Unveiling the Love of Evil

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You can tell a lot about a fellow's character by his way of eating jellybeans. ~ Ronald Reagan

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[Francis]

Unconditional love is total acceptance and ‘loving’ embrace of what is. This includes all that is evil. In fact it implies that we can utterly transcend evil and fear altogether. Unconditional love is therefore de-socialized love because society does not condone the embrace of evil.

Evil resides entirely in the unconscious. However not all that resides in the unconscious is necessarily evil. My working definition: Evil is hidden danger. What you don’t know can hurt you, if evil is involved.

One kind of hidden danger that most people associate with evil is sinister malefactors that deliberately hide their malicious intentions. Like the person who put the poison in the Tylenol tablets way back when. Or like the Uni-bomber, or the 911 pilots, etc.

Another kind of evil is perhaps best described as the unintended consequences of ostensibly ‘good’ endeavors. For example, we now know that DDT is a ‘bad actor’ that causes many problems with biological systems; it’s toxic to life. But that was never intentional. Examples like this abound. The latest suspect is carbon dioxide. This is the aspect that Hegel refers to in his quote, “Men cause evil out of good intentions not out of wicked ones." I suppose the integral movement is one attempt to mitigate this type of evil.

The question I pose here: When the danger of the evil-actor, that was hidden, later becomes revealed, does the object or process in question cease to be evil? Once we see the problems associated with, for example, DDT - is the evil aspect then disarmed? Does the evil aspect, once uncovered for what it is, then become just a manageable danger or threat?

 

[Jana]

Speaking of evil.
In the Bill Gates talk to TED he said that as well as the mosquito netting he provides to Africans, there is also DDT spraying IN THEIR HOUSES, IN THEIR BEDROOMS.

If that is not a declaration of genocide, I don't know what is. What an evil dude!

My Dad died from DDT, which was in the superphospate they were spraying on the fields to kill grass grubs. Well there was the smoking, alcohol, meat eating and non protected pesticide spraying as well.

[jimtzu]

in the DDT example you posed, was the original use of it evil?  it could be qualified that it was a bad idea (pesticides in general) or stupid or ignorant.  but once it was found out how deadly it really was (providing it wasn't actually known beforehand) that the use of it became evil by the hands and greed of man.

i understand your point of "hidden danger" being evil... my question is does the danger that is hidden stop being evil once the light of day is upon it?

[Jana]

"i understand your point of "hidden danger" being evil... my question is does the danger that is hidden stop being evil once the light of day is upon it?"

Evil is when a danger is used knowing against those who have no knowledge of its harm.
DDT used against Africans constitues a weapon of mass destruction. Gates is not dumb, he knows what he and his coconspirators are doing.

[Francis]

was the original use of DDT evil?

My point was partially premised on the idea that the original intended use was for 'good.' Indeed pests that destroyed thousand of acres of crops were managed by it.

my question is does the danger that is hidden stop being evil once the light of day is upon it?

Hey wait, i thought that was my question! Based on my proposed formulation, no, evil requires unconsciousness. If it's conscious, it's not evil. But this consclusion is bothering me. It's somehow counter-intuitive.

Gosh Jana. I chose my examples randomly. Sorry about your dad. As far as Gates; he's a crook. Microsft is a criminal organization convicted on two continents.

[Jana]

My point is why would anyone in their right mind admit to being a genocidal maniac on video at a TED talk...one has to consider his sanity, and those of his buddies. They assume they are omnipotent and can declare their evil without consequence to the sheepers/sleepers of the world for all eternity.

We will probably find that 90% of what we are doing now as a species is extreme evil. Hopefully we will discover this as we awake to our unconscious self-destructive drive. Hopefully we will have enough love to stop the life destroying practices, thoughts and structures.

[Jana]

Schiller’s task in defining anew human nature is to restore man’s dignity while preserving the belief that, despite its adverse effects, modern civilization is not a throwback into a savage past.  The illusion of a progressive movement must be kept.  If the present is to be preserved, not cancelled out as an error but incorporated into a necessary development governed by reason, and if, at the same time, human nature is to be ‘excused’ from the inessentiality this same present reveals, humanity must be redefined in a radically different way.  The surest way to escape the undesirable implications of the fragmentation and inessentiality of modern man is to renounce essence itself and define man as what is forever becoming. 

