconvincing
Evil tends not to be done by hordes of monsters, but by otherwise normal people being manipulated by evil ideas
Good read 👍