Good & Evil - Circular Semantics

[devolved]

Jumping from a different thread on a different Christian forum, there tends to be a halt in discussion when I ask for a clear definition of good and evil that avoids one of the following:

1) Explaining good as synonymous with "everything God says and does", and evil everything Satan says and does. It doesn't really advance the discussion in a pragmatic meaning of good and evil in our scope of existence.

2) Explaining good and evil in terms of synonyms that don't really explain these, like good is everything "right" or "righteousness". Evil is everything bad, or detrimental, etc.

3) Explaining good and evil by appealing to opposite, like "good is everything that's not bad"


So, in general, there's a semantic problem with these terms, especially when it comes to religious appeal to meaning. I find that Christians and Muslims don't do really well with breaking down the precise meaning of concepts and words, and what these mean in our reality.

I would argue that good and evil are merely a judgement of any given entity or action based on the generalized outcome, thus these are stereotypical judgements that we as humans make to form some form of provisional morality. But it's very difficult to pin down the precise meaning of these words apart from a subjective appeal to one's judgement and preference, or some sort of collective judgements and preferences that form stereotypical understanding and associations of these terms.

If you are play by the above rules, how would you go about defining these terms?

 

[Chesterton]

If you want to play by your rules, and you're really into precision, then your rules also need to be very precise. What exactly do you mean by "advance the discussion"? How should we "break down and pin down the precise meaning of concepts and words"? What exactly do you mean by "semantic"? I get that you want to "advance" things and "break" things, but I don't understand what that means, so unfortunately, these may be ideas relevant only to your own reality.

It sounds like you've already gotten generally good ideas. I don't see anything more needs to be done unless you want to go straight to the Euthyphro dilemma.

 

[Dre Khipov]

The question about semantic meaning of good and evil should be taken more seriously IMO, because much of the religious language deals with abstract concepts that all of us "understand". For example, very few of us will have disagreements behind the meaning of a word "apple". Why? It's not a term that depends on layers of abstract meaning. It's a very distinct pointer and it's rather precise, especially when we discuss it in context of food.

When we talk about meaning of evil or good, we are talking about a very broad set of layered and nested meaning encapsulated in a single word. It's a pointer, of the pointer, of the pointer, of the pointer, and so on. Yes, we rely on these shortcuts to speed up the conversation, but it gets us into trouble when we think that we are talking about the same things. We are essentially arguing for and against our own model and interpretation of any given abstract term.

In science and legal realms we developed strict set of rules that demand precision of language in order to maintain clarity and avoid disagreements. Broad consistency in any given definition and language is enforced and maintained. Separate dictionaries are kept to make sure that meaning behind words used is clear.

In religion there seems to be no such standard and there are no definitions, and it seems like anything goes within limits of certain dogma. People are presented with vague ideas like sin, atonement, righteousness, or the guidance of Holy Spirit. There are no strict or concise definition as to meaning or mechanics behind these words in terms of consistent usage.

It's no surprise as to why someone would have basic problem of elaborating and defining fundamental words like good and evil, because these words are merely empty containers people fill with their own understanding, and it's beneficial for religion for these to remain vague.

It perpetuates the aura of agreement and mystery.

 

[Chesterton]

In science and legal realms we developed strict set of rules that demand precision of language in order to maintain clarity and avoid disagreements.

Science uses tons of metaphors for things, and it was a supreme court justice who famously said "I know obscenity when I see it" because the court couldn't define it precisely. It's the same with good and evil. It's not done to perpetuate agreement and mystery, it's simply a mystery, and at bottom there is agreement.

 

[Dre Khipov]

Science uses tons of metaphors for things, and it was a supreme court justice who famously said "I know obscenity when I see it" because the court couldn't define it precisely. It's the same with good and evil. It's not done to perpetuate agreement and mystery, it's simply a mystery, and at bottom there is agreement.

I don't think that I make the metaphors to be the root of the problem. The issue with consistent definition, meaning and understanding.

Even in cases of marginal lack of clarity in some legal cases, you have to agree that religion tends to be far more ambiguous than our legal system. Both science and legal system simply wouldn't function if precise language wasn't carefully maintained. That's why you get these long disclaimers clearly defining meaning of words in both research material, and legal paperwork.

 

[zippy2006]

Jumping from a different thread on a different Christian forum, there tends to be a halt in discussion when I ask for a clear definition of good and evil...

Augustine and Aquinas address this in detail. Good is being under the aspect of the desirable, and evil is a privation of good (see Confessions VII, 3, 5, & 12; Enchiridion 10-12, City of God XI, 9 & XII, 6; ST Ia, Q5; and Ia IIae, Q18. You will also find treatments in Augustine's works against the Manichaens and Aquinas' Summa Contra Gentiles).

