Good vs. Evil? Psssh.

[Kioth]

Although I have a tendency to ramble, I'm not even going to get started on this one. Yet. Unless someone inspires me with some interesting response. Warning: I ramble more with philosophy than anything else. I blame Nietzche

Opinion? Just this: there is no such thing as good or evil, though through our codes of morals and sense of ethics we have given a metaphysical idea solid actions to represent it. In truth, good and evil can only been seen through perspective, because different circumstances and points of view entail different results in thinking. Therefore, a concrete action such as 'murder' can never be assigned an abstract idea such as 'evil', especially not as a blanket term to describe the action.

[Chuck Norris]

"Murder" Perhaps cannot be assigned the 'evil' tag... It's too general and there are way too many good reasons out there for killing someone. However there are some acts that a man can commit that are truly evil and I am unable to see how these certain things can be looked upon as anything else.

Rape. Child Molestation. These two crimes are truly evil. There is definitely a negative connotation associated with these actions and I am unable to see how they can be justified. In my honest opinion there are definitely disctive actions that determine and define good and evil.

On a lighter note, how can saving a life be compared with rape and looked upon with the same light? Saving a life or even putting your neck on the line for someone else is truly a selfless act and easily defined as good.

I completely believe in good and evil.

[Kioth]

Even though in our society actions such as Rape cannot be defined as good in any way, you can use nature to defend them. Though people who are raped rarely become pregnant, rape can be seen as a way of passing on the genes of someone stong enough to do so, thus furthering evolution. Of course, this does assume that we can't looking for intelligence to be passed on, and also that the rapist doesn't kill whoever they are raping.

The point is simply that there are other ways of looking at it. We don't consider these ways most of the time, because in our society, rape is not acceptable- nor should it be. I'm not arguing for these actions to become common place- as a girl, I'd honestly rather be murdered than raped, and I think it's something that should be punishible by death (nooo, that's not too harsh... >.>). The point is simply that we may have been conditioned to see things in only one way, and that they aren't simply evil, because life is not linear. Nothing can be purely good or purely evil; even if the two things exist, everything would have to be a mixture of the two.

Assuming that they DID both exist, actions such as rape would have to be more evil than good, but I don't think they do. To me, assuming in the existence of good of evil means assuming in the existence of a god of some form. They're titles for things we have chosen to be acceptable or not. They are human creations- like names, they don't really exist, but help us to see what we can or cannot reasonably do, and help to simplify the world into something understandable. Things did not start out with names. We named them. Actions did not start out with values. We made them that way.

Thusly, good and evil may exist in our society because we have put them there, but there isn't actually such a thing as good or evil.

As for the good side of things: it's the same argument. I'm not saying that they can be compared with rape, but neither can they be labeled as good. There are still different ways of looking at them. For instance: natural selection. Maybe the person being saved should not be saved. Maybe the person who put their life on the line should be living, becuase they are the more intelligent of the two. Once again- I'm not condoning that. I think it's quite heroic to risk yourself for someone else. It's just the point that there are still other sides to everything. It's never a solid one or the other.