On Evil, Responsibility, and Choice

I don’t believe in the future, which means the world is not ending. There will be no ecological disaster. Pollution will not overrun the waters and the air. The armies of the cruel will not crush the innocent beneath the treads of their armored vehicles.

It’s a nice place to live, this world with no future.

The future exists only in the present, as a function of our minds. For the future to exist, we have to predict, which is a mental function. No mind, no future! The same is true of the past and memory. No memory, no past!

If you stop thinking about the future and the past, then what remains? The place you are, the breath you’re breathing. The moment of sensation that you are currently experiencing. It can be a bit terrifying, because: Where does it come from? Without the stories of past and future, the origin of the present moment is pretty mysterious! Why is there something instead of nothing? Who is making it? Is it real? Is it me? It is someone else? Why is it the way it is, and not some other way? Why is my life MY life and not someone else’s life? 

Welcome to philosophy.

History

Being in the present moment puts us in touch with what is real. That’s why “mindfulness” is recommended. It’s good to touch base briefly with what is real, every so often. Usually, we live in stories. There’s nothing wrong with living in stories; that’s what we were made to do. Stories are what make humans different from other animals, to the extent we are different. Stories are what make history, history.

But apart from history is eternity. There is some stuff that is always there. It never changes, yet it is the source of everything that changes. It is never born and never dies, but it is the source of everything that is born and dies. It cannot be seen or heard or felt, yet it is the source of everything that is seen or heard or felt. What is it? I don’t know, so I call it the Tao.

Our history does not look good. It looks like we’re headed for collapse, which means the death and dissolution of everything we know. You’d think this would be a bad thing, but it’s not clear, actually. Everything needs to go away some time, and it might as well be now.

We’re actually privileged to be around to see it! It means that we’re some sort of special generation, destined to witness the grand spectacle of global death. Why did it turn out this way? Well, you’ll have to ask yourself that, because the amazing truth is that you are in charge of your own destiny. You get to choose where you go in the landscape of everything that’s possible.

I don’t mean to say that we control our own lives. It’s too easy to jump from that idea to weird cults of “prosperity consciousness.” I don’t mean to say that we control our own history. Once you’re in the flow, you gotta go where it’s going. But I do think that we play a part in choosing which river we jump into. And apparently, those of us who are here now are the ones who want to be around for the big climax at the end.

Each one to their own taste! If you like it here, then you’re here.

Responsibility

But what about all the misery? Surely we’re not choosing to be lonely, in pain, humiliated, tortured, and killed, as some people are. And surely we can’t stand by and watch that sort of thing happen to other people when we know it’s wrong!

No, we can’t. But honestly it’s a bit of a mystery why not. I mean, we have to acknowledge the reality that people are butchered, along with animals, trees, and landscapes, so it’s actually happening. Does that mean we are subject to a cruel God who inflicts tortures upon us because… what? We disobeyed His law?

That’s the story that is told really loudly nowadays. Supposedly that’s the only explanation for why terrible shit happens to other people and ultimately to us. But putting that Evil onto God is just a way of saying that it’s not in us. That story is a convenient way of avoiding responsibility for Evil. “It’s not me, because there’s a God out there inflicting punishment on me, and I’m fundamentally good.” Or, “It’s not me because the Serpent beguiled me, that is, tricked me into doing the bad thing”. Those of us of the male persuasion have taken it even further: “SHE did it! The woman beguiled me and I did eat.” (What kind of man blames the woman for being Evil? Weak mother-fucker!)

So if we look inside ourselves and find Evil, what does that do to us? What does that mean? It means we have a choice. That’s a good thing! We have freedom, and responsibility. Freedom and responsibility are fundamental aspects of existence. To be aware is to be free and responsible. The very notion of “being” includes freedom and responsibility, because otherwise we’re just a function, a consequence, an epiphenomenon of someone else’s being. “THEY are free and responsible, and I’m just along for the ride.” No, that won’t do! You can go that way if you want, but you’re just fooling yourself. You are beguiling yourself like the Serpent in the Garden, which ends up being a weird circular self-deception that ends, as everything ends, with your own freedom and responsibility, and the necessity of making a choice.

