Talk:Good and evil/Archive 1

message: Hi there, guys.  I wrote much of the original article on goodness.  I love the additions, which make the article more encyclopedic.  The stuff about Eastern ethics and pluralism is especially lovely.
Now for comments...  I detect departures from NPOV at the conclusion.
Valuing diversity is itself a parochial value, currently in fashion only in some academic circles of the U.S. and parts of Western Europe.  The article will fare better if it ceases to value diversity, but instead explains it as another value system.  Of course, it must then explain the other side, that homogeneous societies generate less social upset and are more comfortable for many people, and this has been the common historical experience of humanity, which motivated almost all official intolerance.  There might even be logical inconsistency in the experiential grounds of "valuing diversity."  To wit, diversifiers may find homogenists "totalitarian," which is a value-laden scare-word if I ever saw one, and seems to indicate (*ahem*) intolerance.  That part might be worth changing.
The fact that philosophers (a notoriously foolish set of people!) haven't defined goodness yet, is not evidence that it "doesn't exist."  Remember, practical people know goodness when they see it and many careful Ethicists are sure that there is some definable central idea, which is why there have been so many approximations.  Also, some of the approximations, with all their warts, have been valuable. (like Economics and Utilitarianism)   Even in eastern systems, there appears to be some concept of "merit." 
When I put on the spectacles of my Methodist upbringing, that section reads rather like a ringing endorsement of empirical relativism.  That might be worth changing, too.  --Ray Van De Walker
:Diversity may not be an intrinsic, or straight ethical good, but it is not simply a 'fashion'.  It is usually a practical good- for example, in my household, we have a diversity of computers- some Macs, some Unices (mine) and some Windows. As a result of this diversity, we rarely have any security problems. This applies to ecosystems as well, and many other situations. --maru 01:03, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV in conclusion 

message: Hi, i would be interested in contributing to this page, but I want to at least state where I'm coming from before just going in and editing away.
I think the circularity and subjectiveness of definitions of "good" is overstated in the article, without any opposing point of view.  There are definitions of "good" that are not at all circular and are objective, in my opinion.  That is not to say that the definition of "good" is 100% straightforward or simple, but I don't see why it is so circular.
I recently edited the "happiness" page, where I was likewise surprised that there had been a lack of any "mechanistic", non-circular explanation of what happiness is (I added the physical aspects and mechanistic view sections).  While I understand the difficulty in defining internal perceptions (and addressed that in detail in the article), still, the concept of happiness -- when considered to be synonomous with pleasure, joy, and satisfaction -- is really fairly simple to distinguish from its polar opposite of unhappiness (a.k.a. pain, dispair, frustration).
In a nutshell, happiness is reinforcement, where our goals have been satisfied.  This is true whether these are short term "built in" goals (drink liquid to avoid dehydration) or long term goals (have a family, comfortable home, lots of property, etc).  The ultra simple way of saying it is, it is our brain's learning / motivation system telling itself "keep doing whatever you did".
Once happiness is defined non-circularly, I believe you can remove the circularity in the "good" definition.  The main complications with good is determining *who* is made happy, and such.  For instance, Mother Theresa was "good", by causing other people to be happy (or maybe "causing them to suffer less" -- same thing).  But "good" is also used when referring to happiness of oneself, even short term physical pleasure (i.e. "scratching that itch feels good" or "this tastes good").
The "do unto others" mantra describes a non-selfish, "good" clearly related to (other peoples) happiness.
In any case, my point is that the concept of good is tied very tightly to the concept of happiness, and with happiness defined in an objective, completely non-circular way, I think you (or I) could start to reduce the areas of the goodness article where it simply surrenders and claims the word is effectively "unknowable" or "undefinable".
Any thoughts?
-rob  Robbrown
Here's a thought. I, for one, don't value pleasure more highly than I value, say, wisdom. If I could make the choice to live a pleasant but idiotic life, dependent upon the care of others, in contrast to a wise and well-informed life that would entail a good deal of suffering, I would likely choose the latter over the former. So if happiness simply means "pleasure," I would reject it under that name, too, as part of the same choice. This kind of example proves that a non-circular understanding of the good is trickier than you suggest. --Christofurio 00:32, 26 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  thoughts on removing the circularity 

