Can ideas be evil? Or just actions?
 

If you don't believe in evil, then insert morally wrong, this thread isn't about that part. Evil is just used as an easy term.

I mean, I hate to use him as an example (Godwin damn you!) but Hitler's ideas infected a nation and caused a holocaust.

So for modern day what does this mean? Does freedom of speech really apply? I used to believe in it. Now I'm not so sure. I don't think hate spewers (such as the KKK) should be allowed to spread their evil ideas. By allowing them to exist, they create more evil.

Of course, who decides what's evil is another thing altogether...

I don't know if I'm just being particularly ornery right now or what. So what do you all think?

The Buddhist perspective differentiates between good states of mind and evil states of mind, good actions and evil actions. If in your mind you are constantly thinking in anger or of partaking in hatred, then this is an evil state of mind. If, however, you are constantly thinking compassionately and of partaking in helping others, then this is a good state of mind. It is the difference between states of misery and states of happiness.

So, yes, ideas have moral value despite the difference between thought and action. It is often contemplated how thoughts or states of mind precede actions. The two are connected.

In terms of speech (a kind of action), hate speech is morally wrong, as it can and usually does lead to harm. I find that many people underestimate the power of words. If you understand the depth of the impact of emotional abuse, you understand this. Words spoken with hatred is an action that is morally wrong.

Woo! Go BG. You said it more elegantly than I. And I figured you'd disagree with me. Cool.

I think you're just being particularly ornery. Thoughtless actions are impossible so they only seem common. Evil needs good. Good only thinks it could get by without evil.
I don't understand the question, which makes me ornery. I HATE that.

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people.
He said, "My son, the battle is between two wolves inside us all.

"One is Evil - It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

"The other is Good - It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: "Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

But many people create acts of evil from idea's they believe to be good.
Is good and evil just based on majority opinion of your peers ?

sometimes you don't even realize you are feeding the evil one even little scraps.

Interesting, I had always thought that Buddhism viewed and interpreted ANY action as kharmic, that is Buddhist put little distinction between 'good' or 'bad' while emphasizing the fact that action (of any kind) is a departure from dharma and therefore an unnecessary bump in the road to enlightenment.

What I get from that is action is contrary to dharma, and therefore Buddhist are often caught trying to balance the bad kharma with good kharma in order to rebalance - an erroneous process from what I understand.

BG - I agree that thought and action are connected, and thought can have value, but in a buddhist context, can thought without action have any kharmic impact? In the Theistic paradigms, thoughts can be interpreted by gods and be rewarded or punished accordingly (i.e. evil or good) however for Buddhists, this doesn't hold true as the aim is to achieve personal enlightenment and gods are on the same path to this aim as humans are.

Of course, I am drawing on the Hinayana or Theravadic exposure that I have had to Buddhism which may differ from some of the non-orthodox methods now prevalent.

The key here is action. I don't think you can work on karma without action. The road to enlightenment includes doing good and being helpful to others. A false view of Buddhism is that it's pessimistic or nihilistic. Furthermore, erroneous views (ignorance) are a barrier to rightful action, and so it is connected. Buddha taught how everything is connected, and that no action, no state, no understanding, has inherent, isolated value.

I don't think hateful thoughts in and of themselves will have a karmic impact. However, I believe that they are a source of karmic activity. The main focus of meditation is on the nature of thought. Thoughts arise, fester, and pass. By observing this process, we can understand how we react to specific thought processes. When we find ourselves carrying out actions that we later regret, we can trace this back to our thoughts that preceded the matter, that provided a basis for it. Usually, these thoughts are rooted in delusion. It's only by breaking through this delusion can we see the truth of our situations and how to act accordingly.

Buddhist enlightenment is personal enlightenment, but it cannot be achieved in isolation. Its path includes compassion for all living beings.

I have read a bit about the Theravadic tradition briefly out of curiosity. However, I haven't explored it further because it was of no use to me. I tend to stay away from Buddhist writings that include too much ritual and symbolism. I don't know anything about the Hinayana tradition, but I hear it's not as rigid as the other.

