Talk 2: Can Evil Explain Monstrous Acts?, by Fong Wai Mung (28th October 2010, 3-4pm)

Philosophy Seminar Series: 28 October 2010, 3-4pm, AS3-05-23;
Speaker: Fong Wai Mung, Current MA Student, NUS;
Moderator: Dr. Christopher Brown

MungAbstract: Y: “Why did X perform this monstrous act?” Z: “Because he is evil.”  Has Z actually answered Y’s question by invoking the idea of evil?  In other words, can the idea of evil perform explanatory work? Eve Garrard thinks that it can with her account of evil.  She defends a secular, motive-based theory of evil in ‘Evil as an Explanatory Concept’.  She holds that the notion of evil is not necessarily something mysterious beyond the reach of human understanding as is often the case in religious context where evil is associated with the metaphysical or the satanic.  People who have no belief in the Devil, she contends, can understand the evil actions of an agent in terms of the reasons which the agent takes there to be (or not to be) for acting so.  This is what, on her view, gives the notion of evil explanatory force.  I attempt to evaluate whether Garrard has succeeded in giving a cogent account.

About the Speaker: Wai Mung is currently pursuing a M.A. in philosophy at NUS.  Her interests include philosophy of religion and moral philosophy.

More information on the Graduate Seminar Series can be found here.

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