Evil

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Worked through in 6 videos · 14 passages.

What Dominique Pagani says

Dominique Pagani holds that the question of evil cannot be separated from any philosophy: a reflection that does not confront it "is not worth a minute's trouble", and he links it to the question "what ought I to do?"1 2. He wants to take evil as a whole, from a scrape to theological evil, and finds its root in misfortune, illness and physical suffering. For him, medicine is an art that brings good back where there is evil3. Evil already shows itself in the need for one living being to devour another. Yet the animal, which knows neither good nor evil, is not bestial: only man can fall below it. Hence his definition: evil is the unnatural reintroduction of the state of nature and of the relation of force by a free being who has passed into the civil state4 5. He also places it on the side of lying to oneself, whose strength comes from narcissism6. He notes that the Apocalypse defines it as making others feel guilty rather than as sin. His examples include the cry for help of victims buried under rubble in Gaza and Lebanon, as well as the Khmer Rouge and those who gave them their power.

Summary produced automatically from 14 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.

Season 13 · 6 Feb 2025On the anti-Sovietism of the Khmer Rouge-Greens

0:00The question about the Khmer Rouge joins the cycle on evil.
1:09:38The case illustrates the essence of evil, both among the Khmer Rouge leaders and among those who gave them this power.

Season 13 · 17 Dec 2024The essence of evil - Innocence of nature, horror of naturalism!

13:33The animal is not bestial and does not know good and evil; only man can fall below the animal.
20:38Evil is the unnatural reintroduction of the state of nature by one who has entered the civil state.
28:24The most criminal thing is that a free being decides to reintroduce physical necessity and the balance of force.

Season 13 · 2 Dec 2024Evil, or the "unknowing" of the self

1:18A philosophy that does not raise the problem of evil is not worth a minute's trouble; it must be taken as a whole, from the bobo to theological evil.
6:52In the Apocalypse, evil is not defined as sin but as the act of inducing guilt.
58:15Evil lies on the side of lying to oneself, and its force comes from narcissism.

Season 13 · 13 Oct 2024The eternal return… of the death camps?

12:46It already appears in the necessity, for the living, of devouring another living being.
40:16Evil is the call for help that cannot deliver itself, like that of the victims buried in Gaza and Lebanon.

Season 13 · 20 Sept 2024Sickness, misfortune, evil

37:28The root of evil is found in misfortune, illness and physical suffering; a philosophical reflection that does not confront the problem of evil is not worth a minute's trouble.
39:49Medicine is an art, not a science: bringing back the good where there is evil.

Season 4 · 11 Dec 2017#4.3 Angélique (by Nerval)

57:29No philosophy is worth anything without the question of evil, tied to the question of what I ought to do.
59:11To abuse the civil state is to reintroduce the state of nature, the relation of force, by pretending there is law.