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Sep 18 2008, 11:21 PM EDT (current) bwmgal
Sep 7 2008, 4:15 PM EDT dforsyth

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When will an act, a thought, or a motive be characterized as immoral rather than moral? Why do people act in ways that others think are unethical? Are ethics based on rational thought, emotion, or intuition? When is an action judged to be evil rather than good and what causes people to act in such negative ways? This project, rather than offering prescriptive answers to these questions—for example, a good act is one that is consistent with the highest moral principles or an act is only altruistic if done sole for the purpose of benefiting others—takes a descriptive approach to good and evil by exploring the personal and interpersonal factors that influence moral thought, action, emotion, and motivation. The analysis will, in all cases, rely on conceptual approaches that have been supported by empirical research relevant to the moral phenomena of interest. However, before examining specific forms of good and bad behavior, we must consider a number of basic conceptual issues, such as "What is the definition of the word evil?" "Is evil a sufficiently scientific term" and "What are the consequences of studying negative and positive actions--does explaining evil condone it?"