On one hand, this new notion of humanity remains within the anthropocentrism of the Enlightenment project as it turns man into an infinite potential, an openness to the future, a progressive and praiseworthy movement toward an ideal.  On the other hand, however, man’s identification with semblance and his proclaimed independence from essence/truth is tainted by something like bad faith.  Once man is no longer conceived as essence, it becomes easy to invent apologies for him as semblance.  It will be objected that the split between truth and semblance precludes semblance from being judged and found apologetic insofar as apology depends on a standard, a truth. However, since this split is never final, Schiller’s notion of the human can be described as apologetic. 

The apologetic aspect (man is semblance because he cannot be essence) is not the only discomforting aspect of Schiller’s notion of humanity.  The ideal of the fully human demands an absolute balance, an equipoise, an “equal tempering” of all individual human functions to produce “happy and complete human beings”(43).  This state of equipoise could be easily confused with a state of apathy or lethargy,[23] and the image of “happy and complete” man involuntarily calls to mind the image of a sedate or brainwashed man deprived of any desires and needs.[24]  As a state of infinite determinability, the aesthetic state is extremely vulnerable.  There is no guarantee that its freedom will not be abused, will not be determined by something other than moral laws, unless the assumption is made (and it is made) that freedom is always already rational freedom.

http://intertheory.org/trifonova.htm

[Francis]

Gates is not dumb, he knows what he and his coconspirators are doing.

All materials, including DDT, can be handled safely, with appropriate precautions. They probably don't realize that the remedy might be worse than the problem. Actually they might even be right. I don't have the numbers here. What I mean is this: if thousands of people per month, say, are dying now, and they take precautions to limit the exposure of people and livestock. Say, if they have the people leave the house for a few days and train them to wash down all the surfaces, protect water supplies, etc. Then maybe, just maybe, it's going to save more people than it kills. This should be left to public health professionals and Gates should stick to programming. He's taking all the money he made illegally and pretending to be a philanthropist. But this isn't robbing the rich to give to the poor. He drove thousands of working people out of business with his illegal monopoly. Now he's trying to ease his conscience. History won't be kind to this man, he knows that much. He's in denial.

[Francis]

I guess I proved my formulation was right. If DDT is only evil when we don't see it's dangers, but not afterward, then my point is supported. We mitigate and 'hold at bay' the dangerous aspects of DDT by the procedures I've outline above. I.e. limit the exposure of people and livestock, have the people leave the house for a few days and train them to wash down all the surfaces, protect water supplies,...

So we must first illuminate the hidden dangers of something, then we mitigate those dangers by taking precautions whilst embracing the object. We thereby avoid all or most of the danger. Still, other hidden dangers could arise when we try this approach, who knows? But to be controlled by this paranoid idea is to be bridled by superstition. But to not be alert to the possibility of other hidden dangers is just naive. In sum, all things have hidden dangers as well as obvious benefits. So nothing is purely evil or purely good. No matter what we embrace, it’s prudent to be alert to, but not controlled by, possible hidden dangers. QED
 

[Jana]

Chimps are immune to the
 malaria we are infected by, so we need to tweek our DNA.
The cure DDT may be worse than the problem...deaths by malaria.
People residing in malaria-endemic regions acquire immunity to malaria through natural exposure to malaria parasites.
If we keep on messing with natures selective mechanisms...?

[Francis]

No matter what we embrace, it’s prudent to be alert to, but not controlled by, possible hidden dangers.

This should have read:

No matter what we embrace, it’s prudent to be alert to possible hidden dangers, but not completely controlled by the fear of such dangers.

[Francis]

So magic in general and science and religion in particular each contain recipes (i.e. spells, techniques, rites, etc) that are designed to embrace the good aspects of a force or phenomenon whilst also disarming and avoiding the potential bad or evil aspects. Like "love God, but don't make idols" or "spray DDT but don't drink it" etc.

[Jana]

We are basically in an extended moral crisis...probably a couple of million years old by now.
It has to do with doing the wrong thing for short term benefit instead of applying more love, brainpower and inquiry to implement the Universal or ultimate solution for the longterm.

Screwing with peoples genetics in order to stop an infectious disease...is undoubtably a cure far worse than the disease. The preservation of the gene pool of a race is paramount, and should be conserved prior to the survival of individual lives.

 

[Francis]

Screwing with peoples genetics in order to stop an infectious disease...is undoubtably a cure far worse than the disease

You just said the opposite two posts ago:

Chimps are immune to the malaria we are infected by, so we need to tweek our DNA.