The influence of gaslight or electric light on the growth of paraheliotropic trees

If evil involves (at its Kantian basic) the failure to recognize individuals as ends worthy of dignity, instead using them as only means, then a Collective Identity which de-emphasizes individuality may make us far more likely to make this cognitive choice.

Then, the fact that humans are social creatures capable of being partially or wholly subsumed into a Collective Identity (which function relies on our Rich Imaginative Construction of Identity, where our Minds Adrift and Strange have a large say in constructing our conception of who and what we are) will naturally lead to the great possibility of evil.

However, a militant rejection of Collective Identity may also lead one to evil, in that we begin to focus on the difference between our self and everyone else instead of the commonality of consciousness.

(Musings inspired by Wikipedia’s discussion of Philip Zimbardo’s book The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil.)

The fact that we live in a world of relative good and relative bad, or, to use the cliche, myriad shades of grey, should not lead us to accept the conclusion that grey is all there is. Grey being the mixture of white and black, black, in this metaphor, absolute evil, exists as the a priori concept that brings darkness, evil, pain, what have you into the world.

(Of course, the possibility of this argument should not be taken as dispositive. It is equally possible that gray is a color, the only color, and there is no absolute a priori morality, only strategies based on contingencies responding to varying degrees of fellow-feeling, developed by experience, evolution, and temperament.)