The Roots of Evil - Softcover

Kekes, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0801473810 ISBN 13: 9780801473814

Publisher: Cornell University Press, 2007

Synopsis

"Evil is the most serious of our moral problems. All over the world cruelty, greed, prejudice, and fanaticism ruin the lives of countless victims. Outrage provokes outrage. Millions nurture seething hatred of real or imagined enemies, revealing savage and destructive tendencies in human nature. Understanding this challenges our optimistic illusions about the effectiveness of reason and morality in bettering human lives. But abandoning these illusions is vitally important because they are obstacles to countering the threat of evil. The aim of this book is to explain why people act in these ways and what can be done about it."―John Kekes

The first part of this book is a detailed discussion of six horrible cases of evil: the Albigensian Crusade of about 1210; Robespierre's Terror of 1793–94; Franz Stangl, who commanded a Nazi death camp in 1943–44; the 1969 murders committed by Charles Manson and his "family"; the "dirty war" conducted by the Argentinean military dictatorship of the late 1970s; and the activities of a psychopath named John Allen, who recorded reminiscences in 1975. John Kekes includes these examples not out of sensationalism, but rather to underline the need to hold vividly in our minds just what evil is. The second part shows why, in Kekes's view, explanations of evil inspired by Christianity and the Enlightenment fail to account for these cases and then provides an original explanation of evil in general and of these instances of it in particular.

About this title

About the Author

John Kekes is the author of many books, most recently The Illusions of Egalitarianism and The Art of Life, both from Cornell.

From the Back Cover

"Evil is here defined as harm in excess and examined with the lucidity and clarity that distinguish John Kekes's books. His focus is on the thrill of evil, and his examples are stunning. This is a work of philosophy for every serious reader."--Harvey C. Mansfield, Professor of Government, Harvard University

"This is a wonderful book. The writing is beautifully clear, brisk, and memorable. The organization of the argument is excellent, and the surefootedness and balance throughout are admirable. John Kekes provides a thoroughly secular account of the nature and sources of evil as opposed to ordinary wrongs."--Lawrence Becker, author of A New Stoicism

Edition details

• Publisher: Cornell University Press
• Publication date: 2007
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0801473810
• ISBN 13: 9780801473814
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 278