## 1. Evil-Skepticism Versus Evil-Revivalism



Evil-skeptics believe we should abandon the concept of evil. On this
view we can more accurately, and less perniciously, understand and
describe morally despicable actions, characters, and events using more
pedestrian moral concepts such as badness and wrongdoing. By contrast,
evil-revivalists believe that the concept of evil has a place in our
moral and political thinking and discourse. On this view, the concept
of evil should be revived, not abandoned (see Russell 2006 and
2007).



Someone who believes that we should do away with moral discourse
altogether could be called a moral-skeptic or a moral nihilist.
Evil-skepticism is not as broad. Evil-skeptics believe the concept of
evil is particularly problematic and should be abandoned while other
moral concepts, such as right, wrong, good, and bad, are worth
keeping.



Evil-skeptics give three main reasons to abandon the concept of evil:
(1) the concept of evil involves unwarranted metaphysical commitments
to dark spirits, the supernatural, or the devil; (2) the concept of
evil is useless because it lacks explanatory power; and (3) the
concept of evil can be harmful or dangerous when used in moral,
political, and legal contexts, and so, it should not be used in those
contexts, if at all.


### 1.1 Evil and the Supernatural



The concept of evil is often associated with supernatural powers or
creatures, especially in fictional and religious contexts. The
monsters of fictions, such as vampires, witches, and werewolves, are
thought to be paradigms of evil. These creatures possess powers and
abilities that defy scientific explanation, and perhaps human
understanding. Many popular horror films also depict evil as the
result of dark forces or Satanic possession. We find similar
references to supernatural forces and creatures when the term
'evil' is used in religious contexts. Some evil-skeptics
believe that the concept of evil necessarily makes reference to
supernatural spirits, dark forces, or creatures. According to these
theorists if we do not believe that these spirits, forces, or monsters
exist, we should only use the term 'evil' in fictional
contexts, if at all (See Clendinnen 1999, 79-113; Cole 2006,
2019).



Evil-revivalists respond that the concept of evil need not make
reference to supernatural spirits, dark forces, or monsters. There is
a secular moral concept of evil which is distinct from fictional or
religious conceptions, and it is this secular conception of evil that
is meant most often when the term 'evil' is used in moral
and political contexts (see Garrard 2002, 325; Card 2010,
10-17). Evil-revivalists seek to offer plausible analyses of
evil which do not make reference to supernatural spirits, dark forces,
or monsters, but which fully capture secular uses of the term
'evil.' Evil-revivalists believe that if they are able to
offer plausible analyses of evil which do not make reference to the
supernatural, they will have successfully defended the concept of evil
from the objection that ascriptions of evil necessarily imply
unwarranted metaphysical commitments (see sections 3 and 4 for secular
accounts of evil).


### 1.2 Evil and Explanatory Power



Some evil-skeptics argue that we should abandon the concept of evil
because it lacks explanatory power and therefore is a useless concept
(see, e.g., Clendinnen 1999, 79-113; Cole 2006, 2019;
Baron-Cohen 2011). The concept of evil would have explanatory power,
or be explanatorily useful, if it were able to explain why certain
actions were performed or why these actions were performed by certain
agents rather than by others. Evil-skeptics such as Inga Clendinnen
and Philip Cole argue that the concept of evil cannot provide
explanations of this sort and thus should be abandoned.



According to Clendinnen the concept of evil cannot explain the
performance of actions because it is an essentially dismissive
classification. To say that a person, or an action, is evil is just to
say that that person, or action, defies explanation or is
incomprehensible (see Clendinnen 1999, 81; Baron-Cohen 2011, 5-7; see
also, Pocock 1985). (Joel Feinberg (2003) also believes that evil
actions are essentially incomprehensible. But he does not think that
we should abandon the concept of evil for this reason.)



Similarly, Cole believes that the concept of evil is often employed
when we lack a complete explanation for why an action was performed.
For instance, we might wonder why two ten-year-old boys, Robert
Thompson and Jon Venerables, tortured and murdered two-year-old James
Bulger while other ten-year-old boys with similar genetic
characteristics and upbringings cause little harm? Cole believes that
the concept of evil is employed in these cases to provide the missing
explanation. However, Cole argues that the concept of evil does not
provide a genuine explanation in these cases because to say that an
action is evil is just to say either that the action resulted from
supernatural forces or that the action is a mystery. To say that an
event resulted from supernatural forces is not to give a genuine
explanation of the event because these forces do not exist. To say
that an event is a mystery is not to give a genuine explanation of an
event, but rather, it is to suggest that the event cannot be explained
(at least with the information currently available) (2006,
6-9).



Evil-revivalists have offered several responses to the objection that
the concept of evil should be abandoned because it is explanatorily
useless. One common response is that the concept of evil might be
worth keeping for descriptive or prescriptive purposes even if it
isn't explanatorily useful (Garrard 2002, 323-325; Russell
2009, 268-269).



Another common response is to argue that evil is no less explanatorily
useful than other moral concepts such as good, bad, right, and wrong
(Garrard 2002, 322-326; Russell 2009, 268-269). Thus, if
we should abandon the concept of evil we should abandon these other
moral concepts as well.



Eve Garrard and Luke Russell also point out that even if the concept
of evil cannot provide a complete explanation for the performance of
an action, it can provide a partial explanation. For instance, Garrard
argues that evil actions result from a particular kind of motivation.
Call this an E-motivation. Thus, to say that an action is evil is to
say that it has resulted from an E-motivation. This provides a partial
explanation for why the action was performed. Furthermore, Garrard has
argued that if evil actions result from particularly unsavory
motivational states then the concept of evil is able to explain why we
react with horror in the face of evil actions. That is, we react with
horror in the face of evil actions because they result from
particularly despicable motivational states (Garrard 2019, 197. See
also, de Wijze 2019, 212). 


### 1.3 The Dangers of 'Evil'



Some evil-skeptics believe that we should abandon the concept of evil
because it is too harmful or dangerous to use (See e.g., Cole 2006,
21, and 2019; Held 2001, 107). No one can deny that the term
'evil' can be harmful or dangerous when it is misapplied,
used perniciously, or used without sensitivity to complicated
historical or political contexts. For instance, it is likely that by
calling terrorists 'evildoers' and Iraq, Iran, and North
Korea 'the axis of evil' former U.S. President George W.
Bush made it more likely that suspected terrorists would be mistreated
and less likely that there would be peaceful relations between the
peoples and governments of Iraq, Iran, and North Korea and the peoples
and government of the United States.



But should we abandon the concept of evil because it leads to harm
when it is misapplied or abused? Claudia Card argues that "If
the likelihood of the ideological abuse of a concept were sufficient
reason to abandon the concept, we should probably abandon all
normative concepts, certainly 'right' and
'wrong.'" (Card 2010, 15) And yet evil-skeptics do
not believe that we should abandon all normative concepts. So why do
they believe that we should abandon the concept of evil?



An evil-skeptic might reply that we should abandon only the concept of
evil, and not other normative concepts, because the concept of evil is
particularly dangerous or susceptible to abuse. We can discern several
reasons why ascriptions of evil might be thought to be more harmful or
dangerous than ascriptions of other normative concepts such as badness
or wrongdoing. First, since ascriptions of evil are the greatest form
of moral condemnation, when the term 'evil' is misapplied
we subject someone to a particularly harsh judgement undeservedly.
Furthermore, it is reasonable to assume that evildoers not only
deserve the greatest form of moral condemnation but also the greatest
form of punishment. Thus, not only are wrongfully accused evildoers
subjected to harsh judgments undeservedly, they may be subjected to
harsh punishments undeservedly as well.



Another reason that ascriptions of evil can be particularly harmful or
dangerous is that it isn't always clear what people mean when
they use the term 'evil.' As Eve Garrard puts it
"the general obscurity surrounding the term makes some thinkers
very reluctant to appeal to the idea of evil"(Garrard 2002,
322). For instance, some people believe that to say that someone
performed an evil action implies that that person acted out of
malevolence (see e.g., Kekes 2005), while others believe that
evildoing can result from many different sorts of motives, even good
motives (see e.g., Card 2002). Given this ambiguity, it might be
unclear whether an attribution of evil attributes despicable
psychological attributes to an evildoer, and this ambiguity might
result in an overly harsh judgment.