 

[zippy2006]

Even in cases of marginal lack of clarity in some legal cases, you have to agree that religion tends to be far more ambiguous than our legal system. Both science and legal system simply wouldn't function if precise language wasn't carefully maintained. That's why you get these long disclaimers clearly defining meaning of words in both research material, and legal paperwork.

The problem isn't religion vs. science, it is nature vs. artifice. The reason that scientific and legal systems have a precise lexicon is because the meaning is either stipulated or the word coined. Scientific and legal systems are man-made entities somewhat removed or abstracted from reality, and thus a definition is what the relevant authority stipulates the meaning to be. For example, astrophysics uses well-defined stipulative mathematical models and then moves to argue that a certain natural phenomenon is well-described by this (artificial) model.

Things which cleave closer to reality itself, like philosophy, religion, or colloquial definitions stemming from everyday experience, are not stipulative, prescriptive, or imposed, but descriptive and received. This is why the lexicographer who writes the dictionary is engaged in a work of discovery rather than stipulation, as are the philosopher and theologian. Thus the definition of words in these disciplines is harder to pin down because the meaning must be discovered and described rather than simply stipulated and prescribed.

This is a general problem of the philosophy forum on CF, where definitions are paid little mind. In many properly philosophical discussions the definitions are only truly arrived at in the end of the discussion, rather than stipulated at the beginning. To ignore this fact is to confine oneself to analytic truths. A recent example of a good philosophical exchange resulting in refined definitions can be found here.

 

[Murby]

This is not that difficult of a question in any context..
Good and evil are defined moment by moment via your circumstances.. (See the green line in my signature)

What is good for society, community, and individual, is the same as what is favorable, desirable and beneficial to those entities.
The opposite is also true for evil.

What changes are the circumstances that determine what is, or isn't, favorable or beneficial to those entities... The normal perspective and expectation is a hierarchical order from society (top) to community, to individual (bottom)..
What may be good for the individual may be bad for society and community.. so is normally regarded as bad or evil. However, because of the hierarchical order, what is good for society and community is not usually regarded as bad or evil for the individual.

Let look at some easy examples..
It may be beneficial for a businessman (individual) to murder his business partner.. but if everyone behaved that way, it would be bad for the larger community and society so its regarded as evil.

It may be beneficial for society or community to limit or even ban fishing in a specific spot or for a specific species.. But while this could have negative consequences for the individual, its regarded as good because it saves a natural resources..

Good and evil are pretty easily defined by circumstances... What might be considered good today, may be considered evil tomorrow.. the reverse is also true, but not as often.

 

[zippy2006]

Good and evil are pretty easily defined by circumstances... What might be considered good today, may be considered evil tomorrow.. the reverse is also true, but not as often.

You're essentially right that (psychological) good is defined by desirability and benefit/happiness, but it isn't primarily a function of circumstances. We identify goods in our present circumstances, for we have no choice but to live in our present circumstances, but what we identify as good need not vary drastically over time. That's because what we desire and what we believe will make us happy need not vary drastically over time. There are corrections and changes of direction, but the movement is something like a spiral that converges on the truly good.

The fact that we desire different things in different circumstances does not mean that our opinion of the good has necessarily changed, it only means that we are presented with different objects to judge. Suppose I think that love is better than a career, and a career is better than cookies. If my circumstances present me with either a career or cookies, I will choose a career. If my circumstances present me with either love or a career, I will choose love. The varying circumstances do not change what I believe to be good. I always believed that love > career > cookies, and even when I choose love over a career I am not denying that a career is good.

From the psychological angle, good is what one desires and believes will fulfill them. This is true regardless of circumstances. The definition of good prescinds from circumstances, even in your own analysis.

 

[Murby]

The fact that we desire different things in different circumstances does not mean that our opinion of the good has necessarily changed, it only means that we are presented with different objects to judge. Suppose I think that love is better than a career, and a career is better than cookies. If my circumstances present me with either a career or cookies, I will choose a career. If my circumstances present me with either love or a career, I will choose love. The varying circumstances do not change what I believe to be good. I always believed that love > career > cookies.

From the psychological angle, good is what one desires and believes will fulfill them. This is true regardless of circumstances. The definition of good prescinds from circumstances, even in your own analysis.

You're measuring good vs evil by desires? How are ones desires in any way related to what is, or isn't, good or evil?

From a psychological angle, if someone thinks raping women will fulfill them, that doesn't make it good.. it's still evil..

Bust my reasoning and you'll be my favorite person for the day.. but you have to debunk it using logic and reasoning that applies to good and evil.. which I don't think you'll be able to do.

What is desirable does not define good or evil...

