Does something have to be conscious to be evil?

Sounds like a silly question, right....

Well, what about the AIDS virus - that's not conscious, but seems pretty evil.

Is evil a characteristic that a person shows, or is it a pre-exisiting phenomenom which can attach to anything?

I just want to add that I certainly do not think that people with AIDS are evil. For a start, I don't know them all. Having said that, perhaps we're all inherently evil (me included!!). If one human is capable of unspeakable evil (e.g Hitler), then are we all? And does that make us all evil? It's such an interesting topic - I'm not sure what I think!

Depending on the moral theorist you're considering. Some like Augustine argue that evil is an absence of good. Sin being a rejection of the good. Evil, in this way is a human action, brought about by the fall of man from the garden of Eden. Other moral theorists consider evil in both a human sense and a utilitarian sense--that is, evil as a result which causes some harm. In this way a natural disaster, or as you say the AIDS virus, can be "evil."
Furthermore, by this axiom, evil can be a simple neglected duty--which does not have "evil" intent. For instance if you were to open a door too fast because you were in a hurry, and hit someone by your indescretion, your action could be considered "evil."
As to my own take, i view evil in terms of intent. I deem an action "evil" only in a human context where there is malicious will. In this way evil is only any human action which is done intently to remove some good from another entity. AIDS could only be evil, by my reconning, if it is spread intentionally, or someone who has it neglects to tell the people he or she sleeps with.

NO, look at George Bush..........

"Evil" is a concept that people have personified to make sense of and/or illustrate it.

So, no.

aids is not evil, it is a disease like cancer and tuberculous. You as an individual decide what is evil. some people think cats are evil, you think aids is evil or people with Aids?

Yes. Evil involves the intention of doing what you do, with the full understanding of the consequences.

Well...to call AIDS evil is actually an anthroporphism---assigning human attributes to non-human things (computers, plants, germs, etc).

It's also a metaphor. AIDS can be called evil because as a virus it causes harm and death to human beings.

But "to be evil" is a human characteristic. You must choose to take an action that is considered harmful or deceitful. A virus does not have the capacity to choose or make a decision. That is a nuance of language and what psychologists would call "projection"--we are projecting human capabilities to something that is non-human.

Make sense? So in a nutshell, to really be evil you have to be conscious. The AIDS virus is a deadly thing to be sure.

Evil is the privation of being. It doesn't "exist" and only is perceptible to us inasmuch as it has a parasitic relationship to what actually is...

I think evil people are very unappy. Because only very lonely, miserable and unfortunate people can be evil. They are people who didn't know love, frienship or ohter things of that kind. So when I meet such people I feel sorry about them.

In order for something to be evil it has to make a concious choice. So yes it has to be concious and in my opinion it has to be human. Places and things may be termed evil but it is because of the people who are associated with them.

no i dont believe so. if someones throws a ball and accidentally brakes a vase, the ball is'nt evil for commiting the deed, its just doing what its made to do....fly around the air and bounce around. anyways i believe that evil is in the eye in the beholder. The holocaust was evil to every jew in the world, but to the nazi's it was purging their land of the wrong, now i'm not supporting the holocaust or anything, i thought it was terrible....oops, got a little off track! sorry! :)
Good Question Though!

Hello:

I am of the opinion that the thing that can make an act good or evil is intentionality of the act, which is to say that the one that acts could have acted otherwise; They have that ability to choose. This does not judge the motivations of their choices specifically, but rather uses their point of choice as the deciding factor.

A hurricane cannot be evil because it does not choose to happen, but rather conditions force it to happen. This might then raise the question...if people made choices that enabled the conditions that forces the hurricane then how does this shade those actions as less moral? Similarly HIV and AIDS cannot be evil (as far as we know) because it does not choose its victims, however the same questions can be raised (more directly than in the hurricane example as that there are generally 2 people involved and very often less then six billion).

Your real question is what is evil. Evil is to hurt another sentient creature. To do it with malice is a greater evil.

I hope this helps.

Rev Phil

I think consciousness is a requirement of evil. No virus in and of itself is "evil," they're just what they are. AIDS is a horrible disease to be afflicted with, but to be evil, it would have to be selective and intentional (only infecting certain people no matter who else was exposed), and it's not.
AIDS can certainly be used as a tool for evil, but so can a rock. Would a rock being thrown at someone's head make that rock evil? No, not even if that action resulted in a death. The rock can't be evil.
The AIDS virus does what it does to survive, it doesn't know it's killing it's host. It's actually a bad situation for the virus too, once the host dies, it dies. It's a result of contained over-consuming, if you will (side note: people should learn a lesson here and stop over-consuming Earth's resources, or we're not going to have a place to live either).

Only a being with consciousness can make a moral decision. AIDS is deadly, not evil. And that's that. If the virus claims I am wrong, let him sue me. :-) And, by the way, evil is not a characteristic. Being evil is a choice.