Other ambiguities concerning the meaning of the term
'evil' may be even more harmful. For instance, on some
conceptions of evil, evildoers are possessed, inhuman, incorrigible,
or have fixed character traits (See Cole 2006, 1-21 and 2019;
Russell 2006, 2010, and 2014; Haybron 2002a and 2002b). These
metaphysical and psychological theses about evildoers are
controversial. Many who use the term 'evil' do not mean to
imply that evildoers are possessed, inhuman, incorrigible, or that
they have fixed character traits. But others do. If evildoers have
these traits, and thus will continue to perform evil actions no matter
what we do, the only appropriate response might be to isolate them
from society or to have them executed. But if evildoers do not have
these fixed dispositions and they are treated as if they do, they will
likely be mistreated.



Thus, while most theorists agree that the concept of evil can be
harmful or dangerous there is considerable disagreement about what
conclusion should be drawn from this fact. Evil-skeptics believe that
because the concept of evil is harmful or dangerous we should abandon
it in favour of less dangerous concepts such as badness and
wrongdoing. Evil-revivalists believe that because the concept of evil
is harmful or dangerous more philosophical work needs to be done on it
to clear up ambiguities and reduce the likelihood of abuse or misuse.
Card and Kekes argue that it is more dangerous to ignore evil than to
try to understand it (Card 2002 and 2010; Kekes 1990). For if we do
not understand evil we will be ill-equipped to root out its sources,
and thus, we will be unable to prevent evils from occurring in the
future.


#### 1.3.1 Nietzsche's Attack on Evil



The most celebrated evil-skeptic, nineteenth century German
philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, also argues that the concept of evil
should be abandoned because it is dangerous. Like contemporary
evil-skeptics whom he inspired, Nietzsche argues that the concept
of evil should be abandoned because it does not describe a moral
reality, but instead, is merely used to demonize enemies. In addition,
he also argues that the concept of evil is dangerous because it
has negative effects on human potential and vitality by promoting the
weak in spirit and suppressing the strong. In *On the Genealogy of
Morality: A Polemic*, Nietzsche argues that the concept of evil
arose from the negative emotions of envy, hatred, and resentment (he
uses the French term *ressentiment* to capture an attitude that
combines these elements). He contends that the powerless and weak
created the concept of evil to take revenge against their oppressors.
Nietzsche believes that the concepts of good and evil contribute to an
unhealthy view of life which judges relief from suffering as more
valuable than creative self-expression and accomplishment. For this
reason Nietzsche believes that we should seek to move beyond
judgements of good and evil (Nietzsche 1886 and 1887).



Nietzsche's skeptical attack on the concept of evil has
encouraged philosophers to ignore the nature and moral significance of
evil and instead focus on the motives people might have for using the
term 'evil' (Card 2002, 28; Cole 2019, 178).



In the *Atrocity Paradigm*, Claudia Card defends the concept of
evil from Nietzsche's skeptical attack (Card 2002, 27-49).
Card rejects Nietzsche's view that ascriptions of evil merely
demonize enemies and indicate a negative life-denying perspective.
Instead, she argues that judgments of evil often indicate a healthy
recognition that one has been treated unjustly. Eve Garrard and David
McNaughton go even further in their rejection of Nietzsche's
form of evil-skepticism, arguing that it is morally objectionable to
question ascriptions of evil by victims of atrocious crimes (Garrard
and McNaughton 2012, 11-14).



Card also argues that we have just as much reason to question the
motives of people who believe we should abandon the concept of evil as
we do to question the motives of people who use the concept. She
suggests that people who want to abandon the concept of evil may be
overwhelmed by the task of understanding and preventing evil and would
rather focus on the less daunting task of questioning the motives of
people who use the term (Card 2002, 29).


### 1.4 Arguments in Favor of the Concept of Evil



Some people believe that we should not abandon the concept of evil
because only the concept of evil can capture the moral significance of
acts, characters, and events such as sadistic torture, serial killers,
Hitler, and the Holocaust. As Daniel Haybron puts it "Prefix
your adjectives [such as 'wrong' or 'bad']
with as many 'very's as you like; you still fall short.
Only 'evil', it seems, will do" (Haybron 2002b,
260). According to this line of argument, it is hard to deny that evil
exists; and if evil exists, we need a concept to capture this immoral
extreme. Eve Garrard and David McNaughton argue similarly that the
concept of evil captures a distinct part of our moral phenomenology,
specifically, "collect[ing] together those wrongful actions to
which we have ... a response of moral horror" (Garrard and
McNaughton 2012, 13-17).



A second argument in favour of the concept of evil is that it is only
by facing evil, i.e., by becoming clear about its nature and origins,
that we can hope to prevent future evils from occurring and live good
lives (Kekes 1990, Card 2010).



A third reason to keep the concept of evil is that categorizing
actions and practices as evil helps to focus our limited energy and
resources. If evils are the worst sorts of moral wrongs, we should
prioritize the reduction of evil over the reduction of other wrongs
such as unjust inequalities. For instance, Card believes that it is
more important to prevent the evils of domestic violence than it is to
ensure that women and men are paid equal wages for equal work (Card
2002, 96-117).



A fourth reason not to abandon the concept of evil is that by
categorizing actions and practices as evil we are better able to set
limits to legitimate responses to evil. By having a greater
understanding of the nature of evil we are better able to guard
against responding to evil with further evils (Card 2010,
7-8).


## 2. The History of Theories of Evil



Prior to World War II there was very little philosophical literature
on the concept of evil in the narrow sense. However, philosophers have
considered the nature and origins of evil in the broad sense since
ancient times. Although this entry is primarily concerned with evil in
the narrow sense, it is useful to survey the history of theories of
evil in the broad sense since these theories provide the backdrop
against which theories of evil in the narrow sense have been
developed.


### 2.1 Dualist and Privation Theories of Evil



The history of theories of evil began with attempts to solve the
problem of evil, i.e., attempts to reconcile the existence of evil (in
the broad sense) with an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good God or
creator. Philosophers and theologians have recognized that to solve
the problem of evil it is important to understand the nature of evil.
As the Neoplatonist Plotinus put it "Those inquiring whence Evil
enters into beings, or rather into a certain order of beings, would be
making the best beginning if they established, first of all, what
precisely Evil is" (Plotinus, *Enneads*, I, 8, 1).



One theory of evil that provides a solution to the problem of evil is
Manichaean dualism. According to Manichaean dualism, the universe is
the product of an ongoing battle between two coequal and coeternal
first principles: God and the Prince of Darkness. From these first
principles follow good and evil substances which are in a constant
battle for supremacy. The material world constitutes a stage of this
cosmic battle where the forces of evil have trapped the forces of
goodness in matter. For example, the human body is evil while the
human soul is good and must be freed from the body through strict
adherence to Manichaean teaching. The Manichaean solution to the
problem of evil is that God is neither all-powerful nor the sole
creator of the world. God is supremely good and creates only good
things, but he or she is powerless to prevent the Prince of Darkness
from creating evil. (For more about Manichaeanism see Coyel 2009 and
Lieu 1985; Greenless 2007).



Since its inception, Manichaean dualism has been criticized for
providing little empirical support for its extravagant cosmology. A
second problem is that, for a theist, it is hard to accept that God is
not an all-powerful sole creator. For these reasons influential, early
Christian philosophers such as Saint Augustine, who initially accepted
the Manichaean theory of evil, eventually rejected it in favor of the
Neoplatonist approach. (See Augustine, *Confessions*; *On
the Morals of the Manichaeans*; *Reply to Manichaeus*;
Burt, *Augustine's World*.)



According to the Neoplatonists, evil does not exist as a substance or
property but instead as a privation of substance, form, and goodness
(Plotinus, *Enneads*, I, 8; See also O'Brien 1996). For
instance, the evil of disease consists in a privation of health, and
the evil of sin consist in a privation of virtue. The Neoplatonist
theory of evil provides a solution to the problem of evil because if
evil is a privation of substance, form, and goodness, then God creates
no evil. All of God's creation is good, evil is a lack of being
and goodness.



One problem with the privation theory's solution to the problem
of evil is that it provides only a partial solution to the problem of
evil since even if God creates no evil we must still explain why God
allows privation evils to exist (See Calder 2007a; Kane 1980). An even
more significant problem is that the privation theory seems to fail as
a theory of evil since it doesn't seem to be able to account for
certain paradigmatic evils. For instance, it seems that we cannot
equate the evil of pain with the privation of pleasure or some other
feeling. Pain is a distinct phenomenological experience which is
positively bad and not merely not good. Similarly, a sadistic torturer
is not just not as good as she could be. She is not simply lacking in
kindness or compassion. She desires her victims' suffering for
pleasure. These are qualities she has, not qualities she lacks, and
they are positively bad and not merely lacking in goodness (Calder
2007a; Kane 1980. See Anglin and Goetz 1982 and Grant 2015 for replies
to these objections).


