The excellent nature of teeth comes from the microstructure of the material they are made of. They are not homogenous like cement used in construction work. It is composed of various different layers such as enamel, dentine, and cementum which are formed by enamel prisms and dentine tubules. This structure of the teeth is the source of inspiration for the produced restorations. Since an exact imitation is aimed, in addition to other properties, the microstructure of the teeth also needs to be imitated.

When the general structure of the teeth is investigated, it is observed that there are two major components: organic and inorganic structures. The filling material, referred to as composite, must be in the color of the tooth and must contain the same type of structure. The filling material in the composite increases the resistance of the restoration and has the same function of the mineral hydroxyapatite in the enamel. In the composite, resin matrix takes the place of the organic matrix in the enamel. Up to this point, everything seems fine but the images of scanning electron microscope (SEM) showing the cross sections portray the trivial difference between the composite and the natural tooth. The homogenous, ordinary appearance of the filling and the astonishingly embellished tooth are very easy to differentiate.

There are prerequisites that make tooth restoration successful. We can summarize these as esthetics, functionality, and phonation. These properties are affected with the loss of the tooth or the structure of the tooth. What follows is an analysis as to how and to what extent these properties can be replaced.

Esthetics in the dentistry means exact imitation of the tooth color. To be able to give a natural color to the filling or to the crown could be considered a miracle. It might sound like a very simple issue. However, this is probably the most challenging thing for dentists. If the color does not match, your restoration will look different and will easily be noticeable. Maybe it is my professional curiosity because while watching television I have a tendency to look at people’s teeth before I look anywhere else. From the most popular singers and actors to mighty and scholarly politicians, I can always recognize their prosthesis. Ironically, these people were spending their wealth on professional dentists who could not give their original teeth back to them. The color is not something that could be mixed up together by fulfilling only one of its features. The color comes into existence as a result of common features of many factors. A dentist’s only hope is one day using homogeneous clay typed structures squeezed from a tube.

The structure of the enamel and the dentine are deeply related with opacity and translucency, two important subjects of optics. That is why some parts of the tooth are translucent while the other parts are opaque. It is possible to restore it with a few optical tricks. The tooth is neither completely opaque nor translucent. For example, while the cutting edges of the tooth are translucent (especially the cutting edges of newly erupted milk teeth, they are almost glassy), the cervix of tooth, adjacent to gingiva, is opaque and dusky. Thus, in big restorations, we implant materials that reflect the light differently for every surface of the tooth. We try to compare and contrast to the original teeth by using optical tricks. However, a more important thing is the sustainability of this quality. Especially, for restorations made to anterior teeth, you can observe that the colors have become darker and have separated from adjacent tooth with a dusky-colored borderline. Indeed, it is evident that color harmony is not preserved properly.

We cannot expect to reach a result that is equivalent to the look and feel of natural teeth through esthetic restoration only. The mechanical properties of restoration must be similar to that of the natural teeth. The reaction of the teeth to a certain force is very important. Teeth are subjected to forces of different types and magnitudes throughout the day, and they are created so as to endure those forces. Any restoration must be as strong and durable as the natural teeth. A piece of filling that is placed into a tooth becomes a working part of the entire system. If it is not as resolute as the rest of the system, then it cannot integrate and may fall out. In this regard, the mechanical properties of the material for restoration are crucial. There are dozens of other aspects in which one can compare those properties with a natural tooth. Considering just a couple of the important properties such as hardness and flexibility is enough to show significant differences between natural teeth and restorative materials.

Both hardness and flexibility of a material are determined by certain characteristics and are all formulated in scientific terms. We can see the difference of natural teeth very easily by comparing the hardness and flexibility of the most commonly used composites in the fore teeth and that of hard tissues like enamel and dentine. There is yet another point not to be missed: What makes our teeth perfect is that they are both hard and flexible at the same time. We can see the big gap between real and artificial teeth when we compare the quantitative values of these mechanical properties.

