Well, just to clarify I don't think it's exactly unreasonable to make a moral judgement about anything you want to. Morality is ultimately not a rational process.. What I would say is wrong is acting on those moral judgements in certain ways.
I disagree in two ways; 1. I think that morality is LARGELY a rational process, morals being largely defined by one's cultural, religious and familial background, and informed by whatever information is available to them. That people get very emotional about their moral values is another matter.
2. Acting on moral judgements in 'certain ways' is vague, but I'd be willing to bet that we disagree on appropriate and inappropriate acts.
I won't say that the idea of a person who is wholely evil is absolutely impossible, but I don't think it's ever happened. I think maybe it comes down to a matter of definition. I certainly think there are people who are more bad than good. If you want to define that as an evil person that makes logical sense to me, though I wouldn't define it that way myself.
Here it can be a difficult line to draw, but I think everyone can and should be able to draw that line for themselves. I think that if a person is more bad than good, that the person is obviously not a good person. Does this make them a 'bad person?' You say no. I say yes.
In a self-defense situation, do you feel that someone has a right to kill their attacker if the attacker put the victim's life in danger?
Also I would add intention. I don't think someone who makes a terrible mistake is evil, which is a situation you can get into if you only consider the act.
Depends on the mistake, don't you think? If the mistake costs lives and/or immense property damage, then by their negligence or wilfull act an evil thing has happened. If they refuse to be held accountable for that mistake, THEN they are committing an evil act. In my opinion, living a life of CYA at the expense of others makes a person evil in a way, and should be treated as such.
To me, an evil person, or a good person is a sort of idealized concept that reality only approaches. For someone to be an evil person, they have to be completely and totally evil, both in action and in intent.
I disagree, because I believe that evil is the corruption of good. Whether the person's intent is only to secure riches for themself and their family is irrelevent if their actions result in the irrevocable loss of life or quality of life. I don't believe there is such a thing as a wholly good person, so setting a standard of absolute evil as a standard of evil is disingenuous for myself.
The reason I would define it this way is because generally when people talk about evil persons it tends to sound like they think the person is, in every way, scum.
Now if you ask them, they might say that they don't really think the person is ALL evil, but in practice it seems to work out that way. I think my definition works with the idea that a person does both good and evil, but is neither.
I can't deny that water-cooler conversation tends to be over-generalized and stereotypical. I generally don't contribute to that at work. If someone asks my opinion, I usually take a good half-hour answering it, since I try to draw more than a yes-or-no from them. I don't often get asked the same question by any of my co-workers, so the trade-off of not getting asked alot of questions is that I don't often have to repeat myself;)
In my mind this is not a helpful approach because it tends to make us ignore a person's positive qualities when we've already decided they don't have any. The same goes for the reverse. We're inclined to think that people we like and respect don't really have flaws. Either way is fairly unrealistic.
Wouldn't you agree that we also see the flipside of this? Consider recent biopics and books about controversial figures like Casius Clay, Kinsey, Yasser Arafat and Martin Luther King, Jr. How often do you hear about character flaws, or known deeds that are more often than not shoved under the rug? If a person is percieved as good, how often are they set up on a pedestal and washed of their sin for the 'greater good' of the causes they championed?
Another reason I define it this way is because often when people describe a person as evil, they seem to be talking about a characteristic that is inherent and unchanging in that person. I do not think this is true, and I think it locks us into a counterproductive mindset.. I believe almost all of could seem evil if the right pressures were placed on us. I also believe almost anyone who seems evil now could appear (or could have appeared) good given the right circumstances.
If a person is possessed of a character trait that has led to evil acts, then it is highly unlikely that they will redeem themselves at some point. Recidivism is high among those who have served time in prison. People who commit evil acts, and are not caught, often repeat them until they are caught. These are facts. I think that whether a person is good or evil relies largely upoin how they act under the right OR wrong circumstances. Circumstances define character. People define the perception of that character. OBL may be percieved as a leader and a good person among some middle-eastern people, but that does not change the fact that he has plotted murder and destruction and profited from such. He is an evil person, regardless of the warm and fuzzies some might get over how he acts towards his wives or children.
Hitler is the obvious example of someone who is evil. But I would argue that if he had been born at a different time, in a different place, he might have used his abilities in a way that we would consider great
But he wasn't and didn't. We only get one chance in life, Val, and I while I believe we should look at what a person had the potential to do, we must look at what a person does as the ultimate factor. Bill Clinton had great potential, but he bungled it. Was he a bad president? I don't think so, but I also don't think he was a good one, even though he could have been a great one.
A current example, is terrorism. Some people talk as if terrorists are these inhuman creatures that are nothing like us. Well I not only think that's untrue, I think it limits our options to frame it that way. When we aren't willing to think of them as people who are being immoral rather than people who fundamentally are immoral, we cut ourselves off from avenues that attack the circumstance.
I happen to think that someone who can murder an innocent person, or three thousand innocents, is inhuman, and nothing like me, and less than human. Does that mean that I am incapable of such? No. I am capable of great good and great evil, just like anyone else. But committing such acts would make me less than I am.
Please, dear readers, don't construe this to mean I think we can just talk with them and work it out, nothing of the sort. But to treat them and consider them to be unthinking animals is a mistake both intellectually and tactically, in my opinion. That's somewhat off-topic though, my appologies.
No apology necessary. I agree, to the extent that to diminish the enemy's intelligence and ability is a flawed way to approach the defeat of that enemy.
I think that ultimately either of our definitions work, though I would have to add motive to yours to be comfortable using it.
? Expand?
Banning gay marriage is the recent example, of course. 