### 2.2 Kant's Theory of Evil



Immanuel Kant, in his *Religion Within the Limits of Reason
Alone*, was the first to offer a purely secular theory of evil,
i.e., a theory that does not make reference to supernatural or divine
entities and which is not developed as a response to the problem of
evil. Kant's concern is to make sense of three apparently
conflicting truths about human nature: (1) we are radically free, (2)
we are by nature inclined toward goodness, (3) we are by nature
inclined toward evil.



Kant's thoughts on evil and morality have had an important
influence on subsequent philosophers writing about the nature of evil
such as Hanna Arendt, Claudia Card, and Richard Bernstein. However,
most theorists acknowledge that Kant's theory is disappointing
as a theory of evil in the narrow sense since it does not pick out
only the morally worst sorts of actions and characters. (See, e.g.,
Card 2010, 37). Instead, Kant equates evil with having a will that is
not fully good.



According to Kant, we have a morally good will only if we choose to
perform morally right actions because they are morally right (Kant
1785, 4: 393-4:397; Kant 1793, Bk I). On Kant's view,
anyone who does not have a morally good will has an evil will. There
are three grades of evil which can be seen as increasingly more evil
stages of corruption in the will. First there is frailty. A person
with a frail will attempts to perform morally right actions because
these actions are morally right, but she is too weak to follow through
with her plans. Instead, she ends up doing wrong due to a weakness of
will (Kant 1793, Bk I, 24-25).



The next stage of corruption is impurity. A person with an impure will
does not attempt to perform morally right actions just because these
actions are morally right. Instead, she performs morally right actions
partly because these actions are morally right and partly because of
some other incentive, e.g., self-interest. Someone with an impure will
performs morally right actions, but only partly for the right reason.
Kant believes that this form of defect in the will is worse than
frailty even though the frail person does wrong while the impure
person does right. Impurity is worse than frailty because an impure
person has allowed an incentive other than the moral law to guide her
actions while the frail person tries, but fails, to do the right thing
for the right reason (Kant 1793, Bk I, 25-26).



The final stage of corruption is perversity, or wickedness. Someone
with a perverse will inverts the proper order of the incentives.
Instead of prioritizing the moral law over all other incentives, she
prioritizes self-love over the moral law. Thus, her actions conform to
the moral law only if they are in her self-interest. Someone with a
perverse will need not do anything wrong because actions which best
promote her self-interest may conform to the moral law. But since the
reason she performs morally right actions is self-love and not because
these actions are morally right, her actions have no moral worth and,
according to Kant, her will manifests the worst form of evil possible
for a human being. Kant considers someone with a perverse will an evil
person (Kant 1793, Bk I, 25).



Most contemporary theorists reject Kant's view that the worst
form of evil involves prioritizing self-interest over the moral law
(See, e.g., Card 2010, 37 and 2002; Garrard 2002; Kekes 2005).
Whether, and to what extent, a person, or her will, is evil seems to
depend on details about her motives and the harms she brings about and
not just on whether she prioritizes self-interest over the moral law.
For instance, it seems far worse to torture someone for sadistic
pleasure than to tell the truth to gain a good reputation. In fact, it
seems reasonable to suppose that the first act (sadistic torture)
indicates an evil will while the second act (telling the truth for
self-interest) indicates a will that is merely lacking in moral
goodness. But for Kant, both acts indicate wills that are equally evil
(for attempts to address this criticism see Garcia 2002, Goldberg
2017, and Timmons 2017).



Kant makes several other controversial claims about the nature of evil
in *Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone*. One of these
claims is that there is a radical evil in human nature. By this he
means that all human beings have a propensity to subordinate the moral
law to self-interest and that this propensity is radical, or rooted,
in human nature in the sense that it is inextirpable. Kant also
believes that we are imputable for this propensity to evil (Kant 1793,
Bk I). Richard Bernstein argues that Kant cannot coherently hold both
of these theses since we could not be responsible for a propensity
that is in us originally and that we cannot be rid of (Bernstein 2002,
11-35). Notwithstanding this important criticism, several
philosophers have argued that Kant's thoughts on radical evil
offer important insights into the nature of evil. For example, Paul
Formosa argues that Kant's reflections on radical evil draw our
attention to the fact that even the best of us can revert to evil, and
thus, that we must be constantly vigilant against the radical evil of
our natures (Formosa 2007. See also, Bernstein 2002 and Goldberg
2017).



In his *Confessions*, Saint Augustine tells us that one day he
stole some pears for the sole sake of doing something wrong
(Augustine, *Confessions*, II, v-x). Kant rejects the idea that
human beings can be motivated in this way (Kant 1793, Bk I, sect. 2).
For Kant, human beings always have either the moral law or self-love
as their incentive for acting. Only a devil could do what is wrong
just because it is wrong. (For more about Kant and diabolical evil see
Bernstein 2002, 36-42; Card 2010 and 2016, 36-61; Allison
2001, 86-100; and Timmons 2017, 319-327).


### 2.3 Arendt's Analyses of Evil



Secular analyses of the concept of evil in the narrow sense began in
the twentieth century with the work of Hanna Arendt. Arendt's
thoughts on the nature of evil stem from her attempt to understand and
evaluate the horrors of the Nazi death camps. In the *Origins of
Totalitarianism* (1951), Arendt borrows Kant's term
'radical evil' to describe the evil of the Holocaust.
However, Arendt does not mean what Kant means by 'radical
evil' (see section 2.2 for Kant's view of radical evil).
Instead, Arendt uses the term to denote a new form of wrongdoing which
cannot be captured by other moral concepts. For Arendt, radical evil
involves making human beings as human beings superfluous. This is
accomplished when human beings are made into living corpses who lack
any spontaneity or freedom. According to Arendt a distinctive feature
of radical evil is that it isn't done for humanly understandable
motives such as self-interest, but merely to reinforce totalitarian
control and the idea that everything is possible (Arendt 1951,
437-459; Bernstein 2002, 203-224).



In *Origins of Totalitarianism* Arendt's analysis of evil
focuses on evils which results from systems put in place by
totalitarian regimes. Her analysis does not address the character and
culpability of individuals who take part in the perpetration of evil.
In *Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil*,
Arendt turns her attention to individual culpability for evil through
her analysis of the Nazi functionary Adolf Eichmann who was tried in
Jerusalem for organizing the deportation and transportation of Jews to
the Nazi concentration and extermination camps. Arendt went to
Jerusalem in 1961 to report on Eichmann's trial for *The New
Yorker* magazine. In *Eichmann in Jerusalem*, she argues
that "desk murderers" such as Eichmann were not motivated
by demonic or monstrous motives. Instead, "It was sheer
thoughtlessness--something by no means identical with
stupidity--that predisposed [Eichmann] to become one of the
greatest criminals of that period" (Arendt 1963, 287-288).
According to Arendt, Eichmann's motives and character were banal
rather than monstrous. She describes him as a "terrifyingly
normal" human being who simply did not think very deeply about
what he was doing.



Arendt's reflections on Eichmann and her concept of the banality
of evil have been both influential and controversial (For theorists
who believe Arendt's thoughts are particularly pertinent today,
see Bar On 2012 and Bernstein 2008. For a discussion of the
controversy see Young-Bruehl 1982). Some theorists take Arendt's
thesis of the banality of evil as a datum to be explained. For
instance, social psychologists Stanley Milgram (1974) and Philip
Zimbardo (2007) have attempted to explain how social conditions can
lead ordinary people to perform evil actions. Others have contested
Arendt's suggestion that ordinary people can be regular sources
of evil (see Card 2010; Calder 2003 and 2009).



There is also controversy concerning the relationship between
Arendt's notions of radical and banal evil. In a letter she
wrote to Gershom Scholem in response to some critical
comments he made about *Eichmann in Jerusalem*, Arendt
writes "You are completely right that I have changed my mind and
no longer speak of radical evil" (Arendt and Scholem 2017, 209). This
suggests that by the time Arendt wrote *Eichmann in
Jerusalem* she had abandoned the notion of radical evil.
However, several Arendt scholars reject this view (Berstein 2002;
Birmingham 2019). For example, Peg Birmingham argues that "Arendt
never wavers in her claim that extreme [or radical] evil is the
systematic production of perfect superfluousness" (Birmingham 2019,
160). According to Birmingham, "[Arendt's] account of the
banality of evil is an account of the production of the moral
thoughtlessness that is concomitant with [radical evil]. They are
interdependent" (Birmingham 2019, 160). 