Teeth, in addition to their superior mechanical features, impress us with their exceptional capacity to transmit the force they face. Teeth come in contact with their hard counterpart everyday while eating or otherwise. A casual observer might think that a tooth is directly attached to the chin bone. Let alone being attached, the tooth does not even touch the chin bone. It is tied to the chin bone with flexible strings. A fusion of the bone and teeth is out of the question. It’s as if a bucket is lowered in a well. Whenever we chew, the pressure endured by the teeth is transferred to the bone through these strings in the best manner. These periodontal ligaments serve as shock absorbers. It would be incomplete to explain force transfer in teeth with these strings. It is imperative to remember the structure called lines of forces located on the chin bone that are shaped in such a manner as to guide the force.

It is a noteworthy challenge to make restorations and to replace a tooth in every aspect. Man-made products or works of art cannot be completely imitated; experts at least could tell the differences right away. Could it then ever be possible to imitate an artwork of the Divine to the same degree of perfection in its authentic form?

Mehmet Yildiz is a Professor of operative dentistry at Ataturk University, Erzurum, Turkey.

We can use electron or tunnel microscopes to extend our observations. Moreover, we discover that the great forces which help to keep together all the parts, from the biggest to the smallest, are active all the time just in order to make the wall stand still. This tells us that the wall has been built according to pre-determined calculations and geometry. So we can extrapolate this and imagine the creation of matter first as a sub-atomic particle, after that as a nucleus,¹ an atom and a molecule and continuing on. This situation clearly shows that at first matter (a kind of raw material) was created in a way that we cannot explain with causes. This matter was then subjected to construction by the Divine Knowledge, Will, and Power in the framework of the relationship of cause and effect in the universe. Today, we know that, starting from the molecule and going into more detail, that in the atomic system there is the atomic nucleus, and in the nucleus there are nucleons (protons and neutrons) and quarks in each nucleon; these tiny particles are kept together by very high forces (strong nuclear force). In other words, as the sizes of things get smaller in this physical world-from the galactic scale to the subatomic scale-the force required to keep things together becomes greater, in inverse proportion to the size. There are four kinds of forces known in the physical world: gravity, weak nuclear force, strong nuclear force and electromagnetic force. Gravity is the weakest of these forces, while strong nuclear force is the strongest. Gravity, the natural force by which all objects are attracted to each other, operates between immense objects like stars, medium-scaled things like planets and small things like apples. Gravity is 1,040 times weaker than the strong nuclear force that is used to keep the sub-atomic particles, such as the proton and quark in the nucleus, together. It is still a matter of debate in quantum physics if sub-atomic particles (those that are smaller than the electron) have a physical entity that we call a “body,” even though their existence has been proven and they have been named.

Can sub-atomic particles give information about the actual nature of matter?

Sub-atomic particles

It has been determined in research that has been carried out since the 1930s, as a result of collisions in particle accelerators, that the quark is the smallest particle. Another, theoretical, way to obtain the quark would be to heat matter to a trillion degrees Celsius and, break the matter down as much as possible. But in today’s conditions this is not possible. Therefore, the theory of Big Bang first came about as an idea that said: “There must have been extremely hot temperatures, or more accurately, there must have been very great and sudden explosions that caused these hot temperatures during the first creation of matter.” This idea has been widely accepted among physicists. At the end of the 20th century, it was realized that the same situation is valid for anti-matter. It was also obvious that matter and the organization and continuity of its mirror image, anti-matter, cannot be explained by mere coincidence.

Studies on matter and anti-matter

Matter can be defined as the intensified condition of energy and which can be converted to energy again (E=mc²). The reactions of fission and fusion² mean the transformation of the one-thousandth or one-ten thousandth of a mass into energy (the rest is transformed into other masses). However it is possible for matter to combine with anti-matter and be transformed into energy with 100% efficiency. So what is anti-matter? In 1931, Paul Dirac started to make predictions about the existence of a strange group of particles that he called anti-matter, as a result of theoretical studies.³ After Carl Anderson of the California Technology Institute carried out studies that supported Dirac’s ideas began to attract attention. But not liking publicity and being a retiring type, Dirac did not encourage the media to become interested in this subject-he had earlier turned down the Nobel Prize. Today, Dirac’s name is known only by those who are expert in the subject, but anti-matter is one of the deepest secrets of modern physics. It is not difficult to understand anti-matter, in spite of the fact that it is often presented as a very complicated subject. In some cases, the particles of anti-matter are the same as those of matter-for example, mass. In anti-matter the situation of properties such as electrical charge,⁴ magnetic moment,⁵ and spin,⁶ which are related to the main particles, is the opposite of the main particles of matter. The greatest difference is that the electrical charges are opposite. The nucleus of anti-matter is negative, not positive. In its orbit there are positrons with positive charges, not negative. The existence of anti-matter has been proven with particle accelerators.

