If you are a Naturalist (i.e., you believe God does not exist and could have played no role in Evolution), you really cannot be consistent and speak of “evil.” Morality is then nothing more than a social construct—just waiting to be deconstructed by anyone named Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Jeffery Dahmer....
While I disagree with the other parts of this (The Nazis were religious, though they were pagan instead of Christianity), I do think that there’s a significant probability that morality is just a social construct, and thus evil and good can only ever be from points of view. This is called moral anti-realism.
Controversial take: The only reason we agree on moral behavior and immoral behavior so much is not because there’s a moral reality waiting to be discovered, but instead the fact that humans are so similar. I don’t assign significant probability mass to this remaining the case, and thus vast disagreements on moral and immoral behavior will arise.
Yes: as far as the German churches, it was a relative handful of people like Dietrich Bonhoeffer who opposed Hitler openly and—to their shame (like the “ordinary” Germans) - Protestant and Roman Catholic clergy/leadership seemed to find it in their interests to either remain silent or even back Hitler.
I think the reason people agree on morality to the extent that they do is that a sense of right and wrong is imprinted in our nature. We are good at ignoring it or making it situational, though. For example, many who commit adultery find all kinds of ways to assuage their consciences, though if it were the same person’s spouse who did the cheating, they would be incensed and unforgiving...telling anyone who would listen how their former partner did them “wrong.”
Like Sartre, you are at least willing to bite the philosophical bullet. The difference between him and Dostoevsky is that D saw that phrase not as a statement of human freedom, but a warning of unbridled terror.
While I disagree with the other parts of this (The Nazis were religious, though they were pagan instead of Christianity), I do think that there’s a significant probability that morality is just a social construct, and thus evil and good can only ever be from points of view. This is called moral anti-realism.
Controversial take: The only reason we agree on moral behavior and immoral behavior so much is not because there’s a moral reality waiting to be discovered, but instead the fact that humans are so similar. I don’t assign significant probability mass to this remaining the case, and thus vast disagreements on moral and immoral behavior will arise.
Only a handful of Nazis believed in pagan religion. Most notable was Himmler. Hitler, afaik, considered it silly and distracting from the main cause.
Yes: as far as the German churches, it was a relative handful of people like Dietrich Bonhoeffer who opposed Hitler openly and—to their shame (like the “ordinary” Germans) - Protestant and Roman Catholic clergy/leadership seemed to find it in their interests to either remain silent or even back Hitler.
I think the reason people agree on morality to the extent that they do is that a sense of right and wrong is imprinted in our nature. We are good at ignoring it or making it situational, though. For example, many who commit adultery find all kinds of ways to assuage their consciences, though if it were the same person’s spouse who did the cheating, they would be incensed and unforgiving...telling anyone who would listen how their former partner did them “wrong.”
Like Sartre, you are at least willing to bite the philosophical bullet. The difference between him and Dostoevsky is that D saw that phrase not as a statement of human freedom, but a warning of unbridled terror.