## 3. Contemporary Theories of Evil Action



Spurred on by Arendt's work, and dissatisfied with analyses of
evil found in the history of philosophy, several theorists since the
1980s have sought to offer necessary and sufficient conditions for
evil. Some theorists focus on evil character, or evil personhood, as
the root concept of evil (See, e.g., Haybron 2002b, 280; Perrett 2002,
304-305; Singer 2004, 190). These theorists consider the concept
of evil action to be a derivative concept, i.e., they define an evil
action as the sort of action that an evil person performs. But just as
many theorists, or more, believe that the concept of evil action is
the root concept of evil (See, e.g., Garrard 1998, 44; Russell 2014,
31-34; Kekes 2005, 2; Thomas 1993, 74-82). These theorists
consider the concept of evil personhood to be a derivative concept,
i.e., they define an evil person as someone who performs, or is prone
to perform, evil actions. Some theorists who believe that evil action
is the root concept believe that only one or two component properties
are essential for evil action, while others believe that evil action
has a multitude of essential components. This section discusses
different views about the essential components of evil action.


### 3.1 Evil and Wrongdoing



Most philosophers, and laypeople, assume that wrongfulness is an
essential component of evil action (See e.g., Card 2002, Garrard 1998,
Formosa 2008). It seems that, to be evil, an action must, at least, be
wrong. However, this claim is not universally accepted (Calder 2013).
The central question for most theorists is: what more is required for
evil than mere wrongdoing? One controversial answer to this question
is that nothing more is required: an evil action is just a very
wrongful action (Russell 2007 and 2014). This position is resisted by
most evil-revivalists who claim instead that evil is qualitatively,
rather than merely quantitatively, distinct from mere wrongdoing (See,
e.g., Steiner 2002; Garrard 1998 and 2002; Calder 2013 and
2019).



To determine whether evil is qualitatively distinct from mere
wrongdoing we must first understand what it is for two concepts to be
qualitatively distinct. According to some theorists two concepts are
qualitatively distinct if, and only if, all instantiations of the
first concept share a property which no instantiation of the second
concept shares (Steiner 2002; Garrard 1998, 2002; Russell, 2007). For
instance, Hillel Steiner claims that "evil acts are
distinguished from ordinary wrongs through the presence of an extra
quality that is completely absent in the performance of ordinary
wrongs" (Steiner 2002, 184). According to Steiner, the extra
quality shared by all evil actions and lacking from merely wrongful
actions, is the perpetrator's pleasure; evil action consists in
taking pleasure in doing wrong. No merely wrongful action is
pleasurable for its doer (for more about Steiner's theory of
evil see Section 3.4).



Todd Calder (2013) disputes this understanding of what it is for two
concepts to be qualitatively distinct, arguing instead that two
concepts are qualitatively distinct provided they do not share all of
their essential properties. Thus, evil actions are qualitatively
distinct from merely wrongful actions provided the essential
properties of evil actions are not also the essential properties of
merely wrongful actions but had to a greater degree.



Calder argues that on plausible theories of evil and wrongdoing, evil
and wrongdoing do not share all of their essential properties, and
thus, evil and wrongdoing are qualitatively distinct. For instance,
Calder argues that it is an essential property of evil actions that
the evildoer intends that his victim suffer significant harm while it
is not an essential property of wrongful actions that the wrongdoer
intend to cause harm. For instance, cheating, lying, and risky
behaviour can be wrongful even if the wrongdoer does not intend to
cause harm (Calder 2013).



Hallie Liberto and Fred Harrington go even further than Calder in
arguing that two concepts can be non-quantitatively distinct even
though instantiations of the two concepts share properties (Liberto
and Harrington 2016). According to Liberto and Harrington, two
concepts are non-quantitatively distinct provided one of the concepts
has a property which determines the degree to which that concept is
instantiated that does not determine the degree to which the second
concept is instantiated. For instance, Liberto and Harrington suggest
that both altruistic and heroic actions have the following essential
properties: (1) they are performed for the sake of others, and (2)
they are performed at some cost or risk to the agent. However, the
degree to which an action is altruistic is determined by the degree to
which it is performed for the sake of others (and not by the degree to
which it is performed at some cost or risk to the agent) while the
degree to which an action is heroic is determined by the degree to
which it is performed at some cost or risk to the agent (and not by
the degree to which it is performed for the sake of others). They call
this form of concept distinctness "quality of emphasis
distinctness" (Liberto and Harrington 2016, 1595).



Importantly, if Liberto and Harrington are right that two concepts can
be non-quantitatively distinct by being quality of emphasis distinct,
then Calder is wrong to think that two concepts can be
non-quantitatively distinct only if they do not share all of their
essential properties. Liberto and Harrington argue further that evil
and wrongdoing are non-quantitatively distinct in the sense of being
quality of emphasis distinct. Consider, for example, Claudia
Card's theory of evil according to which "evil is
reasonably foreseeable intolerable harm, produced by inexcusable
wrongs" (Card 2010, 16). Liberto and Harrington argue that using
this theory we could say that degrees of evil are determined by
degrees of harm, while degrees of wrongdoing are not. If so, evil and
wrongdoing are non-quantitatively distinct by being quality of
emphasis distinct. (For a rebuttal of Liberto's and Harrington's
quality of emphasis account of non-quantitative distinctness see
Calder 2019, 225-226.)


### 3.2 Evil and Harm



Most theorists writing about the concept of evil believe that evil
actions must cause or allow significant harm to at least one victim
(see, e.g., Card 2002; Kekes 2005; Veltlesen 2005; Calder 2013 and
2019; Formosa 2013 and 2019; Goldberg 2019). However, three sorts of
arguments have been used to contest this claim.



First, some theorists argue that evil actions need not cause or allow
significant harm because we can perform evil actions by attempting (or
seriously risking) to cause harm, even if we fail. For example, on
this view, it would be evil to attempt to detonate a bomb in a room
full of innocent people, even if the attempt is thwarted by the police
(See Kramer 2011, 204-205; Russell 2014 52-53; Formosa
2019, 263-262).



Second, some theorists argue that evil actions need not cause or allow
significant harm because we can perform evil actions by merely taking
pleasure in a victim's suffering (Calder 2002, 56; Garrard 2002,
327; Kramer 2011, 211; Formosa 2019, 262-263). For instance, imagine
that Alex takes pleasure in witnessing Carol's extreme
suffering, but that Alex does not cause Carol's suffering. Some
people would call this act of sadistic voyeurism evil even though it
causes no additional harm to the victim (we can imagine that Carol is
not aware that Alex takes pleasure in her suffering so that the
witnessing of her suffering does not aggravate the harm). 



Theorists who believe that cases of failed attempts and/or sadistic
voyeurism show that evil actions need not cause or allow significant
harm nevertheless tend to believe that evil actions must be connected
in an appropriate way to significant harm (See, e.g., Kramer 2011,
203-223; Russell 2007, 676; Formosa 2019, 262-265). However,
others dispute this contention. These theorists argue instead that
there can be cases of "small-scale evil" where evil
actions involve very little or no harm (De Wijze 2018; Garrard 1998
and 2002; Morton 2004, 60). These cases constitute the third sort of
argument against the claim that evil actions must cause or allow
significant harm. For example Eve Garrard has suggested that
schoolyard bullies perform evil actions even though they do not cause
very much harm (Garrard 1998, 45), while Stephen de Wijze has argued
that torturing and killing what you know to be a lifelike robot would
be evil even if the robot has no conscious life (De Wijze 2018,
34).



Two sorts of responses can be given to these sorts of cases. First, we
can argue that, while the action in question is evil, it does, in
fact, involve significant harm. This sort of response seems
appropriate for the bullying case (See Kramer 2011, 218). Second, we
can argue that, while the action in question wouldn't be
harmful, it wouldn't be evil either. This sort of response seems
appropriate for the robot case.



Furthermore, in response to all three arguments for the claim that
evil actions need not cause or allow significant harm (i.e. failed
attempts, sadistic voyeurs, and small-scale evil), we can argue that
theorists who deploy these arguments confuse evil actions with evil
characters. For example, we can argue that failed attempts seem evil
because attempting to perform an evil action is an indication that the
agent performing the action has an evil character and not because the
action itself is evil (See Calder 2015a, 121). Similarly, we can argue
that given their intentions, motives, and feelings, sadistic voyeurs
and robot torturers are evil persons even though they do not perform
evil actions (for more about evil character see Section 4).



