good as beneficence is different from utility and happiness completely. Happiness belongs to the subject (person who is able to make decisions) himself, while good and evil are characteristics of actions between people. Good and evil, instead of happiness, is the moral criterion of society. Murder and drug trafficking are actions for happiness of the subject, but not agree with virtues.
Confucius noted that the meaning of beneficence is “to love others”. Adam Smith said, “Concern for our own happiness recommends to us the virtue of prudence; concern for that of other people, the virtue of justice and beneficence.”14 The virtues (like wisdom, bravery, abstinence, hope and faith) are often used as instruments of selfishness in battles against others, though they can be used for beneficence, too.
Adam Smith said, “Nature, too, had taught us, that as the prosperity of two was preferable to that of one, that of many, or of all, must be infinitely more so.”15 Most emperors, however, considered their own happiness more important than the total happiness of public, and did not mind to sacrifice hundreds and thousands of lives for it. Good and justice are not surely come from nature.
Why do not we murder or fire? An important reason is our fear in mind, though each has good characters in nature. Fear to what? To punishment. Each good person may kill others on certain conditions like revenge or seeking to survive. History stories tell us that bad deeds, as well as good, may rebound upon the doer. That is why we advocate good. The idea of altruism is possible to emerge automati- cally, but it may disappear easily if not be encouraged. Peter Singer listed four reasons for not killing people (the effects of the killing on others; the frustration of the victim's desires and plans for the future; the capacity to conceive of oneself as existing over time; and respect for autonomy),16 but no one of them is able to stop Hitler from killing Jews. The only way is to resist force by force. Punishment is a kind of negative feedback, which is one of major tools to maintain the order of society. Army, police and the alarm of the Judgement Day are always necessary to guard justice.
Punishment is originally made when people resist others for their utility, not by leaders as Bentham said. The basic law of the world is the law of jungle, and there is no natural human right at all.
The original meanings of good and evil are their subjective meaning, which is the valuation on other people's actions for the benefit of the subject.
The subjective definition of good and evil:The good is the characteristic of other people's actions or consciousness which is favorable to the subject. The evil is the characteristic of other people's actions or consciousness which is harmful to the subject.
It is clear in the subjective definition that good and evil are valuations of subject as egoist without any objectivity in it. Where does the unified criterion of good and evil come from then? Everyone praises good and curses evil. Public opinion comes into being from everyone