Evil resists formal definition yet is easily recognized in everyday life

Evidence

At this level of thought, the notion of evil becomes difficult of definition or redundant. However, it is not always at this level of thought that ordinary people think about evil; in everyday thought, including that of psychologists, the notion of evil is alive and well. It may not be easy to define, but none of us have much trouble recognizing it. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 3865

Categorization

• QUESTION: If evil is easy to recognize but hard to define, what extraction from cases drives recognition — and would that recognition generalise across cultures?
• XREF: Connects to the recognition-without-definition paradox familiar from art (I know it when I see it) and from prototype theory in cognitive psychology. — connects to: Concepts with real histories resist definition; only the historyless are definable. — Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean, The Spivak Reader: Selected Works of…, 992