Atheists: how do you explain evil?

Question

Is there some independent force of evil in the Universe? Or are horrible acts committed by humans merely the result of a bad upbringing, a genetic difference, or some other thing?

Answer 1

It's called bad behavior. Why it happens is something best left to the philosophers and to the specialists in criminal behavior.

Answer 2

Sometimes people deliberately do things that cause harm and pain to others. This is "evil." Many times, people do those things in the name of religion. Frequently, those same people suffer from severe and untreated mental illness, or have suffered horrendous abuses themselves which have left them with a damaged mind in the form of greater tolerance for the suffering of others, or equating power with success, or a reduced or obliterated conscience, or a messed up sexual drive, or all of the above. Evil is not an entity, but a word coined to describe the intolerable, violent and/or grossly socially inappropriate acts of humans.

Answer 3

What is evil?  Let's say...killing a baby is evil.  Sounds pretty evil, right?

But if you look at every other species on the planet, killing a baby, even of your own species, is pretty common.  Male lions will kill babies of other males.  Female meerkats even kill their own grandchildren.   As creatures become more evolved, they generally stop doing that kind of thing.

We're another species and a very evolved one.  We do things that we consider evil for many complex reasons.  As a group, we've decided on a moral code (like not killing babies) and we stick with that.

But "evil" isn't a thing, like a smoky substance.  It's an agreed upon moral code.

Answer 4

Evil = immoral.

Immoral = any action that harms the individual

Answer 5

Natural human behavior. Just like good

Answer 6

I don't believe in evil. Evil is a subjective term, and depending on who you ask you will find very different answers.

There is antisocial and detrimental behavior just as there is helpful and constructive behavior - and there are many complex reasons behind so called negative behavior, the supernatural and devil figures not being one of them.  

Answer 7

One man's evil is another man's good. It is just a name for something that you perceive to be bad. That doesn't mean it has an objective independent existence.

Answer 8

evil is just a word we use to describe things that happen or that peopel do that we dont like or dont understand

sociological issues that describe usually psychological or biological, and often natural things that we

we humans with our society and ideals dont agree that some of the natural instinctual or biological issues that we are often controlled by are are 'moral' or right etc so we call hem bad, wrong or evil

what makes a person the description of 'evil' is usually a combination efect, childhood, psychological and biological problems

but we dont as a society understand or accept that, so we define them as differnt, as soemthing that we can never be 'evil'

i believe in energy, and yes there will be negative and positive energy, but they make up a whole, its that balance that keeps the universe in the chaotic order that its in, they work together and they are both natural

Answer 9

mental predisposition. and i think it's open to interpretation.

predators kill animals. it should be evil from the prey's point of view.

Answer 10

Well, I explain it by breaking it down into enslavement to and manipulation by means of fear and desire with a side helping of laziness and vulnerability to pain. The prescription, theoretically , is a deep internalization, much the same way we do with language and socialization, of self hypnosis, meditation and lucid dreaming.Carrot + stick = misery and servitude. Deep thought = liberty which brings conscientious behavior.

Answer 11

"Evil" is a subjective opinion and does not actually exist.  It's just a way that some people describe certain acts or things that they find deplorable.

Answer 12

"Good" and "evil" are relative, subjective terms. The universe knows nothing of them.

Answer 13

could you define evil?  evil is a rather broad term, and i don't think any two people have the exact same definition.

Answer 14

They will tell you it is human nature

Answer 15

As usual Acid Zebra is right.

The universe doesn't give a stuff about our notions of good & evil.  They are purely human - and therefore society - defined.

The ancient Greeks used to have the father deflower young daughters before they married - Urgh! Incest & pedophilia! - but it wasn't "evil" to them...

Answer 16

Evil is in the eye of the history writers and media.

Answer 17

Some people are just bad. Why is that hard to understand?

Answer 18

Because human nature can be very dark

Answer 19

No, there's no independent force of evil - no Satan figure, if you will.  Neither is there a force of good.  There are just people.  Some of them are good, some of them are bad, the majority of them are pretty ordinary.

Answer 20

The latter, its all human choice.

Answer 21

It's the result of human greed or an indifferent natural world.  There's no reason to invent a being that causes evil.

Answer 22

Satan is one answer.

But evil comes in many forms.  We commit evil acts by what we do and what we do not do.

Answer 23

I can tell you it's not because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree.