How Do We Define Evil?
We are missing language that we need
by Mike Meyer ~ Honolulu ~ February 2, 2022
We need to redefine evil. We've lost the use of a crucial word.
The old meaning of evil is still relevant, but its use has become archaic and archaic words don't make it into our daily media. We think we recognize evil but have trouble using it in declarative sentences.
This abandonment of evil is an unfortunate consequence of traditional religion's long, slow death. Those religions defined evil as a product of anthropomorphized mythical forces of nature. Evil was inflicted on people by mythological creatures rather than seen as a product of people.
As mythological religions failed and, themselves, became toxic, the word evil also became toxic. In polite society, we don't call religions evil even if we see them as such.
We know too many people who still define themselves by those religions and are not evil. Evil, then, is too entangled to be safely used for anything.
As religions have failed, they are replaced by science and understanding of evolutionary change as a universal characteristic of our universe. The religious and mythological concept of evil opposed the good and could not be reformed as it was a force coming from an imaginary source…
