section_path: Abstract
section_name: Abstract
paragraph_text: In philosophy, religion, and psychology, " good and evil " is a common dichotomy. In religions with Manichaean and Abrahamic influence, evil is perceived as the dualistic antagonistic opposite of good, in which good should prevail and evil should be defeated. Taoist philosophies typically perceive the world through a dualistic cosmological lens, where this dichotomy is a central concept, and often symbolized by the taijitu, commonly known as the "yin-yang".
  
  Evil is often used to denote profound immorality. Evil has also been described as a supernatural force. Definitions of evil vary, as does the analysis of its motives. However, elements that are commonly associated with evil involve unbalanced behavior involving expediency, selfishness, ignorance, or negligence.
  
  The principal study of good and evil (or morality) is ethics, of which there are three major branches: normative ethics concerning how we ought to behave, applied ethics concerning particular moral issues, and metaethics concerning the nature of morality itself.