message: Shouldn't this page merged with ethics? --Andries 20:52, 20 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: No.  The ethics page is big enough, and there are plenty of other pages on specific ethical topics to create a precedent.  --Seth Mahoney 21:33, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merging with [[ethics]] 

message: I agree that this pages deals rather with the ethics section of the value theory. Indeed there are more value types. This article "Goodness and value theory" could be a subcategory of a more general article about the "value theory". (Furthermore articles “Economics and value theory”, “Aesthetics and value theory” could be written.)
I think we should first discuss the notion of value and value types. After this two are improved we can start a discussion about a more general article "value theory".
Patrick B.
--PBS 00:04, 21 Mar 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Goodness and value theory 

message: With the disputes and all? --Sam [Spade] 10:44, 14 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I was wondering that myself, but for now have just been changing the formatting of the dispute notice and making it a msg. --VV 10:51, 14 May 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  What's going on here? 

message: If anyone's wondering about the new anonymous edits, it's me. If anyone would like to chat about them, I'm here. :) Lucidish 03:33, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  new edits 

message: <Commenting on the phrase in Goodness and value theory—As a related issue, theories of goodness inquire into what sorts of things are good, and what the word "good" really means in the abstract.>
From G. H. R. Parkinson's Benedict de Spinoza "The Ethics - Parts I, II, III, IV, V " and "On the Improvement of the Understanding"; ISBN: 0460873474; 1993; p. 280note136:
:In 3P9n, Spinoza has said that 'we deem a thing good because we endeavour, will, seek or desire it'. This may suggest that objectively good, and therefore that the term 'good' has no place in a rigorous account of human nature, of the kind that Spinoza wishes to provide. In the Preface to Part IV this may seem to be emphasised, when Spinoza says (4Prf:27) that 'good' and 'bad' are relative terms—the same thing can be good for one person and bad  for another. However, Spinoza continues by saying that he has a use for the term 'good', if it is taken to mean that which we know to  be a means to the attainment of that exemplar, that ideal pattern of human nature, that we have set before  ourselves. In the present definition (E IV Def. 1) the emphasis is again on knowledge, in that Spinoza says that he proposes to call 'good' that which we know to be useful to us {The preservation of ourselves and our species. {A man, when rational and judging correctly, calls a thing good if it increases his ability to perpetuate himself—bad if otherwise. 
:{When a little fish is eaten by a bigger fish, does not the little fish "think" that's bad and does not the bigger fish "think" that's good (because each one seeks to preserve itself)?" We say that is Nature, the food chain; if the cycle stops, all life stops. However, we are like that little fish—or, like that big fish; abused or abuser. Good and bad are subjective terms; things just 'are'—the chain of causes. Talk of good and evil is, objectively, meaningless.  
:When Adam and Eve started to think in terms of "good and bad", i.e. subjectively; instead of "true and false", i.e. objectively; they self-thrust themselves from the Garden of Eden, i.e. they were subject to loss of Peace-of-Mind.} 
Yesselman 18:25, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spinoza on Good and Bad 

message: This article has no place on Wikipedia.  It contains a lot of good information but is overly ambitious.  Here are suggestions:  1) The information on specific philosophers belongs on pages devoted to those philosophers. 2) Some of the article could be merged into the articles on ethics, value theory, and axiology.  3) The rest should be split into other articles dealing with economics, etc., etc. 4) There should be no links to articles such as "the meaning of life" as there are now.  It's just ridiculous. 5)  More specific references could be made to the leading advocates of various positions and their works.  I'm sorry I don't give more specific suggestions but there's just so much that needs cleaning up here that I don't know where to start.  This whole article is clearly not Wikipedia quality and should be broken up or removed entirely. -- Unattributed
: I agree. For sure this article should be cleaned up before there's any talk about splitting it. One incoherent, messy article is better than 2 (or more) incoherent, messy articles. Ewlyahoocom 14:09, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'm not exactly so pessimistic as to regard the article as unfixable. I prefer to revise and cleanup; we shouldn't be afraid of articles with wide scope, so long as it is well-defined. But yeah, there are severe problems with this article, and it needs a lot more care. Lucidish 21:46, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

