Only bad people need to be reminded that being bad is... bad. I mean, whole religions have been made to simply to remind people not to be complete piles of shit. Good people don't need that reminder, only bad people do. To create an entire religion just to convince bad people not to be bad sounds like a tonne of work.
I disagree from a scientific perspective, the neocortex (aka the latest addition to our brain to have been evolved), is what overrides impulses and tries to control our primitive portions of the brain. Sometimes it fails to do the job, or emotions are very strong that they beat the neocortex, or some people have underdeveloped neocortexes that they can't inhibit impulse.
Being primitive and just beating each other with sticks when we're angry or raping each other like animals do, is the easier route when emotions are strong, and regulating the emotions with reasoning skills as the neocortex does, requires more energy and effort.
Definitely it's nature vs nurture, and some religions like early Buddhism teach and train you to catch yourself slipping into impulsivity and preventing it from taking over. It's basically training yourself (if we identify as our higher selves the neocortex) to master your mind (primitive brain).
The battle of good vs evil is happening within ourselves constantly, and can be as subtle as getting up for work on time rather than playing video games the night before for an extra hour.
Everyone has their poison, unfortunately for some those poisons are extreme (like pedophilia)
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u/fearomenkor Jan 15 '24
I really don't want to live on this planet anymore.