Why do humans everywhere distinguish between right and wrong, good and evil?

The capacity to distinguish right and wrong, good and evil, is basic to being a human being. We can't talk without claiming that one thing is good and another bad, or that we should or shouldn't do something. This is probably because we must constantly choose a course of action and justify it for ourselves and others.

The problem is to arrive at correct answers on matters of right and wrong, good and evil. These correct answers cannot be matters of opinion, i.e., personal preference, whether individual or collective opinion. They must objectively exist and be objectively verifiable, which means that they must depend on an intelligence with authority over all humans. This intelligence can only be the one true and living God, the Creator who made us and to whom we are responsible.

Cheers,

Bruce

It is because humans are stuck in a Dualistic existence. There is a dual for everything! There is a predisposed natural instinct to make sense of the world by creating dualities, but some cultures, such as Western culture, encourages, even brainwashes people that the duality of life is truly all there is. Some other cultures (mainly cultures that Eurocentrists have wiped out or have been persecuting), there is the spiritual, social and philosophical understanding that all is One, despite the duality we exist in.

Here is a list of dualities some people exist in:

Right and Wrong

Life and Death

Up and Down

Right Wing and Left Wing (politics)

Tall and Short

Fat and Skinny

Democrats and Republicans

Demons and Angels

Light and Dark

Day and Night

Open and Shut

Creative and Logical

Male and Female

Left and Right

Good and Evil

It is truly bliss living beyond duality, where all is One.

The results speak for themselves. If a child sticks his hand in a fire, that's bad. If he holds his cold hands close to the fire, but doesn't put them in the flames, that's good. He learns from that experience.

And so it goes throughout our lives.

That's why.

Add: The teaching of what is right and wrong comes also from others whom we trust (whether that trust is justified or not). And from those others, we attach labels, like good and evil, right or wrong.

You forgot to mention that different things are considered right and wrong and good and evil in different places. In the US, stoning a woman for adultery is considered wrong, in other parts of the world, it's considered right.

Humans like two-sided arguments; a black and white universe... ignoring that the universe is almost entirely a cascade of greys and grays.

right and wrong are not the same thing as good and evil.

Right and wrong can be judged by cause and effect. "good" and "evil" are arbitrary, man-made constructs which can themselves be the very reverse of what they claim.

One learns of these concepts, yes; but I also believe that these are in-born constructs that can be modified. They are self-serving and self-preserving no doubt: be kind and nice to others so that they will return the favor.

They don't. Do you think it's right to publicly flog people for getting caught holding hands in public (some cultures do). How about cutting ones hand off for simply stealing a loaf of bread? (some cultures do). How about cannibalism? Do you think it's right to cut little girls clits off (FGM)? (some cultures do).

They are separate in and of themselves!