Assuming that harm is an essential component of evil, the question
then becomes how much, or what type of, harm is required for evil? In
the *Roots of Evil* John Kekes argues that the harm of evil
must be serious and excessive (Kekes 2005, 1-3). In an earlier
work, Kekes specifies that a serious harm is one that
"interferes with the functioning of a person as a full-fledged
agent." (Kekes 1998, 217). Claudia Card describes the harm of
evil as an intolerable harm. By an intolerable harm, Card means a harm
that makes life not worth living from the point of view of the person
whose life it is. Examples of intolerable harms include severe
physical or mental suffering as well as the deprivation of basics such
as food, clean drinking water, and social contact (Card 2002, 16).
According to Paul Formosa, evil actions involve significant harms,
which are typically instantiated by life-ending, life-wrecking, or
severely autonomy impairing harms (Formosa 2013 and 2019). (For
further discussion of the harm component see Russell 2014,
64-68).


### 3.3 Evil and Motivation



Most theorists writing about evil believe that evil action requires a
certain sort of motivational state. Once again, this claim is somewhat
controversial. In the *Atrocity Paradigm*, Claudia Card makes a
point of defining evil without reference to perpetrator motives. She
does this because she wants her theory to focus on alleviating the
suffering of victims rather than on understanding the motives of
perpetrators (Card 2002, 9). Card's theory also has the virtue
of being able to count as evil actions which stem from a variety of
motives.



However, while Card claims that the atrocity paradigm does not have a
motivation component, part of the plausibility of her theory comes
from the fact that it restricts the class of evil actions to
those that follow from certain sorts of motives. Card's theory
of evil is "that evils are reasonably foreseeable intolerable
harms produced by inexcusable wrongs" (Card 2010, 16). While
this account of evil allows for a wide range of motivations, it does
specify that evildoers must foresee the harm they produce and lack a
moral justification for producing the harm. In other words, for Card,
evildoers are motivated by a desire for some object or state of
affairs which does not justify the harm they foreseeably inflict.



Other philosophers have suggested that evildoers desire to cause harm,
or to do wrong, for more specific reasons such as pleasure (Steiner
2002), the desire to do what is wrong (Perrett 2002), the desire to
annihilate all being (Eagleton 2010), or the destruction of others for
its own sake (Cole 2006). When evil is restricted to actions that
follow from these sorts of motivations, theorists sometimes say that
their subject is pure, radical, diabolical, or monstrous evil. This
suggests that their discussion is restricted to a type, or form, of
evil and not to evil per se.



While some philosophers argue that certain motives, such as
malevolence or malice, are necessary for evil, others focus instead on
motives or desires that evildoers lack. For instance, Adam Morton
contends that evildoers are crucially uninhibited by barriers against
considering harming or humiliating others that ought to be there
(Morton 2004, 57). Similarly, Laurence Thomas contends that one
distinctive feature of an evildoer is that "whereas normally a
person's moral sensibilities would get in the way of his
performing an act of such moral gravity [i.e., one that results in
serious harm], this does not happen when a person performs an evil
act" (Thomas 1993, 77).



Eve Garrard's theory of evil also focuses on a deficiency in the
motivational structure of the evildoer. To understand Garrard's
theory of evil we need to understand the difference between
metaphysical and psychological silencers. A metaphysical silencer is a
reason which is so weighty that, objectively speaking, it takes away
the reason-giving force of some other consideration. When this happens
we say that the less weighty consideration has been metaphysically
silenced. By contrast, a psychological silencer is a reason which is
so weighty *for an individual* that, subjectively, it takes
away the reason-giving force of some other consideration. When this
happens we say that the consideration has been psychologically
silenced for the individual.



Consider Peter Singer's case of coming across a child drowning
in a shallow pond (Singer 1972). If we came across a child drowning in
a shallow pond, the need to rescue the child would be so morally
important that it would metaphysically silence the desire to keep our
clothes clean as a reason for acting or not acting. That is, when a
child is in urgent need of rescue, considerations about keeping our
clothes clean lose all of their reason-giving force. They cease to be
reasons for acting or not acting. For many people, especially for
virtuous people, considerations about keeping their clothes clean are
also psychologically silenced by the urgent need to rescue a child
drowning in a shallow pond. In other words, virtuous people are
completely unmoved by considerations about keeping their clothes clean
when presented with children in urgent need of rescue.



According to Garrard, the evildoer has a particularly despicable
motivational structure. She psychologically silences considerations
that are so morally weighty that they metaphysically silence the very
considerations which move her to act (Garrard 1998, 55. See also
Garrard 2002 and 2019). For instance, it would be evil to
psychologically silence the urgent need to rescue a drowning child as
a reason for acting because we desire to keep our clothes clean.



Critics of Garrard's theory of evil argue that it is too
restrictive since it does not count as evil actions which cause, or
allow, significant harm for no good reason when the agent is slightly
motivated by morally important considerations (Russell 2007, 675;
Calder 2015a, 118). For instance, on Garrard's theory it would
not be evil for John to allow a child to drown in a shallow pond if he
was slightly motivated to rescue her but not motivated enough to dirty
his clothes. Yet it seems that John would do evil by allowing a child
to drown for those reasons.



Other theorists have developed mixed accounts of the motivational
component of evildoing. According to these theorists, some forms of
evildoing are partly constituted by lacking motives
that ought to exist while others are partly constituted by having
bad motives. For example, Matthew Kramer argues that evil actions are
motivated by either sadism, heartlessness, or recklessness (Kramer
2011, 187-203). Paul Formosa argues, contra Kramer, that some evil
actions follow from other motives--not sadism, heartlessness, or
recklessness--such as anger or fear, and that any attempt to
construct a list of motivating states for evil action is bound to be
incomplete or ad hoc (Formosa 2019, 261). Rather than offer a list of
possible motivating states for evil action, Todd Calder's motivational
component of evildoing states that to perform an evil action
an agent must desire his victim's significant harm (or
states of affairs inconsistent with the absence of this
harm) for an unworthy goal, where an unworthy goal is a goal which
"if attained, would not make for a better state of affairs than
if the harm was averted and the goal not attained" (Calder 2015a, 120.
See also Calder 2003, 266-267).


### 3.4 Evil and Affect



Some theorists believe that a perpetrator's feelings or emotions at
the time of acting are relevant to whether an action is evil. For
example, Laurence Thomas believes that evildoers take delight in
causing harm or feel hatred toward their victims (Thomas 1993,
76-77. See also Formosa 2019, 264). Hillel Steiner goes even
further by contending that there are just two components of evil:
pleasure and wrongdoing. According to Steiner "[e]vil acts are
wrong acts that are pleasurable for their doer" (Steiner 2002,
189).



Critics of Steiner's view argue that it is neither necessary nor
sufficient for evil to take pleasure in performing wrongful actions.
Critics argue that it is not necessary to take pleasure in doing wrong
to perform an evil action since it is sufficient to intentionally
cause significant harm for an unworthy goal such as self-interest
(Calder 2013). Imagine that a serial killer tortures and kills his
victims but that he does not take pleasure in torturing and killing.
It seems that this serial killer is an evildoer even though he does
not take pleasure in doing wrong.



Critics of Steiner's view argue that it is not sufficient for
performing an evil action to take pleasure in performing a wrongful
action since we would not think that it was evil to take pleasure in
performing a wrongful action if the victim did not suffer significant
harm. For instance, it wouldn't be evil to take pleasure in
telling a white lie (Russell 2007).


### 3.5 Evil and Relation



Some theorists argue that the relationship between perpetrators and
victims is an important element of evil action. For example, Nel
Noddings (1989) argues that a primary form of evil consists in
neglecting relations, while Zachary Goldberg (2019) argues that to
fully understand evil we must understand the asymmetric power
relations that exist between perpetrators and victims. Todd Calder
(2022) argues that to make sense of the difference between evil action
and complicity in evil we must incorporate a relational component into
our theory of evil action. According to Calder's relational
component, to perform an evil action we must be close to our victim or
their harm (either socially, physically, or agentially). Calder
contends that if the relational component is not satisfied the
connection between a perpetrator's actions and their
victim's harm is too tenuous to support a charge of evil action
and can, at most, support a charge of complicity in evil (Calder 2022,
474-475).



Other questions concerning the relationship between perpetrators of
evil and their victims center on the relationship between evil and
forgiveness. Some theorists define evil as the unforgivable. Others
argue that it should be up to victims to decide whether perpetrators
of evil can be forgiven (Norlock 2019, 283-285). Other interesting
questions concerning the relationship between evil and forgiveness
include whether forgiveness requires reconciliation, whether only the
direct victims of evil can forgive perpetrators, and whether victims
of evil can be obligated to forgive, or to not forgive. (See Norlock
2019; MacLachlin 2009; Thomas 2009).