Physicists have been able to obtain very small amounts of anti-matter by breaking down the sub-atomic particles with a speed close to that of the speed of light in CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research, Geneva) and in the Fermi Laboratories (USA). Just as the system of matter was created from very small sub-atomic particles, anti matter was also created from very small anti-matter particles. The only difference between them is that their charges are opposite. As soon as the very small and very fast main particles of both matter and anti-matter come into existence, they cannot survive long and immediately become energy (in one-billionth of a second) and disappear with the ambiguous physical aspects; this is because they are not suitable structurally or functionally for the conditions of the universe, which has already cooled. In order to determine this, particles without mass or those with very small masses which were obtained after collisions in the particle accelerators were kept in very special conditions; the lightest matter in the universe, that is hydrogen, and the anti-matter of hydrogen (anti-hydrogen atoms) were synthesized (a hydrogen atom is the proton itself). However, all these processes are very expensive. The life of nine anti-hydrogen atoms that were produced in CERN in 1995 was just 40 nanoseconds (one forty-billionth of a second). One million anti-hydrogen atoms were produced in the same laboratories. Their total weight was just one quadrillionth of a kilogram (Weed, 2003). As of 2005, the yearly global production of anti-hydrogen atoms was approximately one hundred billionth of a kilogram and it costs one quadrillion dollars to produce on ounce (28.3 grams) (Berman, 2005). In almost all Big Bang models, it is estimated that equal amounts of matter and anti-matter were created in the time-space universe that existed 14 billion years ago. Taking into account the scale of the universe, the fact that everything was created in pairs seems logical. But apart from the anti-matter that “appears and disappears” in particle accelerators, there is no trace or mark of this. All the anti-matter that is thought to have been created with matter at the beginning seems to have disappeared in less than a second, even if the universe came into being with the Big Bang or something else. So where has all this anti-matter gone and how did it happen? The studies to understand this continue. One of them is related to the radioactive beta decay of weak nuclear force, which is accepted as one of the four fundamental forces. During this decay, a neutron in the atomic nucleus becomes a proton, but the time in which it does this is unpredictable. Meanwhile, an electron and a particle called the anti-neutrino⁷ are emitted from the neutron. In some rare isotopes, we see double beta decay. In this process, both neutrons in the nucleus decay at the same time, which means that they are converted to protons, with two electrons and two anti-neutrinos are emitted at the same time. Physicists have been experimentally observing double beta decay for more than 20 years. However, Hans Klapdor-Kleingrothaus and his colleagues from the Max Planck Nuclear Physics Institute (Heidelberg) say that they have been observing a different version of double beta decay and claim that no anti-neutrino appears in this experiment. This process was predicted by the Italian physicist Ettore Majorana in 1937, but he found it impossible to prove it. The Heidelberg team now says that they have succeeded this. The important thing about the matter and anti-matter relationship is this: if one or two anti-neutrinos are emitted from the nucleus during a normal beta or double beta decay, this means that there is a neutrino in each neutron. On the other hand, in double beta decay, in which no anti-neutrino is emitted, an anti-neutrino appears as a result of the decay of the neutron and is absorbed by another neutron without being able to be emitted; this is contrary to well-known laws. Did the Divine Power hide anti-matter in this way? If the results are correct, double-beta decay that does not emit anti-neutrino apparently indicates that the neutrino, which is hidden in the structure of the neutron, has a different place among the fundamental particles of matter.

Physicists state that the interactions and decay of matter and anti-matter are dependent on special laws, such as the preservation of energy and the number of leptons.⁸ These laws say that the duration of the exchange of matter and anti-matter is equal to time dating back to the beginning of the universe (the Big-Bang). When we look at the emission of a neutron, we can see that anti-neutrinos indicate the same number of neutrons that at the beginning each absorbed a neutrino. The results attained by the team in Heidelberg may help us to explain why the universe is full of matter and not anti-matter and why there is no visible anti-matter.