Choice

You can choose to go out or you can choose to go in. To go out is to be connected to everything. To go in is to be isolated from everything. Both have their charms! It is only in isolation that you can experience the individuation that results in a particular life. To be connected to everything ultimately leads to BEING everything, which is the same as being nothing because there’s nothing to compare with. Which is cool! Everything needs to be nothing, part of the time, otherwise we don’t know that we’re being something when that time comes around.

You have to look at yourself to understand why you have chosen as you did to arrive here. You need to look at your history, and then you need to look at your eternity. When we’re young, it’s the history that matters — what is happening in time. As we get older, we can remember the eternity from which we came. We can see what it is that we are a reflection of. If we’re watching carefully, this gives us a good basis on which to make further choices, about where we want to be next.

When we’re faced with a moral choice, we should choose good, but we don’t have to. Maybe we’ll choose evil. That’s what freedom is, isn’t it? The ability to choose evil if we want?

What does evil mean? I guess it means acting without consciousness of the effect of our actions on others — other people, other beings. If we act without consciousness of the effect of our actions, then we’re imposing the contours of our being on the landscape of existence, rather than acting in accordance with what is already there. We can see from experience (like the recent history of the world) that ignoring the landscape leads to suffering and destruction. Therefore, evil leads to suffering and destruction.

Why would we choose that? There must be a reason, because we do see people choosing it. Maybe it’s simply an upscaling of the predatory instinct which drives life on Earth. Because life on Earth is about predation. Life lives on life! Ameobas eat protozoa. Fish eat plants and other fish. Birds eat fish. Wolves eat sheep. Lions eat gazelles. Humans eat cows, pigs, and just about anything we can get our hands on. Life sacrifices itself so that other life can live.

So when we choose to eat an animal, are we being evil? Are we acting “without consciousness of the effect of our actions?” I think it depends on the context. From the little I know about indigenous people, I think they act with consciousness of the effect of their actions, even when they’re killing something to eat it. I have heard third-hand of ceremonies offered in respect for the beings they are consuming for sustenance. This is true of both plants and animals, I believe.

Sacrifice

So we can kill and consume — i.e. act as predators — without being evil if we act with respect. That is, if we acknowledge the reciprocal relationship between ourselves and what we are consuming. But the flip side is that we must be ready to sacrifice ourselves so that other life can live, and that’s where modern humans — Homo Colossus — falls down. We want it only one way. We expect everything in the world to sacrifice itself for us, but we don’t want to sacrifice for anything. We put ourselves above the world and beyond the world, where we can’t be touched, while everything comes under our dominion. (Notice, of course, that this is the description of the Biblical “God,” the archetypal White Man, who is above and outside the world and cannot be touched by anything within the world. That’s why “God” is conceived this way, to justify our own evil ways with regard to the rest of the world.)

So to choose good is to choose to be conscious of the effects of our actions on other beings. This leads inevitably to the necessity of sacrifice on our part so that other life can live. (And here is the hidden truth and meaning of the Biblical “Jesus,” who became incarnate in the world, thus breaching the untouchability of “God,” and thus becoming a sacrifice on behalf of all humankind.)

So when you choose, choose good. Choose to sacrifice your life so that other life can live. Mix in with the whole community of life, who are engaged in an ongoing orgy of living and sacrifice for living. Do not try to isolate yourself, above and outside the world, like “God.” That leads to suffering, death, and destruction, and a perversion of what life should be. That’s why it’s evil! 

Don’t choose evil, because then you are requiring more sacrifice from everyone else to make up for you not being conscious of the effects of your actions on others. If you persist in choosing evil, you will require more and more sacrifice from others. If you choose ultimate evil, total and complete evil, you will require total and complete sacrifice of everything and everybody elsewhere in the universe. You can rely on the fact that everyone will willingly sacrifice themselves for you, because by the time you’ve gotten to be ultimately evil, everyone else is ultimately good, as a matter of balance.

But where does that leave you? Alone, that’s where it leaves you! Alone to the point that all the energy of the universe is concentrated in your thinking mind, which is not really built to handle that magnitude of flux. You’ve heard of Hell? That’s Hell. I suggest you don’t want to be there.

But of course, it’s up to you.

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