Abstract

This essay will address the question for what good or purpose is evil. First, an examination of the use-mention distinction between evil and “evil” produces two distinct questions: what good is the presence of evil in the world, and what good is the concept of evil as part of our ethical vocabulary describing human interaction. By severing all logically necessary connections between evil and greater goods, we discover that the answer to the first question—what good is evil in the world—is none whatsoever. Evil deeds leave an enduring and destructive impact on people’s lives. Attempts to justify this ruination belittle the torment that sufferers of evil sustain. Because there is no normative vindication of evil’s existence, recognizing it as an indelible fact of human interaction proves to be crucial to understanding elemental features of the moral community and one’s role within it. Hence, the answer to the second question—what good is the concept of evil—is that it is of the utmost importance. Insofar as evil is a perpetual element of human interaction, being aware of this very fact—that is, understanding the concept of evil—is central to comprehending one’s moral agency, to appropriately reacting to others in the moral community, and to possibly inhibiting future incidents of evil.