The Forsaken, for the most part, have become intoxicated by exposure to the Dark One. You can refer to any section of the book in which Lanfear, Ishamael, Demandred, Graendal or Moghedien is in the Dark One's presence - they feel exhilarated and drunk with the power It offers to them. That is largely why there reasons make no sense - they are being manipulated and in many ways are in too deep to escape; Asmodean, once he was separated from the Dark One and fell from favor, started to feel something like regret. To put it bluntly, there is a reason why the most bright and intelligent among the Chosen had such flimsy reasons for joining the Dark One, and most of their defections were related to a rejection of the AoL's societal morals or quite simply going insane. Rand/Lews Therin came close to this in TGS and we all saw how unbalanced his state of mind was in that book. You don't need to understand WHY a person wants something; all you need to is convince them you can provide it. That is sufficient. After that, the person themselves provides the necessary justifications that creates the excesses the Forsaken are famous for. This is why the Forsaken demonstrate such blatant holes in their logic - the most intelligent note that they really don't know what the Dark One wants, that the Dark One often lies and that he uses people...yet in the same breath/thought, they think that the Dark One promised them something and the Dark One would not betray them:



Rand/Lews Therin is not incorruptible. There is nothing that could be further from the truth. The problem is that the Dark One has nothing that Rand/Lews Therin really wants - Rand wanted love and safety for his loved ones; the only way the DO can offer anything in regards to that would be to capture them and threaten him with their safety, which was indeed the goal of the Shadow in the first few books.

And I disagree with you about animals. This is exactly why experienced animal handlers and trainers tend to say you can't understand animals, and why you always need to be careful because you can't predict what they'd do. Why? Because they aren't humans, and have different processes and animal impulses that can be triggered by things humans are not sensitive to. There is that story/saying about the dog that bit the hand that fed it, and others, that refer to this.

I wanted to add that I see your point, but I think we are coming from opposite positions here and in various topics related to the discussions generated from the question.