Why matter and anti-matter?

It is difficult to store anti-matter in great quantity and it is also dangerous and costly; if anti-matter comes into contact with matter, both disappear and release a great deal of energy. Dirac thought that anti-matter masses could be hidden in remote places of the universe. At this time this was a reasonable hypothesis, as a galaxy created out of anti-matter could not have been differentiated from a normal galaxy. Spectroscopic analyses at that time did not reveal any differences. But today it has been claimed that anti-matter is infrequently found in outer-space. The contact between electrons and positrons produces gamma rays with an energy equivalent to 511,000 electron volts. If anti-matter were galaxies to exist, they would interact with the usual particles that swim through intergalactic space and would cause gamma ray circles around existing galaxies. These kinds of circles were looked for, but nothing was found. We live in a new universe of matter (Berman, 2005). Marc Lachièze-Rey, the French astrophysicist, says that, “If there were any antimatter asteroids in our galaxy, they would emit x-rays that we would be able to detect as soon as it disappears with its material,” (Poirier & Greffoz, 2001). The current explanation of the physicists about the domination of matter over anti-matter in the universe has the laws of physics arranged in favor of matter. When a team from the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (2004) determined a minor but distinctive difference in the behaviors of some matter and anti-matter particles, this explanation was supported. This result implied an arrangement in which the material side overpowered the laws of physics. In terms of the causes operated being dependent on these laws, a universe that includes so much anti-matter would be very dangerous; when matter and anti-matter contact, the result is the transformation of matter into energy (E= mc²). It means a release of energy 143 times greater than a hydrogen bomb. If a marble that weighs an ounce collides with an equivalent anti-marble, 50 billion times a trillion erg of energy is released as a result of this reaction; this is enough to light all the electric bulbs in the US for a day. (Berman, 2005). In fact matter and anti-mater are similar to one another. Nobody has been able to explain why matter is dominant over antimatter instead of the other way round. Today, theoretical and experimental physicists predict that the half of the universe has been lost and the last time that it was seen was at the time of the creation of the universe. Matter and its opposite-charged anti-matter demonstrate that there was a certain predestination at the beginning of Creation, to be more exact before the Creation, in terms of knowledge, power and creating. This means that matter and anti-matter cannot exist by themselves. All the causes from the beginning were gathered to reveal a “universe of matter” (not a “universe of anti-matter”) that we can spiritually and intellectually comprehend. Anti-matter and matter demonstrate that they were created with a knowledge, will and power that existed before the creation. Otherwise, how could the first subatomic particles like hadrons, then the protons and the neutrons, then the atomic nucleus, after that the atomic system and the molecules in the sea of quarks, which are thought to be the most transparent, the most scattered, but at the same time the most fluid state (this is what can be predicted by looking at the results of particle collision experiments) of matter that appeared as the result of the Big Bang and under very great temperatures (trillions of degrees Celsius), have been formed? How could the laws that operate as the causes of this universe, a realm of symmetrical matter and antimatter, and then the structures and functions that became dominant have been formed? Could the sea of quarks (maybe the ether), which is the basis of matter, have been transformed by itself into organizations of new matter in the shape of nucleus, atomic system, and molecule only as a result of a decrease in temperature?⁹ Even if the temperature decreased, the sea of quarks could have remained the same, considering its structure. The cause and effect relationship-which we explain with the present physical laws-about temperature changes or about different states of matter may not have existed. Could the quarks have established this law? If the existence of matter and space¹⁰ occurred as a result of the Big Bang and a heat of trillions of degrees Celsius; how, when, for what reason and in which physical realm did this accumulation of energy happen? If there was no physical realm before the explosion, does physics stem from the metaphysics? Yes! The universe was created from nothing. Even if we search for the answer to this question in terms of the exact sciences, we again arrive at the same answer. The universe was created! These questions are not being asked for the first time. However the “hand of science” cannot grasp metaphysics (or pre-physics). Another interesting point here is this: the events on the large scale of the galaxy or even of the universe are trying to be understood by studies on a small scale (such as with sub-atomic particles) and by collisions in accelerators. We can say that small particles contain the index of the entire universe. Moreover, the studied particles do not individually exist. They were in the conditions of the high temperature. We can also say that, if we go in depth in sub-atomic particle studies, the existence of the particles that have very small mass (one quadrillionth of a kilogram) or those with no mass, are very rapid and have a very short life; this makes us think that matter can be created out of nothing at any moment and can be transformed into larger particles that have a greater mass. Most importantly, if we had not seen the activities in the sub-atomic realm we would not be able to understand that God’s Knowledge, Will and Power have penetrated everywhere at all times. If the sub-atomic realm had been static and inactive, God forbid, we would think that this realm was left to its own devices or that the Divine Power could not reach here. If God had not created such small, quick particles that can come into existence at any moment and be transformed into something else, we would not be able to comprehend the greatness of His Power and the intricacy of His Knowledge and Calculation.