text: That is certainly one option. Another is to explain and focus upon how the valuable (both moral and non-moral) corresponds to the good, and scrap the rest of the accretions or ship them off to new articles. Lucidish 23:49, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

text: A shadow article is being written at User:Lucidish/Goodness, which people are welcome to review. One of the features of this shadow-wiki is that the criticisms sections have been deleted due to lack of references. When I'm done, I will replace the current article with the shadow one. 02:31, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Revise/Cleanup or Remove (Do Not Split) 

message: I will shortly be cleaning up this page. Hopefully if anyone finds my edits objectionable we can talk about it here. My plan is to remove/redistribute stub sections, the fairly uncharitable generalizing term "non-Western theories" section, and reorganize and copyedit the sections. "Objects of the good" section should, too, be redistributed as examples of the broader theories. The scheme should look something like this:
#Meta-ethical, descriptive, and normative fields
#Meta-ethical conceptions of value
##Issues with meaning
##Issues with the nature of value
#Normative goods (moral values)
##Welfarist theories
###Objective welfare theories
###Subjective welfare theories
###Mid-range welfare theories
##Perfectionism
#Descriptive goods (non-moral values)
Lucidish 23:21, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: A shadow article is being written at User:Lucidish/Goodness, which people are welcome to review. One of the features of this shadow-wiki is that the criticisms sections have been deleted due to lack of references. When I'm done, I will replace the current article with the shadow one. 02:31, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleanup programme 

message: There's been a lot of pruning here. It needed to be done, because there were simply a ton of redundancies, the purpose of the article was vague, and a lot of necessary material was simply not there. If I've cut out anything you think was extremely valuable, I'm sorry, I may have overlooked something and been too happy with my pruning shears. But I tried to keep relevant stuff in here.Lucidish 19:51, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  I did the deed 

message: It seems really weird to me that this information is in an article called Goodness and value theory while there is almost no valuable information in Value theory.  It seems to me that much of this information should go over there (the information that is actually relevant to value theory rather than being some tangent about other ethical issues) and whatever doesn't have a place over there should be deleted or moved somewhere where it is relevant.  I can understand separating Value from Value theory, just as I can understand the split of atom from atomic theory, and circuit from circuit theory, but I do not understand why we would have two different articles on value theory, one of which utterly lacks philosophy and the other of which garbles it with other ethical debates. KSchutte 22:48, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Much of the current problems with the content of the article involves protracted debate over environmental ethics and transhumanism. I think once this stuff has been sliced up, a more hopeful pattern will emerge. See my draft for some idea of how this might look. Lucidish 23:54, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Splits and merges 

message: Brothels, etc?
144.132.1.37 08:38, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That question is more of a concern for ethics, not value or goodness theory (though talking about the one will inevitably involve the other). Lucidish 19:07, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is prostitution Immoral? 

message: The problem with articles on topics as general as this are that everyone wants to dominate these with their particular formulative and operative methodology, rather than simply explaining what the term means in the various contexts. Ive tried to do that, and Ive tried to do so in a way which makes the spectrum of concepts plain: Basic logic, to reason, to philosophy, to ethics, to religion, all have a place in this article, and their terms all have a very continuous relationship between them, as I hope Ive demonstrated. Regards to all those interested in improving this article. -Ste|vertigo 17:01, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It was a terrible idea to shift this over to "goodness and evil". The point was to talk about moral and non-moral goods and values, not to speak exclusively about the moral dimension, as we're now presently entitled to do. This means that the article needs to be wholly rewritten. Lucidish { Ben S. Nelson } 00:16, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  I have made some edits 

message: I am fascinated that there is an article about evil but a disambiguation page about good, and that goodness is only explored in terms of being in a dualistic context with evil.  Is "good" impossible to explain and reference on its own in the way that evil is?  More to the point, while this is an article about "goodness and evil," evil is mentioned six times in the 5,500-word article.  As interesting side note, as of this posting it really is precisely 5,500 words if one is to count the title and the text "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" to just above "See also," though this double-counts the table of contents.   Why is this article simply not about "good"?  Any strong feelings about this either way?  JDoorjam     Talk 09:42, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Evil]] but no [[Good]]? 