### 3.6 Evil and Responsibility



It is universally accepted that to perform an evil action an agent
must be morally responsible for what she does. Although hurricanes and
rattle snakes can cause great harm, they cannot perform evil actions
because they are not moral agents. Furthermore, moral agents only
perform evil actions when they are morally responsible for what they
do and their actions are morally inexcusable (see e.g., Kekes 2005;
Card 2010; Formosa 2008 and 2013). To meet these conditions evildoers
must act voluntarily, intend or foresee their victim's
suffering, and lack moral justification for their actions. It is
particularly controversial whether these conditions are met in three
sorts of cases: (1) serious harms brought about by psychopaths; (2)
serious harms brought about by individuals who have had bad
upbringings; and (3) serious harms brought about through
ignorance.


#### 3.6.1 Psychopaths



Psychopathy is a syndrome that consists in lacking certain emotional,
interpersonal, and behavioural traits and having others (Hare 1999).
Some of the defining characteristics of psychopathy include shallow
emotions, egocentricity, deceitfulness, impulsivity, a lack of
empathy, and a lack of guilt and remorse. Particularly relevant for
assessments of moral responsibility is the psychopath's
inability to care for others and for the rules of morality.



According to the M'Naughten rules for criminal insanity, a
person is legally insane if, due to a disease of the mind at the time
of acting, she is unable to know the nature or quality of her action
or to know that what she is doing is wrong. For instance, a delusional
schizophrenic who believes that her neighbour is a demon is not
responsible for harming her neighbour since she does not understand
that she is harming an innocent person; she believes she is defending
herself from an inhuman malicious agent. Many philosophers believe
that the M'Naughten rules give us the conditions for moral
responsibility as well as the conditions for criminal responsibility
(see, e.g., Wolf 1987).



It is controversial whether psychopaths are insane according to the
standard set by the M'Naughten rules since it is controversial
whether psychopaths know that their actions are wrong. Motivational
internalists believe that it is conceptually impossible to believe
(and thus to know) that an action is morally wrong and yet be
completely unmotivated to refrain from performing the action.
That is, for the internalist, there is a conceptual connection between
believing that an action is wrong and having a con-attitude toward the
action. The internalist believes that one may be able to knowingly do
what is wrong because, all things considered, she cares more about
something that is incompatible with refraining from wrongdoing,
provided she is at least somewhat inclined to refrain from doing what
she knows to be wrong. Since psychopaths seem to be completely
indifferent to whether their actions are right or wrong, motivational
internalists believe that they do not truly believe, or understand,
that what they do is morally wrong. At most, they might believe that
their harmful actions break societal conventions. But it may be one
thing to believe that one has broken a societal convention and quite
another to believe that one has broken a moral rule. Philosophers who
reject the internalist thesis, i.e., motivational externalists, are
more willing to believe that psychopaths know the difference between
right and wrong. According to motivational externalists, moral
knowledge only requires an intellectual capacity to identify right and
wrong, and not the ability to care about morality. Since psychopaths
are not intellectually deficient, motivational externalists do not
think there is any reason to believe that psychopaths cannot tell the
difference between right and wrong. (For more about how the
internalist and externalist theses relate to the moral responsibility
of psychopaths see Brink 1989, 45-50; Duff 1977; Haksar 1965;
and Milo 1984. See also Rosati 2006. Recently, some theorists writing
about the moral responsibility of psychopaths have tried to avoid the
internalist/externalist debate. It is beyond the purview of this entry
to survey this literature. See Levy 2007 and 2014, Matravers 2008,
Talbert 2008, Aharoni, Kiehl, and Sinnott-Armstrong 2011, Nelkin
2015.)


#### 3.6.2 Bad Upbringings



The degree to which deviant behavior is caused by bad upbringings
rather than genetic starting points or individual choices is a
difficult empirical question. Assuming that there is a strong causal
connection between bad upbringings and deviant behaviour, there are
two main arguments for the claim that we should not hold perpetrators
morally responsible for behaviour that has resulted from bad
upbringings. The first argument contends that since we do not choose
our upbringings we should not be held responsible for crimes which
result from our upbringings (See, e.g., Cole 2006, 122-147).
Susan Wolf (1987) offers a variant of this argument. According to Wolf
people who have had particularly bad upbringings are unable to make
accurate normative judgements because they have been taught the wrong
values. Wolf likens people who have been taught the wrong values to
people suffering from psychosis because like psychotics they are
unable to make accurate judgements about the world. For example, Wolf
has us consider the case of Jojo, the son of Jo, a ruthless dictator
of a small South American country. Jo believes that there is nothing
wrong with torturing or executing innocent people. In fact, he enjoys
expressing his unlimited power by ordering his guards to do just that.
Jojo is given a special education which includes spending much of his
day with his father. The predictable result of this education is that
Jojo acquires his father's values. Wolf argues that we should
not hold Jojo responsible for torturing innocent people since his
upbringing has made him unable to judge that these actions are wrong.
Since Jojo is unable to judge that his actions are wrong he meets the
conditions for insanity as stated in the M'Naghten rules (See
section 3.5.1 above).



The second argument for the claim that we should not hold people
morally responsible for crimes that result from bad upbringings begins
with the supposition that we are morally responsible for our crimes
only if we are appropriate objects of reactive attitudes, such as
resentment (Strawson 1963). According to this argument, perpetrators
of crimes who have had particularly bad upbringings are not
appropriate objects of reactive attitudes since there is no point to
expressing these attitudes toward these perpetrators. A proponent of
this argument must then explain why there is no point to expressing
reactive attitudes toward these perpetrators. In his paper
"Responsibility and the Limits of Evil: Variations on a
Strawsonian Theme" (1987) Gary Watson considers various ways to
make sense of the claim that there is no point to expressing reactive
attitudes toward people who commit crimes due to bad upbringings.
Watson's discussion centres on the case of Robert Alton Harris.
As a child, Harris was an affectionate good-hearted boy. Family
members say that an abusive mother and harsh treatment at corrections
facilities turned him into a malicious cold-blooded murderer.


#### 3.6.3 Ignorance



Sometimes ignorance is used as an excuse for putative evildoing (Jones
1999, 69-70). The argument goes something like this: if an agent
has no good reason to believe that she causes significant harm without
moral justification, then she is not morally responsible for causing
this harm because she has no good reason to act otherwise. For
instance, if Dorian shoots a gun into some bushes on a country estate
without having any reason to believe that a man is hiding there, he is
not morally responsible for harming a man who is hiding there (this
case comes from Oscar Wilde's *A Picture of Dorian
Gray*). In this way ignorance can be a legitimate excuse for
causing unjustified harm.



However, since Aristotle, theorists have recognized that ignorance is
only a legitimate excuse for causing unjustified harm when we are not
responsible for our ignorance, i.e., when the ignorance is
non-culpable (*Nichomachean* *Ethics*, Bk III). One sort
of culpable ignorance which has received a fair bit of attention from
philosophers writing about evil is ignorance that results from
self-deception. In self-deception we evade acknowledging to ourselves
some truth or what we would see as the truth if our beliefs were based
on an unbiased assessment of available evidence. "Self-deceivers
are initially aware of moments when they shift their attention away
from available evidence to something else, although they may not be
aware of the overall project of their self-deception." (Jones
1999, 82). Some tactics used by self-deceivers to evade acknowledging
some truth, including (1) avoiding thinking about the truth, (2)
distracting themselves with rationalizations that are contrary to the
truth, (3) systematically failing to make inquiries that would lead to
evidence of the truth and (4) ignoring available evidence of the truth
or distracting their attention from this evidence (Jones 1999, 82).
Several theorists writing about evil have suggested that
self-deception plays a significant role in the production of evil
actions and institutions (Calder 2003 and 2004; Jones 1999; 
Morton 2004, 57-58; Thomas 2012).


## 4. Contemporary Theories of Evil Character/Personhood



The terms 'evil personhood' and 'evil
character' are used interchangeably in the literature. This
entry will follow this convention.



Extant theories of evil personhood can be cross-listed as regularity
or dispositional accounts on the one hand, and as action-based,
affect-based, or motivation-based accounts on the other (aggregative
accounts are also possible, however, it isn't clear that any
theorist currently holds an aggregative account [See Russell 2014,
139-153]). For example, John Kekes holds an action-based
regularity account (Kekes 1990, 48; 1998, 217; 2005, 2), while Todd
Calder holds a motive-based dispositional account (Calder 2009,
22-27).



