Morning Scepticism: Evil

How many truly evil people do you know? Perhaps you could name people who have some disturbing traits, but I'm going to guess that no-one you know is truly evil. I think this is something important to reflect on, when thinking about anything that has to do with agency think about people. I think two things stem from this: first that cartoonish evil is best reserved for comic books, and second if someone does something horrible I'd be willing to bet that its often the case that the horrible action stemmed from an intention to do good. Security measures might seem draconian and malevolent (after all, the government IS spying on its citizens) but I'm betting the reason for it is the perception that doing so would prevent future atrocities. Likewise I think the terrorists aren't evil, but fighting for what they see as the good. Those promoting vaccines and those trying to stop vaccine use are both doing so to protect life, go figure!