 

[zippy2006]

You're measuring good vs evil by desires? How are ones desires in any way related to what is, or isn't, good or evil?

From a psychological angle, if someone thinks raping women will fulfill them, that doesn't make it good.. it's still evil..

Bust my reasoning and you'll be my favorite person for the day.. but you have to debunk it using logic and reasoning that applies to good and evil.. which I don't think you'll be able to do.

What is desirable does not define good or evil...

First let's recall that you yourself spoke first of desirability:

What is good for society, community, and individual, is the same as what is favorable, desirable and beneficial to those entities.

Let's also recall that I did not define good as merely desirable:

You're essentially right that (psychological) good is defined by desirability and benefit/happiness...

And let's finish by remembering the actual point I made:

You're essentially right that (psychological) good is defined by desirability and benefit/happiness, but it isn't primarily a function of circumstances.

Good for the human is what will allow it to flourish as a human being, and for that reason it is intrinsically desirable by humans. Whenever a human being calls something "good," they believe it to be desirable and amenable to their flourishing, although they are sometimes mistaken. The truly good is that which will truly allow them to flourish. Finally, circumstances are a secondary consideration that do not factor into the definition of good.

 

[Murby]

First let's recall that you yourself spoke first of desirability:

I should have chosen a better word to characterize it. I meant it as "what a society desires" or what a "community desires".. It was not mean to characterize the minutia of personal desires, fads, trends, or other insignificant attractions..

 

[Spiribala]

Certainly Christians, like everyone, use the context of specific situations to determine how to act in a particular moment. What makes Christian ethics, Christian, is a lens that is generally Biblical and perhaps also influenced by their own faith tradition. This may not be easily expressed in a few short sentences, but I'll try to simplify.

It makes sense to provide a simple motif of the Biblical story. Their is creation, the fall, God's plan for redemption, Jesus' life, death and resurrection and through that mans' sin in wiped clean and eventually believers will come to be with him in his kingdom.

In the Christian story then, you don't have a deistic God, or perhaps a number of gods like those in Greek myths that either consider people an afterthought or care about people as one among many interests. And this God, again unlike the Greek gods, isn't fallible - He's all knowing, and all powerful. You have a God that truly cares about people, that became a man himself and knows what temptation as well as what suffering feels like. This is a compassionate God yet one who hates sin. And you have a humanity that is mired in sin and looks to God only haltingly and sometimes not at all.

Oftentimes nonChristians look at Christian morality and think that the God in the Christian context must be like any other being in the world except just a whole lot more powerful. From that standpoint it doesn't make sense to, as the Bible says "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." It does however make sense with a loving and personal God who has experienced what you've experienced, and who does have a purpose for you. It's not that Christians suggest we follow him, only out of fear or only due to a promised reward. It's that God has put this universe together and best knows how it works and that includes our role in it.

A common Biblical metaphor is one of family. Their is a standing offer to all people to enter into God's family, become his children so we no longer are subject to all the consequences of sin, even if we have to deal with during our lives here. Like an earthly family, a child doesn't just come naturally equipped with the best way of doing good and avoiding evil. A father and mother provide an example of how to live and a child generally does well to follow their examples because the child's parents love him and they know better than him through experience. Christians see God as the perfect father so what goes for an earthly father goes much more so for following God.

 

[Radrook]

The area of philosophy called ethics has absolutely no difficulty defining what is evil.
The human condition of mortality or ability to die, ability to reason, ability to suffer psychological and physical pain, the urgent need for social cooperation in order to enhance survival, all these place specific a duties on all humans which if violated, constitutes evil.

BTW
The United Nations Charter for Human Rights is based on some of these.
The pre-Socratic Sophist idea that good and evil were to be considered merely subjective culturally-determined perceptions was discarded long ago as being a morally bankrupt concept.

 

[DogmaHunter]

Jumping from a different thread on a different Christian forum, there tends to be a halt in discussion when I ask for a clear definition of good and evil that avoids one of the following:

1) Explaining good as synonymous with "everything God says and does", and evil everything Satan says and does. It doesn't really advance the discussion in a pragmatic meaning of good and evil in our scope of existence.

2) Explaining good and evil in terms of synonyms that don't really explain these, like good is everything "right" or "righteousness". Evil is everything bad, or detrimental, etc.

3) Explaining good and evil by appealing to opposite, like "good is everything that's not bad"


So, in general, there's a semantic problem with these terms, especially when it comes to religious appeal to meaning. I find that Christians and Muslims don't do really well with breaking down the precise meaning of concepts and words, and what these mean in our reality.

I would argue that good and evil are merely a judgement of any given entity or action based on the generalized outcome, thus these are stereotypical judgements that we as humans make to form some form of provisional morality. But it's very difficult to pin down the precise meaning of these words apart from a subjective appeal to one's judgement and preference, or some sort of collective judgements and preferences that form stereotypical understanding and associations of these terms.