According to regularity accounts, evil persons have evil-making
properties habitually, or on a regular basis. According to
dispositional accounts, evil persons need never have evil-making
properties. It is sufficient to have a disposition to have evil-making
properties.



Action-based accounts contend that evil-making properties are certain
sorts of actions--evil actions. Affect-based accounts contend
that evil-making properties are certain sorts of feelings--evil
feelings. Motivation-based accounts contend that evil-making
properties are certain sorts of motivations--evil desires.



Some theorists argue for more than one sort of evil-making property.
For example, Luke Russell argues that both evil actions and evil
feelings are evil making properties (Russell 2014, 292), while Daniel
Haybron argues that evil feelings and evil motivations are evil-making
properties (Haybron 2002b, 269).


### 4.1 Action-Based Accounts



Most theorists writing about evil personhood hold action-based
accounts (See, e.g., Barry 2013, 87; Kekes 2005, 2; Thomas 1993, 82;
Russell 2014, 180). According to action-based accounts, evil persons
perform evil actions often enough, or are disposed to perform evil
actions. For example, Laurence Thomas argues that "a person with
an evil character is one who is often enough prone to do evil
acts" (Thomas 1993, 82).



Critics argue that the problem with action-based accounts is that it
seems sufficient for evil personhood to have evil feelings or
motivations, and thus, evil persons need not perform, or be disposed
to perform, evil actions. For instance, it seems that a harmless
sadist who relishes in the suffering of others but who is not disposed
to perform evil actions, could still be an evil person. Similarly, a
cowardly or incompetent sadist who strongly desires to cause others
suffering but who is not disposed to perform evil actions, is still an
evil person (Calder 2009, 23; Haybron 2002b, 264).


### 4.2 Affect-Based Accounts



According to affect-based accounts, evil people have certain sorts of
feelings or emotions. For instance, Colin McGinn argues that "an
evil character is one that derives pleasure from pain and pain from
pleasure" (McGinn 1997, 62). There is some initial plausibility
to this view since sadism and malicious envy are paradigms of evil.
However, while it is undoubtedly true that some evil people are
sadistic or maliciously envious, there is reason to believe that
feelings of pleasure in pain or pain in pleasure, or any other sorts
of feelings, are neither necessary nor sufficient for evil character.
The problem with thinking that certain sorts of feelings are necessary
for evil character is that an evil person might routinely cause
serious harm to her victims without any accompanying feelings. For
instance, someone who routinely runs down pedestrians out of
indifference for their well-being, and without any accompanying
feelings, seems to qualify as an evil person (Calder 2003, 368).



The problem with thinking that certain sorts of feelings, such as
feelings of pleasure in another person's pain, are sufficient
for evil character is that these sorts of feelings might be
involuntary and not endorsed by the person who has them. For instance,
John might be just so constituted to experience pleasure in the face
of another person's pain. If John does not desire to take
pleasure in other people's pain, and is horrified by his
sadistic feelings, it seems too harsh to call him evil. He should be
pitied rather than condemned. Calling someone like John
'evil' would be like blaming someone for her patellar
reflex (Calder 2003, 368-369).


### 4.3 Motivation-Based Accounts



According to motivation-based accounts, to be an evil person is to be
motivated in a certain sort of way. For instance, Todd Calder argues
that to be an evil person it is sufficient to have a regular
propensity for e-desires. An e-desire is a motivational state that
consists in a desire for what is correctly believed to be someone
else's significant harm for an unworthy goal or for what would
correctly be believed to be someone else's significant harm for
an unworthy goal in the absence of self-deception (see Section 3.5.3
for more on self-deceptive evil). According to Calder, significant
harm is desired for an *unworthy goal* if a state of affairs
consisting of the achievement of the goal together with the harm would
be less valuable than if the goal was not achieved and the harm was
avoided (Calder 2003 and 2009. See also Card, 2002, 21 for a similar
view).



A problem for motivation-based accounts is to explain why we should
judge someone as evil based solely on her motivations. In other words,
why judge someone as the morally worst sort of person for having
certain desires if these desires do not result in significant harm?
Why not judge people as evil only if they actually cause significant
harm? One way to respond to this objection is to point out that even
if e-desires do not result in significant harm on some particular
occasion or for some particular person, e-desires do, for most people
most of the time, lead to significant harm (Julia Driver's
consequentialist theory of virtue and vice (2001) uses a similar line
of thought). Or else, a proponent of a motivation-based account could
insist that judgments of evil character look inward to an
agent's psychology and not to the effects (or likely effects) of
her actions (See Calder 2007b for a similar view about virtue and
vice).



However, if we insist that judgements of evil character look inward to
an agent's psychology and not to the effects of her actions, why
judge evil character solely on the basis of her motives? Why not take
into account the agent's affective states as well? (Haybron
2002b, 267)


### 4.4 Regularity Accounts



According to regularity accounts, evil persons have evil-making
properties frequently, or on a regular basis (See, e.g., Card 2002,
21; Kekes 1990, 48; 1998, 217; 2005, 3; Stone 2009, 23). For instance,
John Kekes writes that when "agents are regular sources of evil
... we can identify them, and not merely their actions and character
traits, as evil" (Kekes 1990, 48). An advantage of regularity
accounts is that they explain the intuition that evil persons deserve
our strongest moral condemnation (Russell 2014, 135). For if evil
persons have evil-making properties frequently, or on a regular basis,
then it makes sense to say that they are the worst sorts of people and
deserve our strongest moral condemnation.



However, one problem with regularity accounts is that they do not seem
to be able to make sense of the fact that some evil persons only very
rarely (if ever) have evil-making properties. For instance, Luke
Russell argues that we should reject regularity accounts because they
cannot accommodate the intuition that a brooding spree killer could be
evil (Russell 2014, 139). The brooding spree killer does not perform
evil actions frequently or regularly. She plans and fantasizes about
her attack, and then performs evil actions sporadically or all at
once. Thus, Russell argues, if brooding spree killers can be evil, as
we think they can be, then we should reject regularity accounts.



Notice, however, that Russell's counterexample only works
against action-based regularity accounts, since proponents of affect
or motivation based regularity accounts could argue that brooding
spree killers do have evil-making properties, i.e. evil feelings or
evil desires, habitually or regularly during the planning and/or
fantasizing phase (even if they do not perform evil actions) and thus,
count as evil persons on these sorts of regularity accounts. So the
question becomes, are there persons who are comparable to brooding
spree killers in that they have evil feelings or desires sporadically
or infrequently rather than on a regular basis? It seems that there
might be cases of this sort when opportunities for evil feelings and
desires are scarce. For example, we can imagine that an evil person
might fail to have evil feelings and desires because she has been
stranded on a deserted island. After many years without potential
victims and needing to focus all of her attention on survival, she
might lack evil feelings and desires due to a poverty of stimulus.
This would mean that she is no longer an evil person on affect and
motivation based regularity accounts. However, it seems that we should
say that she is still an evil person if she is still disposed to have
evil feelings and desires in the sense that her evil feelings and
desires would immediately return if she were presented with a victim.
If so, we should reject affect and motivation based regularity
accounts.


### 4.5 Dispositional Accounts



Most theorists writing about evil personhood adopt dispositional
accounts (See, e.g., Barry 2013, 87; Haybron 2002a, 70; Russell 2010
and 2014, 154-195). Broadly speaking, dispositional accounts
contend that someone is an evil person if, and only if, she is
disposed to have evil-making properties.



A potential problem for dispositional accounts is that they seem to
conflict with the intuition that evil persons are rare since most of
us are disposed to have evil-making properties in certain sorts of
situations (Russell 2014, 159). For example, assuming for the moment
that evil actions are evil-making properties, Stanley Milgram has
shown that most of us are disposed to perform evil actions
(specifically, administering potentially lethal electric shocks to
innocent people) when in certain experimental conditions (i.e. when
asked to do so by a researcher working for a prestigious institution
in the context of a study on punishment and learning) (Milgram 1974).
Milgram's experiments were designed to explain how thousands of
ordinary people could have played a role in bringing about the
Holocaust during the Nazi era. Milgram's research suggests that
most of us are disposed to perform evil actions when influenced,
manipulated, or pressed to do so by authority figures, as many people
were in Nazi Germany (Russell 2014, 170-173). But if most of us
are disposed to perform evil actions in these situations then it seems
that on the dispositional account of evil personhood, most of us are
evil, and thus, evil is not rare.