message: Why is this article named "goodNESS and evil" instead of the shorter, simpler, more balanced, and more frequently use phrase, "good and evil". Nietzsche, to take just one example, titled his book, Beyond Good and Evil, and I think this is the standard phrase. --Jcbutler 16:32, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Who knows? The page has been shunted around for unclear reasons since eternity. At least it's easily fixable. { Ben S. Nelson } Lucidish 16:43, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  name of the entry 

message: Suggest references to Satan need to be sorted out. "Satan" in Jewish tradition is just "Adversary," and does not mean "Evil"; is not even the same being as the one in the Garden of Eden. The confusion comes later (temporally) and is not really grounded in biblical scholarship I'm aware of. Gorbag42 (talk) 21:49, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Satan 

message: Biblical definition of Gods Love.
The complete seperation of good and evil (pain and plesure) into hevean and hell. Above the earth Good. Below the eath Evil.
Beyond Gods Love.
The complete distruction of pain and asursion of plesure.
Or
The complete distruction of plesure and asursion of pain.
Or
The complete distruction of both pain and plesure.
--Gjeremy (talk) 03:35, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Beyond Gods Love 

message: I believe that this article could be improved by improving the rest of wikipedia so this article will be under stood in context. 
In this article there is no mention of pain and pleasure in refrence to an ancient Greek Philosophy of Good and Evil. Neither is the Christian doctrine mentiond in the article FreeWill. I was told that a Wikipedia artical was not the place to voice my own opinion and I should only write in an article discussion page if I believed I could improve that article. Plus I would have to back it up with lots of references. 
Finding refrences is not my gift. 
In the article Love I gave an argument in my own words useing the terms of pain and plesure. Love is a philosophy article so I thought other philosophers would recognize this ancient Greek Philosophy of Good and Evil and improve the article. Sadly my comments were removed from the discussion page. 
Please be kind and discuss what Ive said with more than one Wikipedia gate keeper before deleting it. The fate of a Wikipedia article should not be in the hands of a single gate keeper.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gjeremy (talk • contribs) 16:52, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pain and plesure 

message: As it is today, the introduction to this article is the most absolute PoV I've ever seen, with some bits of pure nonsense (like the part on entropy!!). Would someone please remove it? Velho 02:38, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've taken it out, once again. However, user 192.220.139.* is a repeat offender here and constantly and consistently pushes this bit of unsourced material back in. Nothing short of semi-protection can solve this problem. { Ben S. Nelson } Lucidish 23:27, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Maybe it is applicable. Maybe it's even true. This doesn't excuse the inclusion of a bold unsourced comment which has no prime facie validity. The fact there are "no links whatsoever" is exactly the reason why it is junked. Wikipedia is about verification, not truth. If the failure is "fundamental", then surely you can cite a respectable source for it. { Ben S. Nelson } Lucidish 02:34, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Until that time, the material is not appropriate here. { Ben S. Nelson } Lucidish 22:08, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Yes, evil is not included. I think the evil article should be merged with this article. Though this article could also possibly be named Good and bad (already redirects) and somehow linked to Virtue and vice/Virtues and vices, Light and dark (etc.?).--Brz7 14:30, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Merging evil seems a bad idea - the resulting page would be unwieldy and 'evil' deserves its own page. Anarchia 20:54, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi! Well, then Good also deserves an own page (which would contain almost all of the content of this article). More specifically both good and evil could redirect to good and evil with on top of the page links to Good (disambiguation) and Evil (disambiguation). Best regards, --Brz7 21:27, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a serious problem with the title of this page, a problem that is reflected in the introductory paragraphs. The term 'good' refers to values not actions. The term 'evil' tends to be used to refer to actions rather than values. Much of the material in the article fluctuates between being a discussion of value and ethics. There is obviously some relationshoip between value theory and ethics, but even this is not presented well in this article. How would people feel about moving the article to 'Good and bad'? Anarchia 20:30, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