References

• Berman, B., “What’s the Antimatter?” Discover, Vol 26, No 10, October, 2005.
• Weed, W.S., “Startrek,” Discover, Vol 24, No 8, August, 2003.
• Poirier, H. & Greffoz, V., “Asteroïdes: La menace se précise,” Science & Vie, No 1006, July, Paris, 2001.

Notes

1. This before and after relationship is valid; Our Creator, Who created the time, is not bound by time.
2. The slow chain reaction fission (the division of atomic nucleus) is the working principle in nuclear plants and it is the working principle of atomic bomb as a rapid chain reaction.
3. In 1928, Paul Dirac also predicted the existence of the positron, the anti-particle of the electron. This prediction was proven by physicist Carl Anderson at California Technology Institute in 1932.
4. The electrical charge is the application of the force of a matter on another matter, and the unit is the coulomb (C). A body is charged with electricity as a result of friction, induction, or chemical change. The charge itself shows an electron unit on the body (negative charge) or loss of electron (positive charge). The static electricity that we see when putting on an acrylic sweater or combing our hair is the result of the loss or gain of an electron from surface atoms. A charge flow, such as the passing of electrons from a copper wire, is electrical current and its unit is the ampere (A).
5. Magnetic momentum is the effect that happens dependent on the length and force of the magnet.
6. Spin is the natural angular momentum of a sub-atomic particle, such as a proton or neutron, of an atomic nucleus, an atom or a molecule; spin continues to exist even if the particle becomes inactive. A particle, in a certain state of energy, has a spin peculiar to itself as well as having an electrical charge and mass.
7. The neutrino is one of the three uncharged main particles (and one of the three uncharged anti-particles) belonged to leptons and it has a very small mass (almost zero). The three types are electron neutrino, muon neutrino and tau neutrino. The anti-particle of an electron neutrino is the anti-neutrino that is emitted during the beta decay of a nucleus.
8. Being one of the fundamental particle types that are not affected by strong nuclear forces, leptons correspond to the electron, muon, tau and the neutrinos of these three particles and also to the six anti-particles of these. In July 2000, direct proof of the tau lepton was obtained in the Fermi Laboratories. The muon, on the other hand, is a fundamental particle similar to the electron except for its mass. It is 207 times greater in mass than the electron. Its half-life is two millionthof a second. It is transformed into electrons and neutrinos at the end of this period of time. Although it is thought that the muon is a meson in origin, it has not been classified as a lepton yet. Meson is an unstable sub-atomic particle group consisting of a quark and anti-quark. Its existence was determined by cosmic radiation and it is emitted by a nucleus that has been exposed to the bombardment of very high-energy particles. The sub-class of hadrons, mesons, includes kaons and pions. Their existence was predicted by the Japanese physicist Hideki Yukawa in 1935.
9. It seems that the existence of matter and anti-matter causes the high temperature present at the beginning to drop and the combination of the sub-atomic particles (nuclear synthesis). The encounter of matter and anti-matter causes high energy. Therefore, we can understand that a very large explosion (the Big Bang) and very high temperatures were the conditions at the beginning of time.
10. Today physicists accept that matter was created out of nothing and in the space in which it was embedded.