To make sense of the rarity of evil personhood, Luke Russell proposes
a restricted dispositional account according to which someone is an
evil person if, and only if, she is strongly disposed to perform evil
actions in only autonomy-favoring conditions (Russell 2014,
72-75. Peter Barry argues for a similar view [See Barry 2013,
82-90]).To be "strongly" disposed (as opposed to
merely disposed) to have evil-making properties is to be very likely,
as opposed to merely able, to have evil-making properties (Russell
2014, 156). Autonomy-favoring conditions are conditions in which an
evildoer is not "deceived, threatened, coerced, or
pressed" (Russell 2014, 173), and thus, able to do what she
truly wants to do. According to Russell, although most of us are
strongly disposed to perform evil actions in Milgram scenarios, since
Milgram scenarios are not autonomy-favoring conditions, most of us are
not evil persons.



Several objections have been raised against Russell's
autonomy-favoring dispositional account (Calder 2015b). One objection
is that it isn't clear that Russell's restricted
dispositional account is an improvement over a more basic
dispositional account according to which evil persons are simply
strongly disposed to perform evil actions (Calder 2015b,
356-357). For it might be argued that since most of the subjects
of Milgram's experiments were surprised and distressed by what
they were asked to do, they would not have taken part in further
iterations of the experiment. If so, the subjects of Milgram's
experiments were strongly disposed to perform evil actions only when
surprised by the novel circumstances of Milgram's experiment,
and not on an on-going basis in those circumstances. But if we do not
have a disposition to perform evil actions on an on-going basis, then
we do not really have a strong disposition to perform evil actions, or
at least, one could argue, not in the sense implicitly meant by the
basic dispositional account. Furthermore, if some subjects of
Milgram's experiments would have willingly taken part in further
iterations of the experiment, it isn't clear that they
wouldn't have been evil persons, which runs counter to
Russell's autonomy-favoring dispositional account.



A second objection to Russell's autonomy-favoring dispositional
account is that it is tailor-made to capture an intuition that some of
us do not share: that most people could not be evil persons in any
environment, even hostile political ones. Russell's theory is
based on the idea that if most of us would be strongly disposed to
perform evil actions in certain sorts of environments, such as in Nazi
Germany, then we aren't evil persons if we are disposed to
perform evil actions in only those situations. But we might reject
this reasoning and argue instead that most of us are susceptible to
becoming evil persons in these environments, and so, need to be wary
of these environments.


### 4.6 Additional Theses about Evil Personhood



In addition to arguing for regularity or dispositional accounts on the
one hand, and action-based, affect-based, or motivation-based accounts
on the other, theorists have argued for several additional theses
concerning evil personhood.


#### 4.6.1 The Fixity Thesis



According to the fixity thesis, evil persons have particularly fixed,
or durable, characters such that it is very difficult to go from evil
to non-evil, and changes of this sort rarely occur. Theorists add
fixity components to their theories of evil personhood to capture the
intuition that evil persons are near moral write-offs, beyond
"communication and negotiation, reform and redemption"
(Russell 2014 169. See also, Barry 2013, 82-87).



Todd Calder has argued against the fixity thesis. Imagine that Darlene
has a highly fixed disposition to perform evil actions that she does
little to resist. Geoff also has a disposition to perform evil
actions, but this disposition is not highly fixed because he is
indifferent about whether he should be disposed to perform evil
actions and is, in general, capricious and unprincipled. It
isn't clear that Darlene is an evil person while Geoff is not.
If so, the characters of evil persons need not be highly fixed (Calder
2015b, 354).


#### 4.6.2 The Consistency Thesis



According to the consistency thesis, evil persons have evil-making
properties, or are disposed to have evil-making properties,
consistently, or almost all of the time. For instance, Daniel Haybron
argues that "To be evil is ... to be consistently vicious in the
following sense: one is not aligned with the good to a morally
significant extent" (Haybron 2002b, 269). By this he means that
evil people almost always lack empathy and concern for others, and
they are in no way motivated to help others or to do what is morally
right.



Some theorists contrast the consistency thesis with the extremity
thesis according to which evil persons have some set of character
traits to an extreme degree, e.g. extreme callousness or extreme
maliciousness (Haybron 2002a; Barry 2013, 56-71). The extremity
thesis is consistent with most theories of evil personhood. The
consistency thesis is more controversial.



Critics of the consistency thesis argue that it is too restrictive
(Calder 2009, 22-27; Russell 2010, 241). Imagine that Bob loves
to torture children and does so frequently, but that Bob also displays
genuine compassion for the elderly, perhaps by volunteering at a
long-term care facility on a regular basis. According to the
consistency thesis, Bob is not an evil person because he does not have
evil-making characteristics consistently. And yet most people would
want to say that torturing children for fun on a regular basis is
enough to make Bob an evil person (Calder 2009, 22-27).


#### 4.6.3 The Mirror Thesis



According to the mirror thesis an evil person is the mirror-image of a
moral saint. Several theorists who write about evil personhood endorse
this thesis and use it to argue for their theories (Barry 2009; 2013;
Haybron 2002b). For instance, Daniel Haybron argues that one reason to
accept his contention that evil persons are wholly (or almost wholly)
unaligned with the good is that it fits well with the intuition that
moral saints are "perfectly, or near-perfectly, aligned with the
good" (Haybron 2002b, 274. This argument makes an implicit
appeal to the mirror thesis.



Luke Russell rejects the mirror thesis, arguing that while moral
saints are morally admirable in all respects, some paradigmatic evil
persons possess some morally admirable traits, such as courage,
commitment, and loyalty, which help them achieve their immoral goals
(Russell 2010, 241-242). Since evil persons need not be bad in
every respect and moral saints must be good in every respect, we
should reject the mirror thesis. In response, Peter Brian Barry argues
that on plausible conceptions of moral sainthood, i.e. those that can
make sense of actual moral saints such as Mahatma Gandhi, Martin
Luther King Jr., and Mother Teresa, moral saints can have some moral
flaws (Barry 2011). Thus, the fact that some evil persons have some
admirable traits shouldn't convince us to reject the mirror
thesis.


## 5. Evil Institutions



While most theorists writing about evil focus on evil action and evil
character, there has also been some discussion of evil institutions.
When we speak of 'evil institutions' we might mean one of
two things: (1) organizations that are evil or that perform evil
actions, or (2) social practices that are evil, such as slavery and
genocide. Since an organization can only be evil, or perform evil
actions, if it is morally responsible for what it does, the debate
concerning the concept of evil institutions in sense (1) is discussed
under the heading of 'collective responsibility.' Evil
institutions in this sense will not be discussed in this entry. (For a
recent contribution to this literature which makes explicit reference
to evil collectives, see Scarre 2012.)



According to Claudia Card, an institution, in sense (2), i.e., a
social practice, is evil if it is reasonably foreseeable that
intolerable harm will result from its normal or correct operation
without justification or moral excuse (2002, 20; 2010, 18,
27-35). For instance, genocide is an evil institution since
significant suffering and a loss of social vitality result from its
normal and correct operation without moral justification (Card 2010,
237-293).



However, while Card's account of evil institutions correctly
identifies genocide and other paradigmatically evil institutions as
evil, her account also classifies as evil some institutions which are
less obviously evil such as capital punishment, marriage, and
motherhood (Card 2002, 2010). Her classification of marriage and
motherhood as evil has been particularly controversial.



According to Card, marriage and motherhood are evil institutions
because it is reasonably foreseeable that their normal, or correct,
operation will lead to intolerable harm in the form of domestic abuse
without justification or excuse (Card 2002, 139-165). For
instance, Card argues that the normal, or correct, operation of
marriage leads to spousal abuse "because it provides incentives
for partners to stay in broken relationships, places obstacles in the
way of escaping from broken relationships, gives perpetrators of abuse
virtually unlimited rights of access to their victims, and makes some
forms of abuse difficult or impossible to detect or prove"
(Calder 2009, 28). Card argues that there is no moral justification
for the intolerable harm that results from the institution of marriage
since nothing prevents us from abolishing marriage in favour of other
less dangerous institutions.



Critics argue that even if Card is correct that it is reasonably
foreseeable that the institution of marriage will lead to intolerable
harms, it is too heavy-handed to call marriage an evil institution.
For instance, Todd Calder has argued that an institution should be
considered evil only if intolerable harm is an essential component of
the institution. Since suffering and a loss of social vitality are
essential components of genocide, genocide is an evil institution. But
since spousal abuse is not an essential component of marriage,
marriage is not an evil institution (Calder 2009, 27-30).