text: I think it best to have the two extreme value categories in the same article. Anarchia 04:27, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Right now, though, this article is almost completely about good. I still think we should change the title and create a new article that addresses them both. I guess you could call it a split. It's just silly to have an article about evil, but no article about good. Wrad 04:52, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I know I am being a philosopher here, and this may mean it is most sensible to ignore me, but 'good' and 'evil' are about different things!!!! A situation can be good or bad, even if noone does anything. For something to be evil, it has to have been done by someone. An eruption that kills hundreds is 'bad', it is not 'evil'. Someone who gives me a bunch of flowers has done something 'right'. That right action might bring about a 'good' state of affairs (me being happy (always a very good thing!)), but, it is not the action that is 'good'. 'Good' and 'bad' refer to values. 'Right' and 'wrong' refer to actions. 'Evil' is kind of like 'right' and 'wrong'. The problem with paying any attention at all to this is that people seem to use these words almost interchangably in life! Anarchia 05:10, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Introduction 

message: This article is significantly imbalanced towards the "good" side of the issue.  It does not include any significant discussion of the concept of "evil" aside from an inadequate and superficial discussion in the introduction.  Large portions of this article (such as the sections "Virtue theories," "Agent-external theories," and "Objective theories of wellbeing") discuss "good" in a matter irrelevant to the discussion of "evil" as presented in the introduction -- two thirds of the article discusses Welfarist theories and variations, which have no concept of evil that the article mentions.-24.27.61.4 17:41, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, evil is not included. I think the evil article should be merged with this article. Though this article could also possibly be named Good and bad (already redirects) and somehow linked to Virtue and vice/Virtues and vices, Light and dark (etc.?).--Brz7 14:30, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Merging evil seems a bad idea - the resulting page would be unwieldy and 'evil' deserves its own page. Anarchia 20:54, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi! Well, then Good also deserves an own page (which would contain almost all of the content of this article). More specifically both good and evil could redirect to good and evil with on top of the page links to Good (disambiguation) and Evil (disambiguation). Best regards, --Brz7 21:27, 13 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a serious problem with the title of this page, a problem that is reflected in the introductory paragraphs. The term 'good' refers to values not actions. The term 'evil' tends to be used to refer to actions rather than values. Much of the material in the article fluctuates between being a discussion of value and ethics. There is obviously some relationshoip between value theory and ethics, but even this is not presented well in this article. How would people feel about moving the article to 'Good and bad'? Anarchia 20:30, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

text: I think it best to have the two extreme value categories in the same article. Anarchia 04:27, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Right now, though, this article is almost completely about good. I still think we should change the title and create a new article that addresses them both. I guess you could call it a split. It's just silly to have an article about evil, but no article about good. Wrad 04:52, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I know I am being a philosopher here, and this may mean it is most sensible to ignore me, but 'good' and 'evil' are about different things!!!! A situation can be good or bad, even if noone does anything. For something to be evil, it has to have been done by someone. An eruption that kills hundreds is 'bad', it is not 'evil'. Someone who gives me a bunch of flowers has done something 'right'. That right action might bring about a 'good' state of affairs (me being happy (always a very good thing!)), but, it is not the action that is 'good'. 'Good' and 'bad' refer to values. 'Right' and 'wrong' refer to actions. 'Evil' is kind of like 'right' and 'wrong'. The problem with paying any attention at all to this is that people seem to use these words almost interchangably in life! Anarchia 05:10, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: What happened to Evil?

