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Is evil real, or merely the absence of good

Good - concerned for well being of others. Pursuing moments of compassion and care between people.
Evil - Concerned for the self. Interested in manipulating others, lying, being sly to get what they want.

Word. To play devil's advocate, however: if you take the viewpoint that there is no independent self to begin with, how can you reconcile that with this view that evil is a self pursuing its own aims to the detriment of others?

*By "no independent self," I mean that we are all interdependent, that any harm caused to others is also harm caused to the self.
 
Thanks for all the replies, gives me a lot to think about

Obviously evil/good all depends on your viewpoint, and maybe they don't even exist at all. And I wasn't trying to imply there is an "absolute" good or evil, obviously these things could be infinite, and yes it's mostly a grey area

Interesting mindfuck

The definition of evil differs so much from one person to the next, that it leads me to believe it isn't true.

The same could be said for "good", truth is the greater of either.
 
I think that's just attributable to good and evil being strictly human conditions/ constructs. What is good or evil? What a consensus agrees to be good or evil on a societal level and aside from that what we as individuals interpret to be such. There's nothing to suggest either exist without us aside from our own invention.
 
Word. To play devil's advocate, however: if you take the viewpoint that there is no independent self to begin with, how can you reconcile that with this view that evil is a self pursuing its own aims to the detriment of others?

*By "no independent self," I mean that we are all interdependent, that any harm caused to others is also harm caused to the self.

Seems that we are interdependent to a certain extent, but greed becomes a challenge to this. Clearly it is the evil one, who will shed his care for others if it means his own gain.
 
Yea more curious about the original question:just if there is really evil or a lack of good

Example: there are agonists and antagonists, but then there are inverse agonists and withdrawal. Which is evil (metaphorically)

Obviously it's debatable whether evil/good are concrete and depends on viewpoint etc...
 
there is an evil in the nonapplication of particular "goods", and then there is another evil in the badness that takes some effort to create.

an analogy is to a driver and an animal on the road.
a- in the first instance the driver would run over the animal if they do not swerve out of the way;
b- the second involves the driver swerving in the attempt to run over an animal they would not have had they stayed on their original course.

the light analogy doesn't quite work unless you use black holes/dark matter as part of it as well, in which case darkness isn't just an absence of light, but a removal of it.
 
Yea more curious about the original question:just if there is really evil or a lack of good

Example: there are agonists and antagonists, but then there are inverse agonists and withdrawal. Which is evil (metaphorically)

Obviously it's debatable whether evil/good are concrete and depends on viewpoint etc...


there is neither good or evil, they exist in the receivers perception and the givers intent; truth is what exists as motive. in a spirituality context, this is why morals exist, in order to acclimate into singularity surpassing this common proposal amongst many pertaining to the topic of duality.

_________
"Woe to those who call good evil and evil good, who put darkness for light and light for darkness"
Isaiah 5:20
 
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My answer would be yes, there is evil. If there isn't there is no good. My opinion is that there is no good or evil outside of us though.
 
My answer would be yes, there is evil. If there isn't there is no good. My opinion is that there is no good or evil outside of us though.

of course there is... if you lose your soul in this world... you're not having it handed back in the next.
 
Sure,

evolving_soul.jpg


lol sorry.....

But I can't show you something immaterial that easily.
 
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No, our consciousness. But if you drive it into spiritual turmoil in this world; don't expect it to be all forgotten in the next. Consequence is eternal.

i see the conscious as awareness of the senses, acting as a weight or tether-line to the soul, when it becomes light enough, the soul is allowed to carry on. what lightens the load of consciousness is doing good things, without conscious effort.
 
i see the conscious as awareness of the senses, acting as a weight or tether-line to the soul, when it becomes light enough, the soul is allowed to carry on. what lightens the load of consciousness is doing good things, without conscious effort.

Well the 2 go hand in hand. One must be conscious to discover the soul. The soul influences the consciousness and vice versa.

But I do understand your point entirely. It is very true what you say. Our minds and body's develop all kinds of addictions, worries, urges which distract us from the soul to the point we even become unaware of it's existance. It takes a lot of development as a person, experience and thought to let a spiritual side emerge and live, in your own words, "Without conscious effort". Also referred to as "rising above the flesh".
 
^there are levels of consciousness though that we chose not or need not to be made aware of, such as involuntary body functions like breathing and the heart beat - those are arguably the most vital besides having the mental capacity and physical ability to feed oneself. our breathing pattern and the heart-rate can be controlled with the subtle realization of how to. the same can be done with the subconscious, the soul and true self, and thus the life-path the self has acquired; along with this knowledge knowing or doing other-wise begins to take conscious effort.
 
There is no such thing as good or evil bc what one might consider good,others might view it as evil.Good can become perverted into evil and vice versa. The majority of society shapes what we view in these ways,however,those who have transcended the thoughts of the social norm will see that good and evil are illusions.However, Light and Darkness are the perfections of these ideas which we strive for when we do "good" or "evil" things. We will never reach this perfection though.But the concepts of their perfection is needed for the concept of balance of energy in the universe.
 
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