A tooth is created with four main layers: enamel, dentine, pulp chamber and cementum (the thin layer where the tooth attaches to the jaw). The hardest tissue of the body, the enamel is the protective, outermost layer of the tooth. Since it does not contain any living matter such as veins or nerves, we are not affected by hot, cold, sweet or sour stimulants via the tooth. If the Owner of an Everlasting Might and Compassion had not created the enamel of the tooth, which He placed at the entrance of the digestion room in the human palace, as he did, the variety of food we would eat would be very limited. Even slight contact with air would cause us great discomfort, and speaking or even opening our mouth would give us great pain.

The dentine, the hard layer just below the enamel, is a tissue sensitive to hot, cold, sweet and sour stimulants. As a reflection of the Creator’s Affection for His Creation, the dentine tissue is repaired when necessary by the restoring cells that he placed there.

The most inner part of the tooth is the organic part called the pulp chamber, which is filled with veins to protect the tooth from decay and feed it with necessary nutrients. Nerve cells in the soft pulp tissue play the greatest role in sensing the stimulants of heat, cold and pressure.

If we examine the anatomical structure of a tooth in detail, only then can we clearly see how it is perfectly equipped with wondrous and intelligent structures. However, are we really conscious of the duties of our teeth, placed in our jaws like pearls, in protecting our general health?

One of the main entrances to our bodies for microbes is the mouth. Because of this, maintaining healthy teeth and a clean mouth is very important in preventing diseases and maintaining a healthy life. When the mouth is not kept hygienic, a suitable environment is formed for the emergence of even very feeble microbes. In an unhygienic mouth, food residue accumulates and forms a bacterial plaque on the teeth. Using the glucose in this plaque, these bacteria produce acids. It is this acid that causes tooth decay and gum diseases.

Are we adequately informed about dental health and hygiene, a very important concept in preventive medicine? That Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, emphasized the importance of cleaning the mouth and teeth whenever one does his/her ablution and after every meal, grants a profundity of worship to God by keeping our teeth healthy.

Importance of Milk Teeth

Milk teeth start to appear in a baby’s gums after about the sixth month of age. The appearance of milk teeth differs from baby to baby according to factors like genetics, birth weight, socio-economics and nourishment level. By cutting a group of teeth every six months, all of the milk teeth appear by the age of 30 months. Between the 6th and 12th months the first incisors, between the 12th and 18th months the first molars, between the 18th and 24th months the first canines and between the 24th and 30th months the second molars erupt. Since the dentine tissue is not fully developed in this period, milk teeth are not at all resistant to decay. Since the pulp chamber is very soft and packed with blood vessels, it is very vulnerable to decay. Sucking fingers, excessive use of a pacifier, sucking or biting lips and gritting teeth all negatively affect the development of milk teeth. During the eruption of milk teeth, babies may have discomfort like itching gums, a need to bite something, excessive saliva secretion, watery eyes, lack of appetite, loss of weight, fever, bad temper and crying. In order to relieve these discomforts, the baby may be given something to chew on to relieve the pressure on the gums, and some cold drinks and cold food to soothe the pain.

As nothing in creation occurs devoid of wisdom, one may ask “What benefits are there after the discomforts when a baby’s milk teeth are coming in?” In other words, why are the milk teeth so important? Most of us do not give them enough care, because we think of them as temporary. The space occupied by the milk teeth is saved for the permanent teeth, and when the permanent tooth starts erupting, the milk tooth guides it into its proper place. If milk teeth are extracted too early, this alignment and spacing function of milk teeth cannot be performed, hence the permanent teeth may erupt in an improper way. Moreover, milk teeth provide proper chewing and correct vocal speech for the baby. When a baby develops unhealthy milk teeth, this may cause problems like poor facial appearance, and therefore some psychological disorders in the future. Untreated defects of milk teeth can cause pain, bad breath, difficulty in chewing, disorders in jaw development, malnutrition, aesthetic and general health problems like rheumatism and heart diseases.

