Are humans EVIL by nature

[MrsSassyPants]

If this topic has been discussed before then forgive me. I am too lazy to look it up.   But God damnit the people in my life, mainly coworkers are god damn shameful in their everyday behavior.  Which made me think of the holocaust, and what our own species is capable of when given power.  Do we just have different abilities when it comes to containing our evil?

[MrsSassyPants]

Please entertain me someone.  I am on the edge of my seat....

[the_antithesis]

If you want to know about evil, it's all contained inside this book.

[spoiler]

And Evil only exists in this book.[/spoiler]

[wolf39us]

Evil is subjective

:-)

[GrinningYMIR]

If you want to know about evil, it's all contained inside this book.

[spoiler]

And Evil only exists in this book.[/spoiler]

I'm not evil, I'm chaotic neutral!


Evil is a manner of perspective

[the_antithesis]

Evil is a manner of perspective

Whatever, rhombus.

[MrsSassyPants]

Oh well, it just seems that when evil people find each other they have no limits, regard, concern, empathy, yada yada yada, wasnt sure if there were any studies on this. 

Subjective it is.  I am atheist, but I am not exactly on the same education level as Dawkins or Darwin.  I just got lucky enough to be good at smelling bull shit, too bad I didn't get the brains some atheists have.

[stromboli]

Evil is a term, a word. Apply it as you see fit. But humans are not evil by nature. That we have a sense of morals and an understanding of right and wrong shows we are capable of good, which means evil is not necessarily inherent.

[MrsSassyPants]

I just don't understand why people can be so mean.  Lame maybe, but my nature is the "do unto others" bull shit. 

[Berati]

No, I don't believe humans are evil by nature.
We possess both good and bad tendencies.

[the_antithesis]

I have a real bad feeling about this.

[kilodelta]

I've always felt that humankind is the best and worst thing about our planet. There is little that we can do about the people that make mankind the worst, but we can always try to be the best ourselves.

[aitm]

I believe on a "neutral field" 95% of humanity are caring and considerate people. When the table starts to slant, the rise of "evil" is directly proportional to the percentage of people who prescribe to a certain belief or are of a certain following. The greater the majority of any belief, following, heritage or religion the greater the capacity of "evil".

[Shiranu]

Quite the opposite OP, I believe that humans are born inherently neutral & good and that we must work to maintain that. There are very few people I would consider inherently "evil" (a term I despise) due to mental illnesses, but the overwhelming majority of people who do bad things have reasons for why they do them. The reasons may be dead wrong, but this is a matter of not teaching them ethics or having a proper education, not a matter of them being innately mean.

[agnostic]

I wouldn't say all humans but I always wonder what makes some people so evil. Is it just the experiences they have been through in life that have made them that way, I dunno.