What is evil?

People ask me a lot about evil, as if I'm some sort of expert. I tell them that I don't have any special insight into evil, or even a sense of its definition. But I'm curious too, and I like that people are asking the question. What is evil? So asks the co-hosts on this podcast from the "Kitchen Shrinks".  They're a little silly and a lot redundant, but it's an interesting topic. Highlights (largely paraphrased) include:

• Starts with a discussion of Zimbardo and Stanford prison experiment
• "You put anybody in the situation where they are to control others -- you give them the role of authoritarian -- and all of us might be influenced to act in an aggressive way towards those prisoners given the same circumstances."
• The first thing that anyone thinks when they hear about someone doing something terrible is -- that's not like me. They're a bad person, I'm a good person. There's something inherently wrong with them, about them particularly and their lack of a soul that makes them evil or different from me. The whole idea that the role is critical (not that there are just some people that are evil), was new -- that you could put a "good" person in the right circumstances and have them act in evil ways was groundbreaking.
• If I can say that it's those people and them, not by me. What is disquieting is if I was in the same situation, would I be compelled to do evil as well? It's not as simple as there are some bad people or evil people, it's that all of us can act evilly in the right circumstances.
• Milgram discussion starts around 11:30. "We could create murderers under the right circumstances." "Milgram was shocked and even quite troubled by the experiment."
• "If you want to essentially be someone who does not engage in troubling behaviors, watch your environment. Watch for the things that push or pull you to do certain things. Become more aware of what the situation is asking you to do." To do that, you have to humble yourself enough to admit that you are capable of doing something bad to someone else. "Admit that we're all capable of doing evil things."
• Discussion of how the "exit costs" are high for bucking social norms, even when the social norm is something "bad" like college pranks. One host discussed how the mob mentality can make someone lose track of who they are because "it would have been to expensive socially to say no."
• "Would you want to be held accountable for every behavior you ever did?"
• When someone else does something wrong its their disposition, when you did something wrong it's your situation.
• How to get someone to do something evil? (1) Authority figure (2) Dehumanize the victim by making them a "thing," perhaps by giving them a label like "witch" (Paul Deen?) (3) Diffuse responsibility, e.g. by trying to detach oneself from actions by just fulfilling a role or being anonymous.
• Zimbardo "Evil begins at 15 volts" when you first start, when you let the camel get its nose under the tent. The tendency to act in an evil way happens in little increments.
• "These human beings, we're going to call them terrorists, we're going to change the language. They're not people anymore, they're evil." "That's not a human being, that's a threat."

They also have a feature on sociopath vs. psychopath.