Where's the justified killing in that? --> (the averted hijackings) Nobody killed each other off, they just let themselves die for a purpose. The purpose of keeping everyone else safe and I thank them dearly for that.

The psycho thing, you win...(for now...my brain is really dead...)

For cops, yeah, I've seen them, they always try and negociate...it doesn't work sometimes though...and when that happens, well that's just too bad...

Nobody's perfect, and we have to take our shortcuts, they have good intentions, but they still are wrong. The overall goal is for the best, but it still isn't right. They will still be rewarded, but not for killing the guy off or for lying, but for saving the person or people that needed it.

But in all reality, these situations shouldn't even exist in the first place. As long as people with bad intentions and ect exist, we'll still have to go through this whole damned thing...until everyone learns to be nice or at least just pretend, then things would be just dandy...but it's not.

note: I'm not saying, get rid of the bad guys, I'm saying get rid of the bad in the guys. How?...hmm...I wish I knew...

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...wee?

"Nobody's perfect, and we have to take our shortcuts, they have good intentions, but they still are wrong."

It sounds like you're trying to have your cake and eat it too here.  Why are you committed to saying that good intentions are still wrong?  Some guy is at your door and because you have to lie to him to protect a person that you're protecting, you're wrong too?  That doesn't make any sense.
Besides, you were trying to say that lying was one of the absolute black sins, and we just agreed that lying under the circumstances of this event was the right thing to do, so it's not absolute.  You're projecting wrong-doing upon a guy whose only mistake was answering the door.  The psycho's immoral intentions are not a burden that the other person should carry just because he wants him to go away.
It may be regrettable to lie, but in this situation, it's not the wrong thing to do. Nothing wrong is being done except for the guy at your door, holding a gun.

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-The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

-On the converse, all good intentions lead to hell.

The first one is true. The second is not. This isn't something that can be flipped around.

You cannot go through your life terrified that you're going to be evil, or trying to avoid evil, because evil is an illusion. It's a warped little figment of your imagination meant to persuade you that there is purity in the world, that everything is black and white, and that by staying with the white, everything will be fuzzy kittens and happy skies for the rest of your life.

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Come, see Neko Girl Jessica's Place, a haven for RPers everywhere!

once again, Terra, your extreme sarcasm invigorates a response. Now, when debating such a topic, it becomes neccessary to have vital interaction between the sides and not degrade into repeating one's opinions.

With that said, out of curiosity, I looked this up...

adj. e·vil·er, e·vil·est

1. Morally bad or wrong; wicked: an evil tyrant.
2. Causing ruin, injury, or pain; harmful: the evil effects of a poor diet.
3. Characterized by or indicating future misfortune; ominous: evil omens.
4. Bad or blameworthy by report; infamous: an evil reputation.
5. Characterized by anger or spite; malicious: an evil temper.

n.

1. The quality of being morally bad or wrong; wickedness.
2. That which causes harm, misfortune, or destruction: a leader's power to do both good and evil.
3. An evil force, power, or personification.
4. Something that is a cause or source of suffering, injury, or destruction: the social evils of poverty and injustice.

\E"vil\ ([=e]"v'l) n. 1. Anything which impairs the happiness of a being or deprives a being of any good; anything which causes suffering of any kind to sentient beings; injury; mischief; harm; -- opposed to good.

Evils which our own misdeeds have wrought. --Milton.

The evil that men do lives after them. --Shak.

2. Moral badness, or the deviation of a moral being from the principles of virtue imposed by conscience, or by the will of the Supreme Being, or by the principles of a lawful human authority; disposition to do wrong; moral offence; wickedness; depravity.

The heart of the sons of men is full of evil. --Eccl. ix. 3.

3. malady or disease; especially in the phrase king's evil, the scrofula. [R.] --Shak.

He [Edward the Confessor] was the first that touched for the evil. --Addison.

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.

evil

\E*vil\a. [OE. evel, evil, ifel, uvel, AS. yfel; akin to OFries, evel, D. euvel, OS. & OHG. ubil, G. ["u]bel, Goth. ubils, and perh. to E. over.] 1. Having qualities tending to injury and mischief; having a nature or properties which tend to badness; mischievous; not good; worthless or deleterious; poor; as, an evil beast; and evil plant; an evil crop.