message: Several whole paragraphs on this page are not referenced and it seems alot of this work is largely baseed on the author's on research that has not been verified   Darklionface 13:17, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: References

message: At the current revision this article needs work. However, that is not my concern.
What can't be seen on this page is the namespace and redirect issues. We have material at Evil and material here (that appears to have been at good, but was probably moved to this namespace).
As mentioned above, I think Good and Evil are ideas that are studied in and of themselves, obviously in philosophical ethics. Under the topic Good, one would not be surprised to read about Welfare. Under the topic Evil, one would not be surprised to read about Criminal law. Though Welfare and Criminal law would not suit themselves to the complementary articles.
Naturally, both a Good article and the Evil article would refer to one another somewhat. However, detailed consideration of the relationship between good and evil might actually be better at a page with the current title, and provide a sub-topic of Ethics.
I propose someone (or ones) with time and motivation create a Good article regarding the pursuit of virtue, value systems and so on, while transforming this page to refer specifically to discussion of the relationship between Good and Evil. Alastair Haines (talk) 15:24, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  High level tidy up 

message: Does it make sense to say that good and evil form a dualistic spectrum, if there is typically one course of action, one state of the world considered good and very many different kinds of things considered evil? Wouldn't it be more exact to say that good is the preferred course of action (for a good reason) and the evils something that ought to be avoided (for a good reson). InsectIntelligence (talk) 10:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  One good and several evils 

message: I am just curious as to why there is no mention of altruism as one of the characteristics of good.
71.123.102.144 (talk) 21:45, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Altruism 

message: As I understand it, good/evil as a dualistic relationship originated in Zoroastrianism a good 5 centuries before it shows up in Western philosophy. Maybe someone who knows about Zoroastrianism should add that in the origins section?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.173.90.73 (talk) 23:58, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Zoroastrianism 

message: There is numerous issues with this article. I attempted to add sources however much of the article seems to contain statements concluded from a list of sources but without any specific source for the statement. Each statement has to have a source. This article needs a major rewrite.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Empireheart (talk • contribs) 13:30, 24 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Research issues 

message: I'm wondering how useful the lead image is as an illustration of "good," given that there's a distinction between good and innocence (the same image is, more appropriately, the lead in that article).  May I suggest George Frederic Watts's good samaritan, or Rembrandt's? Chick Bowen 01:53, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Note that the lead image has been changed a couple of times since I wrote this, so my comment no longer applies. Chick Bowen 03:19, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lead image 

message: This article should be renamed to Goodness, because there's already article about Evil.--Mladifilozof (talk) 19:10, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rename 

message: Does anyone else think that the definition of good and evil given in Leviathan deserves a spot on this page?
From Leviathan (book)#Part I: Of Man:
:"But whatsoever is the object of any man's appetite or desire, that is it which he for his part calleth good; and the object of his hate and aversion, evil; and of his contempt, vile and inconsiderable. For these words of good, evil, and contemptible are ever used with relation to the person that useth them: there being nothing simply and absolutely so; nor any common rule of good and evil to be taken from the nature of the objects themselves..."  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kostmo (talk • contribs) 06:57, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes. The article should give an overview of the historical evolution of the term in the West, as well as in other cultures. At present, more recent philosophical views of lesser importance are overemphasised in the article. It would be interesting to compare Hobbes' use of "appetite" here with that of Aristotle, or at least present a brief link between the two, if that can be done without trespassing into original research. Narssarssuaq (talk) 12:28, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Thomas Hobbes' definition 

message: Please partake in the discussion whether Manichaean paranoia should be deleted or not on this page (WP:AfD/Manichaean paranoia (2nd nomination)! ... said: Rursus (bork²) 13:57, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  AfD: [[Manichaean paranoia]] 

message: Does anyone object to me setting up automatic archiving for this page using MiszaBot? Unless otherwise agreed, I would set it to archive threads that have been inactive for 30 days and keep ten threads.--Oneiros (talk) 14:26, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: --Oneiros (talk) 22:30, 22 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Automate archiving? 

