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Definition: The definition that my group had come up with in lecture 1 was that evil is an intentional act that crosses social boundaries and morals that inflicts harm which results in no remorse. This definition was then expanded on by talking about the characteristics of the individual as well as the social context. ThisContinue reading “Last Post”

In reading the final chapter of Baumeister (1997) book, the thoughts about the myths of pure evil struck me the most. Baumeister (1997) discusses how the myths of victims and the myths of the perpetrators are so vastly different, and that is one of the reasons why evil is so difficult to define. Further, victimizationContinue reading “Week 11-Victims”

While reading the end of Zimbardo (2008) book, some of the questions that were brought up were why the people who were at the top of the chain of command, either participated in or turned a blind eye to the horrible things that happened at Abu Gharib. As Zimbardo (2008) puts it, there was aContinue reading “Week 10- Leadership”

This week most of our class was taken up by presentations, with a short activity at the end. The activity at the end was about what our class perceived to be the big take home message for Zimbardo (2008) book. My group thought it was that ordinary individuals such as Fredrick in Abu Gharib orContinue reading “Week 9- Dehumanization”

Does the failure to intervene as a bystander constitute as an evil inaction?? This statement was put forth in Zimbardo (2008) when he was discussing what occurred after the experiment had wrapped up. Several of the “good” guards did not intervene when the prisoners were being abused, and similarly, the prisoners did not intervene whenContinue reading “Week 8-Failure to Intervene”

Ambiguous situations, or situations where there can be multiple interpretations, can lead individuals to follow the rest of the group, as was discussed in class. This can be demonstrated in Zimbardo’s experiment, where the guards followed each other’s lead to see what they were supposed to be doing in that situation (Zimbardo, 2008). The abilityContinue reading “Week 7- Group Mentality”

Many people have heard of Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment, as it is one of the most famous examples of what happens when innocent people get caught up in roles that they play. Both the prisoners and the guards exhibited what occurs when you put good people in an evil situation to see what or whoContinue reading “Week 6- Roles”

Something that stood out for me in the readings this week was the discussion about serial killers. For many people, they see serial killers as extremely evil, and this is also portrayed in many television shows and movies within the past decades. The impulses one feels to be angry can be resisted which is whyContinue reading “Week 5-Serial Killers…”

What makes someone violent? What changes between men and women to make one conduct these acts on a more prevalent basis? To answer these questions, Baumeister (1997) discusses self-esteem in regards to who commits violent acts. More specifically, he discovered that revenge occurs due to threats to an individual’s self-esteem, and that there is aContinue reading “Week 4:Ego Threats and Gender Differences”

Empathy is a large piece of what is discussed when talking about the concept of evil. In class, we spoke about 3 different domains; eye of the beholder, the individual and societal aspects. Empathy was discussed for all of these domains, as it is the piece that ties all three together. I think this theContinue reading “Week 3- Empathy”