If you are play by the above rules, how would you go about defining these terms?

I think one could write entire books about what "good" really means, and idd entire books have been written about it. And still many of the authors feel like they didn't cover everything there is to cover about it.

So to nail it down in just a few words, one would have to be extremely simplistic about it. With that in mind, I'ld say'ld say that "moral" is anything and everything that promotes the well-being (in all aspects) of sentient beings, without, or with a minimum, of negative impact on the well-being of other sentient beings.

"immoral" would be the opposite: anything and everything that negatively impacts the well-being of sentient beings.

I like Sam Harris' ideas concerning this.

He hypothises two worlds:
- one of maximized well-being and prosperity for all sentient beings
- one of maximized suffering and misery for all sentient beings.

"Moral" are those actions and decisions that take us closer to the first one.
"Immoral" are those that take us closer to the second one.

 

[juvenissun]

Jumping from a different thread on a different Christian forum, there tends to be a halt in discussion when I ask for a clear definition of good and evil that avoids one of the following:

1) Explaining good as synonymous with "everything God says and does", and evil everything Satan says and does. It doesn't really advance the discussion in a pragmatic meaning of good and evil in our scope of existence.

2) Explaining good and evil in terms of synonyms that don't really explain these, like good is everything "right" or "righteousness". Evil is everything bad, or detrimental, etc.

3) Explaining good and evil by appealing to opposite, like "good is everything that's not bad"


So, in general, there's a semantic problem with these terms, especially when it comes to religious appeal to meaning. I find that Christians and Muslims don't do really well with breaking down the precise meaning of concepts and words, and what these mean in our reality.

I would argue that good and evil are merely a judgement of any given entity or action based on the generalized outcome, thus these are stereotypical judgements that we as humans make to form some form of provisional morality. But it's very difficult to pin down the precise meaning of these words apart from a subjective appeal to one's judgement and preference, or some sort of collective judgements and preferences that form stereotypical understanding and associations of these terms.

If you are play by the above rules, how would you go about defining these terms?

Evil is simple. It is anything which goes against God.

Good is more than just not-evil. Things not-evil may not be good enough to be good. I do not really know how to define good. Temporarily, I would say good is something which pleased God.

Good or evil can not be defined without having God.
You tell me one thing which is either good or evil without referencing to God, then I can reverse your classification.

 

[Loudmouth]

Evil is simple. It is anything which goes against God.

This assumes that God is good and moral. Plenty of cultures have gone to very dark places when they decide that their leader or chosen religious beliefs can't be wrong. What you are really describing is obedience to God, which isn't much better a group of followers who once used the excuse, "I was just following orders".

If we can't determine for ourselves what is moral and immoral, then we have no real way of saying what is good and evil. However, I think most of us agree that we are moral agents capable of making that judgment.

 

[Shempster]

If you are play by the above rules, how would you go about defining these terms?

GOOD: Any benevolent attitude or action that does not break the "law of love" that Jesus live and portrayed.
EVIL: Any malevolent attitude or action that seeks to boost ones self above another person or God.

IMO its all about the NATURE of a person. There are two natures: the man of flesh and the spirit of God. Which ever one rules you is the one that will determine the good or evil in your heart and life. Of course, most Christians live with one foot in the spirit and one foot in the world. This is a serious problem, but He will see to it that you eventually make it.

 

[Dre Khipov]

Evil is simple. It is anything which goes against God.

Good is more than just not-evil. Things not-evil may not be good enough to be good. I do not really know how to define good. Temporarily, I would say good is something which pleased God.

Good or evil can not be defined without having God.
You tell me one thing which is either good or evil without referencing to God, then I can reverse your classification.

Quite the opposite, actually.

Saying that evil is anything that goes against God doesn't really define evil at all. How do you get to determine what exactly evil is by such measure? It's infinitely vague.

The same goes for good. If you God is the "ultimate measuring stick" then what exactly is that? How do you get to measure and judge that quality, and by which interpretation of "against God" or "for God"?

 

[Dre Khipov]

GOOD: Any benevolent attitude or action that does not break the "law of love" that Jesus live and portrayed.
EVIL: Any malevolent attitude or action that seeks to boost ones self above another person or God.

Defining good as a "benevolent attitude or action" and evil as "malevolent" is circular, but you did do a couple qualifications:

1) Doesn't break the "law of love" of Jesus. - I think you'd need to explain what you mean by that
2) Seeks to boost one self above other person or God - the same. Would basketball players be evil when they compete and attempt to rank each other by that measure? Would you going to a job interview and saying why you should be the one chosen... be evil?