message: Why isn't Fredrick Nietzsche work not mentioned here? His book was one third dealing with the good/evil problem and one of his most influential works. It at-least deserves a paragraph  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.196.212.89 (talk) 21:38, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  On the Genealogy of morals 

message: On the one hand there is the ancient belief that... 
*Good will always ultimately triumph over evil, 
And on the other hand is the apparent fact that...
*Evil has the power to do both evil actions and good actions. 
So if one is "evil" and can do as one pleases, while one who is "good" is limited to doing only good actions, doesn't this mean that evil is, by definition, more powerful than good?  How can good ever triumph over evil if evil is more powerful than good? 
*And shouldn't this "power paradox" be included in the article on "Good and Evil"?   .`^) Painediss`cuss (^`.  05:35, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Good/Evil Paradox 

message: Why is Zoroastriansm not mentioned at all? The 400 bc date given in this article is beaten by the concept of good and evil in Zoroastrianism where, good ( Ahura Mazda) fights evil (Ahriman) and good eventually prevails. This article needs a lot of work done.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by TheTruthA (talk • contribs) 15:12, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Origing of Good and evil. 

message: This article needs the attention of an expert in the field. Narssarssuaq (talk) 05:53, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Expert needed 

message: ===Choice of lesser goods theories===
Sometimes more thorough attempts will also be made to describe the origin of evil and how it might tend to come into existence as well. Those attempts will sometimes fall under the category of describing as false various forms of goodness. Among some schools of thought, the idea is put forth that all evil comes from the excessive pursuit of goods of lesser value, at the expense of goods of greater value. For instance, greed derives from the pursuit of gain for one's self, generally a good thing, at the expense of others, generally a bad thing. Overeating may result from the exchange of momentary pleasure derived from the eating of food, for the greater good of long-term health. In psychology similar processes might occur in the formation of various types of addictions. No particular thing is thus considered to be intrinsically bad automatically, but rather evil will come from the pursuit of various goods in excess, to the expense or the neglect of other more important ones.
Narssarssuaq (talk) 12:30, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  DELETED: Anti-goodness theories 

message: Sometimes more thorough attempts will also be made to describe the origin of evil and how it might tend to come into existence as well. Those attempts will sometimes fall under the category of describing as false various forms of goodness. Among some schools of thought, the idea is put forth that all evil comes from the excessive pursuit of goods of lesser value, at the expense of goods of greater value. For instance, greed derives from the pursuit of gain for one's self, generally a good thing, at the expense of others, generally a bad thing. Overeating may result from the exchange of momentary pleasure derived from the eating of food, for the greater good of long-term health. In psychology similar processes might occur in the formation of various types of addictions. No particular thing is thus considered to be intrinsically bad automatically, but rather evil will come from the pursuit of various goods in excess, to the expense or the neglect of other more important ones.
Narssarssuaq (talk) 12:30, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Choice of lesser goods theories

