Kenneth McKendrick

And we're seeing some responses to that catastrophe which is unfolding.

that are very unpleasant in many kinds of ways right we're seeing certain kinds of politics that are emerging that are very divisive and you know not really interested all in communication and that kind of stuff so philosophically and scientifically we know more about how we use words and how the brain is constructed and how social worlds are constructed we know a lot more about that but

even when we know about those things, that doesn't necessarily release us from the temptation of making use of that information in ways like... One of the things my evil course is really good for, for example, is business advertising.

Because as soon as you heard that we're clean and dirty, you're just like, as an advertiser, if I can sell purity, I'm going to be able to sell anything.

So if I can describe someone in terms that someone will...

recognize as disgusting and have them stick, we can get rid of that person.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

Like if we can convince someone that so-and-so is evil, then we don't have to take them seriously anymore.

We just can ignore them or we can wipe them away.

Right.

And it's horrible when we see ourselves doing it.

And it's horrible when we see other people doing it to us, when we see sort of populations vilified in these kinds of ways and described in these kinds of ways.

And

unfortunately, we're seeing a lot of it.

And so fortunately for me, it keeps me in business because people are super interested in the topic of evil because it's confronted them on a daily basis.

And it doesn't seem to matter how much more we know about cognitive processes and development and evolution and all of these kinds of things.

It's still getting used.

It's used in marketing.

It's used by political parties.