A good tree can not bring forth evil fruit. --Matt. vii. 18.

2. Having or exhibiting bad moral qualities; morally corrupt; wicked; wrong; vicious; as, evil conduct, thoughts, heart, words, and the like.

Ah, what a sign it is of evil life, When death's approach is seen so terrible. --Shak.

3. Producing or threatening sorrow, distress, injury, or calamity; unpropitious; calamitous; as, evil tidings; evil arrows; evil days.

Because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel. --Deut. xxii. 19.

The owl shrieked at thy birth -- an evil sign. --Shak.

Evil news rides post, while good news baits. --Milton.

The dictionary definition, not that it matters overly much, just something to keep in mind...

There are lots of words in the dictionary, but that doesn't mean that all of them point to a reality.  I mean, ghost and spirit are in the dictionary, but what are those things?

You're taking a subjective term and asserting that just because society has defined it based on a system of values that it must be some kind of definative force or thing.  That's not what evil or immorality is.  Immorality is the cause of unnecessary harm to other beings.  That's all it is.  We don't desire pain, so we avoid pain, and because we can feel the pain of others we do the same for them too.

Morality isn't black and white.  A fundamentalist wants to say that lying is always evil, yet I just showed a good case where it isn't always evil.  Given an extreme, it could be a very good thing that you should be proud of.  You shouldn't do it to people you love, but if it's going to protect them from injury or death, then its acceptable.

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So killing a human being is acceptable... as long as doing that prevents the human being from possibly killing another? What logic is that? How do you define what the worth of a being is?

The dictionary definition, I never said that it was true, though you imply that I did.

That's not the point I was trying to make.  You're trying to make an absolute black and white situation again.  Protecting another person's life isn't always going to be the hard justification for taking another person's life.  If you can avoid it by, say, disarming him, then by all means, do so.  You should use the minimum enforcement possible while trying to avert a catastrophe.  But if you're the cop several yards away and you see he's readying to fire upon another human being, you aim that pistol at what's going to stop that man, and you fire.  You take his life, if necessary.
Talk to a police officer some time whose been involved in a case where lethal enforcement was necessary.  See if you think he's an evil sinner after he's told you what is job is like.  Is he evil for stoping some sociopathic killer just because circumstance has limited his options?
You can't have absolute rules of morality, otherwise, you're throwing ethics out the window.  You'd be eliminating the entire justice system if you did that.

Rules are bad.  Principles are good, and the principle of minimizing harm we do to others is a good humanistic principle.  And this isn't some wacked out idea that I'm pulling out of my hat.

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"You're taking a subjective term and asserting that just because society has defined it based on a system of values that it must be some kind of definative force or thing"

"A fundamentalist wants to say that lying is always evil..."

"You're trying to make an absolute black and white situation again."

"See if you think he's an evil sinner after he's told you what is job is like."

First off, stop putting words into my mouth.

Next, I'm beggining to see the vital purpose of the dictionary. This might sound a tad odd, but in any case, I think you guys are dodging the term evil out of spite for which it implies. When I say "evil" it brings to the mind images of plays, cartoons, books, games and the like in which evil was simplified down to paper thin sadistic characters who's depth was simplified to... well, "evil".

This, they say, doesn't exist. A good point, and one which invalidates the point of this thread. However, instead of leaving it at that, they continue to pound that point in. Here, for instance, is a situation of which black & white evil cannot be applied. Upon this realization, I bring in the dictionary term, to perhaps revitalize the argument, however, I am told that I am attempting to use the dictionary to substantiate evil, an inherently flawed as percieved concept...

 

What point are you trying to make?  I've presented very good cases for how, in real life, you cannot have absolute rules and apply them to morality.  You're trying to bring in a dictionary definition of evil, which is an abstract human perception.

You've lost me.  Was there some theological point to bringing up the definition of evil?  Were you agreeing?  Disagreeing?  What?  What point were you trying to make by bringing in the dictionary definition anyway?