message: In the first paragraph of the article, Good and Evil are defined as a philosophical imaginary location or direction on a linear spectrum of morality. This, as I shall attempt to prove hereafter, is both an inadequate definition and a fallacious one. 
In the article entitled 'Evil', evil is defined as Profound Immorality; an extreme lack of adherence to a moral or ethical code. This second definition would suggest the spectrum is vertical, like temperature or degree of light, a measure not of simple direction or location, but a theoretical value on an indifferent scale; suggesting evil is the absence of or deviation from Good. Good being necessarily both proper and infinite in its theoretical value but not in actual testable value, again a parallel to heat(I have not proved this yet; see Plato's Form of the Good, as well as second paragraph for evidence). Any measure of evil, then, would and must be deviant, changing, and imprecise in its character, being anything that is not Good, while Evil itself in Absolute form could be correctly defined as a direction on a vertical linear scale; the direction which is not Good. But Good may not be described as a direction on the vertical scale or as any value measurable on such a scale. It must be defined only as Absolute, just as Truth is absolute. Either you are Right, and have One Conclusion, that will be congruous to All Right conclusions of the same matter and scale, or you are Wrong, and may have any number of the infinite possible mistakes, as anything that is not the right answer is wrong, and though some conclusions seem to be 'more wrong' than others, all those which are Not Actually Completely True. Anything that is not Good is evil. 
Whether or not the standard of Good is Fixed Eternally is a subject for another debate, but it is logically necessary that it be 'fixed' in a specific iota of hypothetically motionless time(or no-time), according to the definition of time(extremely simplified, if anything is happening, time is passing). Therefore, in a state of no-time the nature of good is fixed and necessarily(whether temporarily or no)Absolute. Even if the nature of Good is determined by social mores it must be absolute in any given time frame.
But Good, like Truth, is not, and must not be variant. If the concept of Good were Really and Actually to Change, according to the mores of Society or any other temporal standard, the problem this author has in conflict with the definition of Good is one of pure semantics. It comes to this: If one talks of ethics, or any moral philosophy, in reference to the concept of Good one must either be talking of that which is Ultimately desirable, efficient, superior, excellent, correct, true, et cetera, or talking of another concept. If the latter is the case and one takes the term 'good' and applies it variably, then one must come up with a new term for the Ultimately Ethically Proper, or be hopelessly lost in describing It.    
Thus, in the definition of Good and Evil, Good must needs be defined as an Absolute, while Evil must needs be defined as variant. Such that a person may be 'slightly evil' or 'very evil' according to their few or many incongruities with the Absolute Standard of Good, Whatever that may Actually be, but a person cannot be 'slightly good' or 'very good' insomuch as they cannot conform any More to a fixed standard. 
The nomenclature, then should be characterized as follows, according to syntactical norms. Good, when talking of Good vs Evil, must be at all times capitalized, to oppose from the layman's term 'good' which could be used to describe a 'good meal' or 'good time at the mall'. Whereas evil should at most times be lowercase, as it denotes usually a variant, inexact value; as does the lowercase good. Evil then, with a capital 'E' should only be used when referring to the Philosophical Direction on a moral or ethical scale. Exempli Gratia: Person A has become more Evil everyday. vs. Person A is evil. This form of distinction shall be used hereafter. 
Perhaps it has been proven so far the Necessity of the Existence of Infinite Good. This author has defined Infinite Good, as it relates to its necessary Existence and the philosophy of Ethics. This author has not defined Infinite Good as it defines the Natural World.
Except in religious philosophies of Dualism, where Evil and Good are seen to be Equal and Opposite forces, the concept of Evil should not be a part of the natural world, whereas the concept of Good drives its existence. However, instances of evil should persist prolifically in the natural world, as the natural world continues to either strive for or fall from but regardless not meet the Standard of Good. Herein lies the empirically testable part of my hypothesis: If this hypothesis of Infinite Good and finite evil is correct, we should expect to see in nature an abundance of flaws, deficiencies, inefficiencies where nature does not meet the Standard of Good. The reader may argue that this is in of itself circular; if we see a bad thing we label it bad; if we see a good thing we label it good; if we see evil we label it evil: an awful tautology that has only one solution: The clear and Separate definition of Infinite Good, as perceived by an Infinite Being.
Logically, a being capable of holding in its mind a clear definition of Infinite Good as it defines all of finite matter and time, must be Infinite. This arrives the author at an unexpected conclusion. Either Infinite Good exists, as proven by earlier paragraphs, and therefore an Infinite Being to define it, and hold the form of its standard, or Infinite Good is an illusion, a mirage in a water-less desert, and so therefore is the concept of all things Good a mirage. Either Truth exists or it doesn't. Either these words are the incoherent ramblings of a piece of sentient matter, or they are the incoherent ramblings of a piece of sentient matter that matters. 
It is interesting to note that as my hypothesis suggests Reality, wikipedia has so applied it. Evil, being measurable on a scale, and prolifically present and variant, contains an article of the same description.
The article for 'Good' has disappeared altogether, and the link redirects to 'Value Theory', which was initially the investigation of the natural laws of Good and Evil, also known as ethics, which has since evolved to other more empirical pursuits. I also suggest in this forum that the link for 'good' be redirected to Form of the Good, an article on Plato's theory. 
89.211.104.73 (talk) .C 8:36 AM Sunday, February 24, 2013 (UTC)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.211.104.73 (talk) 07:53, 24 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Absolute Good vs. Variant Evil