Ayrıntı Yayınları Modern Düşüncede Kötülük / Susan Neiman

In her book, "evil in modern thought," susan neiman offers a fresh perspective on the history of philosophy through the lens of the problem of evil. she argues that the core driving force of modern thought is embodied in this very question. furthermore, to uncover the relationship between the existence of meaning in the world and evil, it's necessary to trace the answers to certain questions: is there a connection between natural evils and moral evils? are natural disasters a punishment for immoral actions? is the suffering endured the result of a deserved punishment? is the source of evil vice? will divine justice eventually prevail? and is it possible to call the world we inhabit the best of all possible worlds?

All kinds of approaches presented will eventually reveal that evil is a matter of grasping the world.For example, while 18th century europeans considered the lisbon earthquake as proof of evil, they had a very different approach compared to today's people.From leibniz to hegel, many philosophers have sought to justify the existence of a world where evil exists, within the framework of these very questions.However, how can one possibly consider a world riddled with such conflict and suffering to be the creation of a flawless god?The efforts of these philosophers, contrary to what was hoped, weakened the power of god, accelerated by literary personalities such as pope, voltaire, marquis de sade.Now, it was time for nietzsche's argument to come to the surface: god is dead!The distinction between moral and natural evil, which began as a debate about how much of the world's suffering is god's fault and how much is ours, would only deepen from here on out.Neiman today emphasizes that we see evil as something related to human cruelty.As the most concrete example of this, auschwitz stands before us with all its terrifying appearance.While there has been so much talk about the lisbon earthquake that it has caused boredom, the fact that auschwitz has caused an odd silence among intellectuals is, above all, a reflection of this incomprehensibility.Indeed, neiman, in his effort to construct an alternative history of philosophy that he tries to realize in his book, seems to be chasing the answer that philosophy gives to the holocaust, which he considers the ultimate moral evil: should morality make evil understandable, or will understanding it make us more helpless?

"evil in modern thought is a good indicator of where we stand for us ""moderns"" who try to give meaning to life in pain between life and death."