The pursuit of comfort has become one of the most fundamental orientations of modern humanity. The increasing options that simplify daily life reduce physical boundaries while also loosening mental and ethical ones. Thus, comfort gradually transforms from merely a standard of living into a value judgment, beginning to shape our behaviors. However, this tendency can leave deep impacts across a wide spectrum, from psychological health to the moral balance of social structure. We spoke with Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan about the effects of increasing conformist approaches on human nature, moral decisions, social structure, and how they pave the way for the normalization of evil!
You state that evil is nourished by conformist tendencies. In this context, how can the concept of “evil” you mentioned be defined? Which behaviors or tendencies should be evaluated within this scope?
In human nature, there are both evil and good parts simultaneously, malignant and benevolent. The two are in balance. According to the law of behavioral entropy, there is a dynamic balance of opposites between good and evil. That is, there is no darkness, only the absence of light. There is no cold, only the absence of heat. Similarly, there is no evil, only the absence of good. When thought of this way, a ground for increasing evils needs to be formed. One such ground is conformism. That is, choosing to live easily, comfortably, and indulgently, without effort or fatigue.
The physical health equivalent of this situation is obesity. Failing to maintain eating discipline is linked to a lack of goal awareness. When a person's inner discipline regarding eating is disrupted, physical obesity and growth occur. Similarly, humans also have psychological obesity. Psychological obesity manifests as greed, insatiability, irresponsibility, and boundlessness. Someone in this state always thinks of their own interests, only their own pleasures, lives only for themselves, and sees only things that disturb their comfort as threats.
You state that today we are facing psychological and physical problems that feed evil and are defined as “comfort diseases.” Could you explain the concept of “comfort diseases” in a bit more detail?
There are three main symptoms to say that a person has caught the comfort disease. The first is a person's aimlessness; that is, if a person wakes up in the morning without a purpose, without a plan for the future, this person does not program their brain. The programming of our brain belongs to our consciousness. The brain plans the day and the future. The person, in turn, performs a psycho-SWOT analysis related to this.
For example, in resource management, all business managers teach SWOT analysis. What is SWOT analysis? It is for a person to know their strengths and weaknesses; to understand the threats and opportunities awaiting them. But when evaluating this, they must also have goals, strategies, and a vision. Just as financial resources are managed with a vision, goals, and strategy, and a SWOT analysis is performed, when managing a person's psychological resources, they also need to think in a goal and strategy-oriented way; set medium, long, and short-term goals and get to know themselves in opposition to these. Then, on the path they have drawn, they need to analyze, plan, and time the threats and opportunities awaiting them. When a person fails to do this, they enter the most significant area of conformism.
Our brain's operating system is a common feature in all living beings. The brain operates with a survival focus. Eating, drinking, reproducing, and sheltering are common features of the brain in all living beings. For humans, there is also a survival-oriented operation, but humans also have a network called the Default Mode Network (DMN). This network is a meaning-seeking network in the human brain. That is, beyond eating, drinking, and reproducing, what is the meaning of the work I do here? What is my position here in nature? What kind of dream should I have? This only exists in humans. For example, if you think of a dog's dream world, it's always chasing bones, chasing food. You look at a bird, food. All are like this. But when we look at the human dream world, it changes from person to person because humans are beings in search of meaning. For this reason, someone who is aimless contracts the disease of comfort, or conformism.
The second is meaninglessness. There are two kinds of meaning: secular, worldly meanings and transcendental, spiritual meanings. That is, meanings related to the afterlife. A person merely chasing pleasure is sufficient to fall into the comfort trap. In such situations, what should be done? To avoid falling into the comfort disease, instead of only material, hedonistic, pleasure-oriented goals, meaning-oriented goals should also be adopted. Engaging with music, art, and science are also beautiful. However, these meanings do not alleviate a person's existential anxiety. To alleviate a person's existential crisis, they need to spiritually resolve the uncertainty in their mind regarding supernatural reality and creation. Humans are beings who cannot tolerate uncertainty. A person wants to fit everything into a logical definition and framework within their brain's meaning network. When they fail to do this, they can take the easy way out and fall into pleasure traps.
A third characteristic of comfort disease is a person's indulgence in luxury. Those who are fond of luxury also fall into the conformism disease. Because they consider themselves worthy of the best, their sense of contentment is low, and they always want more. As a result, easiness, indulgence in luxury, and laziness emerge. That is, currently, one of the most important causes of laziness is conformism. These people try to live by freeloading off others. They consume without producing. If someone else starves to death, they say, “What's it to me?” Most people who say, “Let the snake that doesn't touch me live a thousand years” are those who have fallen into conformism, or comfort disease, wanting to achieve things without effort or fatigue. Indulgence in luxury is also one of the conformism diseases. For this reason, simplicity should be chosen as a life purpose.
Can the need for comfort also be considered a protective part of human nature at some point? At what point does this need begin to weaken an individual's development, social responsibilities, or ethical sensitivity? How can we maintain healthy boundaries in the pursuit of comfort?