My approach to Buddhism is largely philosophical, and I try to stick to the core teachings as much as possible.

depends what you think evil is, and in what sense you take an idea to exist in the world. or what you think an idea is.

an idea is a pattern. a pattern is an organization of information. information is defined by the patterns that organize it.

a bit of information, however you construe that, can be made amenable to activation via multiple patterns, but not at the same time.

on the other hand (and there's always an on the other hand) the frames of reference that people drag into activating a pattern are almost never clear. so they're always multiple, it seems to me, because they're embodied directly, so integrated into the pattern-generating apparatus that is memory, which is a pattern of patterns that is as it patterns so is through its patterning so isn't an object even though when one says "memory" so uses a noun one implies an object-ness or an amenable-to-being-formalized-as-objectness and the same obtains with the word "idea" and pattern for that matter.

but it is the case that there are socio-cognitive pathways or tendencies and these are specific and/or particular. in a social-historical sense. the social imaginary, really. which is particular to each social-historical space, which is each space and the range of forms that can be produced and which, in turn, produce it.

in the soft totalitarian system we live in largely shaped by the ideological production apparatus though of course not entirely. were it entire, we'd just be repeating. were we just repeating there'd be no cognition really. by which i mean no active assimilation of the various environments through which the systems of systems that we are move.

ideas are patterns that operate in particular textual spaces or media spaces as if they existed outside the processes of appropriation, or making and remaking. these spaces are externalizations of memory. when no-one is reading or listening or remembering, these patterns are like things forgotten.

if ideas are patterns and patterns are bits of information that are defined through how they operate in patterns, then a dictionary definition is just another patterning. if you look at a noun as a word-object and assemble the results of that looking in a particular space, ordered in a particular way, you get a collection of word-objects that is a dictionary. definitions are not the only way to think about meanings. that is why i mention this.

are ideas evil. i would think that patterns can define information in ways that makes their activation dangerous. it's a context-dependent kind of danger, i would think. is dangerous that same as evil? depends what you think evil is. what is dangerous? o, for example a notion of nation that hinges on a notion of identity that presupposes to operate the exclusion of another, or a range of others and that aligns the ongoing production of identity with the ongoing production of exclusions (in the benign-ish form) or eliminations (in the less benign form with the difference between a matter of degree).

is national identity therefore evil? depends what you mean by evil. is it dangerous? if the pattern that informs its social operation resemble the above, then yes it is. when does dangerous become evil? depends on who you're talking to.

maybe.

A national identity and the potential dangers therein is an example of delusive thinking, in relation to what I discussed above. If it produces an "us versus them" mentality, this is delusive in that it overlooks the common humanness of people outside of those who identify with the national identity.

National identities can also be looked at as an aspect of what leads to anger, mistrust, and even war. To think that those who exist outside of the national identity are any less human can and has lead to evil actions, if we can agree that war and destruction and conquest can be evil.

As for the nature of ideas, you bring up a great problem, rb. Preformed ideas that disseminate as ways of manipulation or deceit are likely to be a great source of evil actions, if we can agree that the exploitation or oppression of others can be evil.

A national identity isn't inherently evil, nor is it inherently dangerous. As you say, it is context-dependent. Is it benignish or not-so-benignish?

Absolutely, the Buddhist monks (bikkus) that I hung with were staunchly in the traditionally orthodox method of Buddhism (Therevadic/Hinayana) and adhered more closely to the Buddha's teachings. they were quite adamant that any kind of action (i.e. the key here is action) was going to have an impact on their attainment of enlightenment.

The way that one guy described it to me was that the practice of dharma (right action) was akin to creating no shadow on the ground (he gave me the image of a stick in the ground at noon as the practice of dharma - the stick was present, but it cast no shadow - the shadow being action and the results of action).

He went on to state that kharma (good or bad - it didn't matter) is a departure from dharma. The daily meditations were aimed at understanding how to lessen the impact on the world caused by kharma.


So you are correct - Kharma is action. Action in an orthodox Buddhist context is contrary to the achievement of enlightenment.



So - we as normal folk, do not have the luxury of day long meditation like the bikkus. We, by necessity, need to assess our daily actions and try to come out ahead where our good (non-evil) thoughts generate actions that put us on the positive (good) side so that we can at least conform to societal needs and perhaps progress along our own paths.

As far as I know, the Hinayana or Therevadic paths are as close to the core of the philosophy as one can get. The newer Mahayana and other derivatives (Tibetan, Zen etc) have evolved and grown.

Leto, my starting point in Buddhism was the Dhammapada. From there, I read a few intro texts that were written for secular readers. I've read a number of books by high-profile practitioners, including Pema Chodron, Thich Nhat Hanh, and the 14th Dalai Lama. The selection I've read were for no particular audience other than a Western audience, but the focus was on Buddhist philosophy and how to apply it to everyday life and how it can work through wider problems such as war and global strife.

But I really need to read and study Shantideva's Bodhicaryavatara if I want to get closer to the source.

