Is it safe to equate 'less evil' to 'more good'?

We had a bit of a debate with this one. He, a native speaker (unlike me) went for:

"less evil" implies that you are comparing evil people and "more good" implies that you are comparing good people

I always felt that there's no difference. Am I on the minority of English speakers? Who is more correct between the two of us?

Solution 1:

It depends a little on how the expressions are used, but generally there is a distinct difference. Consider a sentence like:

Gandhi was less evil than Hitler.

If you aren't familiar with the persons in the sentence, or only familiar with Hitler, you would naturally assume that it's about two evil persons.

Solution 2:

Each expression carries a different implication.

If you're comparing, for example, different options for a brand new expensive car you would use positive language since all of the options are pretty favorable. You wouldn't say "this one isn't as bad as that one, so I'll pick it instead" you would say "this one is better." Even when making a negative statement about a car, you wouldn't say "this car is worse than the other one" so much as you would say "this car isn't as good."

Also expressions like "This isn't as bad as I expected" imply that the subject is not completely up to par with what would be considered "good."

Violating this rule is used for humor. Consider this conversation:

Person 1: How's the new boss?

Person 2: He's better than Hitler.

This means that this boss is so terrible that only Hitler could be favorably compared.

Solution 3:

The "one" you speak of is right. Less evil is, well, less evil. Still evil, just less so. Though "more good" doesn't really make sense in general, talking about a good character. "less good" would match "less evil" here, and would make sense in the context. And of course, less good doesn't mean evil.

"Less X" means you're talking about a sliding scale. With "good" and "evil" being opposite ends of this scale. And there's everything in between, so "less" of the extreme ends doesn't mean we're at the other end, just not at the very extreme of this end.

Compare "hot" and "cold". "Less hot" doesn't mean cold, does it? Just as "less cold" doesn't mean hot. It doesn't even have to mean "warm".