Within humans, there is what we call the "bad part," a greedy, insatiable part that wants things immediately. That is, there is a self-serving section. This part highly exalts comfort. It is a human tendency for a person to achieve things in life without effort and without too much difficulty. However, this must be within ethical limits. A person does not have the right to harm others or to freeload off others.
Good, right, and beautiful things often disrupt comfort. But if a person has a goal, they can achieve the comfort that comes from success and reaching that goal as they realize it. Therefore, from their perspective, conformism and happiness are not the same. The word 'peace' refers to a comfort that makes one feel secure about their future. After a person has made their medium and long-term plans and become part of a greater meaning, the conformism in that person is a healthy indulgence in comfort. Thus, we cannot say that conformism is entirely bad or entirely good.
Can the tendency to adapt to evil be explained solely by the desire for comfort? In your opinion, why have we adapted to evil? Does the desire to conform to social structure also contribute to this process?
Of course, conformism is just one of dozens of reasons for adapting to evil. Along with this, a person's other narcissistic tendencies, such as hastiness, impatience, selfishness, and opportunism, are among these reasons. The main reason that leads to evil is a person's hedonism. Second is selfishness. Third is unhappiness. When these three are together, a person tends to be troubled, unhappy, and pleasure-seeking.
Because one is unhappy, brain chemicals decrease. The search for pleasure begins. The brain wants to increase chemicals like serotonin, dopamine, and noradrenaline. So, if a person cannot find healthy ways or methods to increase these, what do they do? They turn to pleasure centers. Some lean towards entertainment, some towards alcohol, some towards substance use. In this way, they try to satisfy the pleasure-related areas of the brain. However, because this situation is like bribing the brain, the brain always wants more and is never satisfied. For this reason, conformism harms people and encourages lying. Such individuals can easily lie for their comfort. In conformism, there is an approach that "anything can be done to achieve the goal." There is an approach of not complying with social norms and rules. Due to these approaches, conformism feeds all evils.
Can the question “How can we get along?” be decisive not only in interpersonal relationships but also in terms of different social groups with different mindsets living together? How can such an approach function to reduce discrimination, soften social polarization, and make it easier for individuals to find their place? Does this question have the potential to create intellectual resistance against conformist tendencies and evil?
One of the most important characteristics of conformism is that it weakens social bonds. Loneliness emerges at the end of conformism. Because loneliness emerges, a person lives only according to their own desires and interests. They say, “What benefits me is good, what does not benefit me is bad.” Their life philosophy changes. Such individuals, being egocentric, cannot empathize. They cannot read the feelings of others. Their emotional literacy is low. For this reason, people are with them when they are powerful, but abandon them and become lonely when they lose power. So, we can say that a significant portion of individuals who become lonely when they lose their authority or health are conformist people.
Awareness is the most important thing here; individuals with an ego ideal can manage their comfort. We need to have an ego ideal. “What kind of person do I want to be when I reach the end of my life? What kind of mark do I want to leave? How do I want to be remembered?” Someone who answers these questions thinks of their goal, not their comfort. A student being conformist means not studying, being lazy, and getting caught up in entertainment. What happens then? They cannot pass the exam; they lose. Those who work hard win. Therefore, the result of conformism is laziness. Laziness, in turn, causes a person to fail in global competition and within their living environment. As a result, the unsuccessful person's self-confidence drops, and they become lonely. Furthermore, such individuals may become aggressive to achieve results.
Individuals can compromise their values over time to avoid losing their comfort. This situation, in turn, can lead to greater disharmony or silent evils at a societal level. How can we strengthen the necessary motivation, both personally and socially, for different personalities to live together in harmony and unite around a common purpose?
For a common purpose, people of different temperaments, if they act together, can divide tasks and establish healthy horizontal relationships. They turn the system they work in into a learning organization. That is, they turn society into a living mechanism. Thus, both the leader and other employees learn. But this happens only if there is a common goal. In such situations, people who think only of their own comfort are excluded.
The smallest learning organization is the family. Both parents learn, and children learn. If the learning organizational mechanism in that family works, everyone learns together. No one tries to dominate anyone else. They can establish horizontal relationships. When mistakes happen, something is learned from those mistakes, and people can come together and work for common goals. Then the pleasure of producing surpasses the pleasure of comfort. The pleasure of comfort is momentary and short-term, but the meaning derived from producing, adding meaning to life, and being useful to other people brings more happiness.
At the top of Maslow's hierarchy of psychosocial needs is not the need for self-actualization, but the need for "self-transcendence." Self-transcendence means not working only for oneself. This is, in fact, the formula for happiness. That is, being happy by making others happy. Making others happy by helping them and fulfilling that need by dreaming and taking steps related to self-transcendence... For this reason, conformism erodes and corrupts values. For values not to decay, a person must focus not on short-term pleasures and satisfactions within that group, but on medium and long-term pleasures and satisfactions. Short-term pleasure says, "Let me eat, drink, not work, let's party." But the medium-to-long-term goal says, "Let me experience this difficulty for a year, then make this investment, produce this, achieve this." The pleasure derived from a person thinking about their medium and long-term success surpasses the pleasure provided by conformism. Therefore, instead of saying conformism is bad and prohibiting it, it is necessary to teach people to think about medium and long-term pleasures. Values should be managed in this way.