In my own situation, Buddhism has helped me formulate my moral beliefs and practices. It has informed my humanistic tendencies. Its essentially atheistic foundation (i.e. personal enlightenment, rather than a creator) based on observation, practical reasoning, and compassion is what drew me to it as a non-religious person curious about how to live a life with meaning.

In terms of its views of good and evil, it's really quite simple: Do what you can to help others; if you cannot, at least do no harm.

I'm interested to hear some opinions about this, especially from Baraka, but of course anyone can say their piece.

I'd give my take, but I have no take to give. I've pondered that same question, "is good and evil, right and wrong, really just based on what the majority opinion is?" Something tells me the answer is no, as I believe humans are inherently good, but capable of evil. So good is based on the default human nature, which is good, and that's what sets the tone for what really is "good vs evil."

The thing to keep in mind, Pearl Trade, is that people generally wish to avoid suffering and they wish to experience happiness. This gives room to a sense of relativity, but at the same time there are certain universals we can observe. Most of us would say we are made happy by a sense of belonging and that a lack of it could lead to suffering through alienation. Most of us wish to avoid pain, and so forth.

That said, what is right and wrong isn't something simply put to a vote for a majority, and good intentions that lead to misery aren't necessarily the fault of the intentions themselves. However, many laws and customs within a society are made so based on a common belief that they are good things. This is why you see many similarities between cultures.

Though the problem arises when a culture or society has what is viewed as unjust "norms." There are still cultures that support what is essentially a violence against women, or against those who are not a part of the majority in terms of religion, race, or creed. Despite such cultures supporting these injustices, there will be others who will say it is wrong despite the common beliefs. These others are usually a persecuted minority, or outsiders.

I don't want to delve too much into universal claims of good vs. evil, but I have, I hope, provided at least some examples of the differences between opinions of select groups vs. the realization that most humans want the same basic things.

If I think I'm going to hurt you but end up helping you instead, does that outcome mitigate the evil in my intent or lessen whatever good was done? If I think I'm helping but harm you instead...y'know.

Here we need to make a distinction between intention and outcome. If you had evil intentions and attempted to act upon it but ended up helping someone instead, it doesn't change the fact that you had evil intentions. The good thing is that no one was harmed---they were actually helped. But a problem remains: you likely still have evil intentions, and there is a chance that it will be worsened by your unintended outcome.

The good outcome will be good insofar as it benefits the recipient, regardless of your intention. You will still be burdened the evil intent, however. It will be yours still to deal with, and so that hasn't changed.

On the other hand, if you try to help someone but something terrible happens, it will cause misery to the recipient and you alike. This is something that you both will need to deal with regardless of your intention. If you remain positive and compassionate, you can work through the situation, but no matter how well-meaning you were, a terrible outcome is a terrible outcome. It should not be avoided or ignored.

Thoughts can't be evil man. I know this because I am NO rapist! I have sex with Angelina Jolie every night!! She just doesn't know about it.

of course thoughts can be evil. its thoughts that control action right? thinking about killing someone or thinking about ripping people off or thinking about swiping a lollypop from a kid before knocking his teeth out are all evil thoughts. you just need to learn to control them

I submit that there's no controlling your thoughts. When the group tells an individual they're wrong it's probably a misunderstanding unless it turns into an action.

The thing about the assumption that good beliefs can lead to negative actions is...some people are fully aware of their actions, in such events as premeditated murder or such. The thing about Hitler was, he was infatuated with his vision that while a logical part of his mind might've registered what he was doing as wrong, his emotions overrode that logic. regardless, he was also pushed by his friends and peers (ie Heinrich Himmler, who was mostly responsible for the Holocaust)

---------- Post added at 07:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:54 PM ----------

There is a certain point here, being that the thoughts already were logically processed and planned out, and I believe that type of thought is evil. But what really screws up this concept is the line between fantasy and actual belief. And that's where serial killers/sadists/psychopaths fit in, right where that line begins to blur

Or the other conclusion is that we all have some evil inside of us...

Now my question is, is it evil for the executioner to kill the murderer? To think of it? To think of killing all bad people in the world? A cleansing if you will. Some day we may have a similar choice with some sort of selective super virus.

If the executioner enjoys his job, it's evil. We're such a self-important & self-involved species, though, that we disagree even where we could not.

So I can go on a killing spree so long as I don't enjoy it?

'taint what I said, but I see I said nothing. Sorry about that.

I was RESPONDING. Mea culpa.

Ideas that don't lead to actions, including speech, are neutral, I think.

Zeraph, no you can't. If the executioner is just doing his job, that I still think it's evil won't save my neck. Do you follow?