The interesting thing about the English language is that we rely so much on popular usage that words change definition, so the dictionary isn't really a document of absolute fact but rather a snapshot of what the words meant when the book was printed or last updated.  It's not like France, where there's an actual counsel that sits down and decides upon absolute concrete definitions.
For instance, take the word "bad".  Bad used to only mean disobedient.  Now it can mean to be cool.  In the fifties, when they were writing the Flintstones, gay meant to be happy.  Now that's one of the most uncommon uses for that word.
Even within context of the definition you provided, there were derivatives of evil, such as "eviler" or "evilest" to suggest that our human interpretation of the word has changed from something that may have once been considered absolute to something more abstract, like morals and ethics.

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Actually, I had just realized that, for this thread, I'd used entirely the wrong term. Based on the dictionary. I had used the word evil, to mean extreme immorality in a sense. The point of the argument was where your limits lie in the wrongness of crimes. Murder and such.

 

Now murdering is something that is a lot more specific than killing.  Because of how specifically murder is defined as an act done to cause harm to another, you could definately define it as wrong regardless of the circumstances.  I wouldn't paint all murder with the same brush, because there's a difference between someone who conspires to murder someone they dislike versus someone who kills indiscriminately, but in all cases, that act is wrong, because it's a harmful and you might say "evil" act.

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When it all boils down, though, it is all a matter of perception.  What one person considers to be evil could be completely different from another person's point of view.  No two people share the exact same perspective, it is part of what makes each of us unique.  There is truly no defenition for the word evil.  In fact, this holds true for any word in any language. 

All the dictionary tries to do is provide the few most common interpretations of a word.  Leaf through the dictionary sometime and see how many entries you find that have only one definition written down.  This is the fatal flaw of communication of all forms and the root of misunderstanding.

Communication tries to designate things (be they words, symbols, expressions...) that have common meaning between individuals.  However, in accordance with the above assertion that no two human beigns share the exact same perspective, this is fundamentally impossible.  One word could mean one thing to a certain individual, but something completely different to another.  The vast majority of misunderstandings stem from this.

It could be argued that this is the source of debate, to disscuss things such as the defenition of the word evil which have particularly anomalous meanings to people...but now I'm straying from the point.  My point is that no two people share the exact same definition of evil.

Evil is a man-made concept. We like to think that people are born "evil" and that certain motives and actions are "evil"- usually what we mean is that it was greedy to the point of harming others.

No animals are evil, no forces in this world are evil, and no people are inherentley evil. It's just another way to categorize things.

That said, the idea of evil is a total lack of compassion, a total inability to care about right vs wrong. What we define as "evil" is usually something that takes no interest in the well-being of another or the whole, or has the intent of harm.

First of all the word evil is defined by one person only, the individual. Before you define evil I think you have to define good. What is good and what is right. Not what God tells you or society tells you, but what your gut feeling is. Then everything opposite of that would be Evil. I find a few exceptions, sex crimes and murder/decapitation or something like that, anything that harms an innocent human being. What defines innocent? Well for the most part children are always innocent, and any bystander who doesn’t deserve to be hurt.

 

-Zac

Evil is only evil because of they way everyone has been taught... If we lived in a culture where acts traditionally defined as 'evil' were rewarded (although, this doens't sound far from the truth...) then we all would grow up killing, lying, and torturing. It turns out that the actions that are 'good' are only good by coincidence. Which is why if we ever meet some other form of life, we should be careful, as they may percieve US to be despicable, with our supposedly good acts. They would have a completely alien set of morals.

Take Hitler; a man called by some the most evil man alive. However, I'm sure if you asked him if HE thought he was evil, he would have said no (or, more probably, 'nein'). Take Lucifer; he rebelled against Heaven (according to Christains, pretty much the most evil thing you can do). However, if you read around his rebellion, in books like Paradise Lost, you see that he had his own, almost honorable, reasons for doing so. Same with Caine.

I suppose the only way you could conceivably be 'evil' would be to come up with an idepandant set of morals, and then deliberately go against them for some reason.