Protection of Milk Teeth

Since tooth decay in babies’ teeth is very difficult to treat, preventive measures are much more important in looking after the milk teeth. Some of these measures are as follows;

• A baby must not allowed to sleep with A milk bottle in her/his mouth,

• Sugar, honey or any other sugary substance must never be added to baby’s milk,

• Baby must be given water after every feeding,

• After baby’s first teeth erupt, after every morning and evening meal, his teeth must be wiped with a soft, wet, clean towel,

• Give a soft learning toothbrush to the baby to play with.

A child must start using a toothbrush after his molars erupt, at the age of 2.5 to 3 years old. The size of the toothbrush should be suitable to the child’s mouth. It should be soft and made of nylon. Children can only brush the front of their teeth. Since the space between the teeth should also be cleaned to provide a shield against decay, parents should supervise their children when brushing their teeth. At this age, a child cannot brush his/her teeth properly, but the main aim to be achieved is for him/her to get into the habit of brushing teeth. Toothpaste may start to be used for the child after the age of three. We must not forget that the important thing for oral hygiene is not the toothpaste itself, but brushing the teeth properly and thoroughly. If these measures are not taken, or if it is already too late, any disorder in the milk teeth must be treated immediately without making the mistake of thinking the milk teeth will be replaced anyway.

Permanent Teeth

The first permanent teeth are the first big molars, which erupt when the child is about six years old. Between ages 7 and 9, the lower and upper incisors, between ages 9 and 10, the lower canines, between 10 and 12, the first and second small molars, between 11 and 12, the upper canines, between 12 and 13, the second big molars, and finally, between 17 and 21, the wisdom teeth, the third molars erupt. During the eruption of permanent teeth, some problems like distorted development may occur. Genetic factors, early loss of milk teeth, breathing disorders, untreated cavities between milk teeth and a mismatch of jaw and tooth sizes, may cause irregular development of teeth. The dental treatment practiced for aligning such irregular teeth is called ‘orthodontic treatment.’ Since irregularities of teeth form spaces suitable for the accumulation of food residue which allows microorganisms to increase and then leads to decay, orthodontic treatment should be done before the permanent teeth are firmly positioned. Irregular teeth may cause jaw-aches because of abnormal interlacing of upper and lower teeth.

There are different thoughts about whether the wisdom teeth should be pulled out or not. Wisdom teeth are placed at the furthest back part of the jaw curvature. This part of the mouth is very suitable for food residue and microorganisms to accumulate. Because of this, wisdom teeth are very vulnerable to decay. In addition, any decay in these teeth may also affect the adjacent molars. If a positive result will not be achieved from treatment, these teeth can then be pulled out. However, if the wisdom teeth will erupt correctly into their places and do not negatively affect the surrounding tissues, and if there is sufficient space for them in the jaws, it is definitely beneficial for them to stay.

Another tooth problem that seems to concern today’s aesthetic conscious individuals is the color of teeth. However, tooth color is completely a personal phenomenon, like eye or skin color. But still, we must know that some external factors, like tea, coffee, smoking, feeding habits and tooth injuries, and some internal factors, like genetic attributes and aging, may also affect the color of the teeth.

What should we do to obtain Dental Health?

Mouth and tooth hygiene is an important issue that was emphasized strongly by Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him, and the most effective method he used was brushing the teeth. However, after eating acidic foods or drinking acidic drinks like fruit juice, fruits, soft drinks or fizzy drinks, you should wait for about 30 minutes, because the dental enamel will be softer and more sensitive just after consuming such foods and drinks and if you brush straightaway, you may rub the acid into the enamel tissue of your teeth. You can clean the residues of acidic foods and drinks by rinsing your mouth with water or a fluoride based mouth rinse.

Having a healthy mouth and teeth mainly depends upon applying a good brushing technique to the teeth and gums. By applying the brush in a circular manner, you should always start brushing the gums towards the teeth, then the outer surfaces and finish with all inner surfaces. You must avoid damaging the masticator surfaces by applying too much force. Brushing the teeth twice a day at least is necessary to prevent the formation of bacterium plaque.

In order to achieve ideal hygiene for your teeth, you should also use dental floss for cleaning between the teeth. This will help to clean places where a brush cannot reach and thus prevent dental plaque. Also, special mouth rinses may be used in order to provide an effective general cleanliness.

Toothpicks can also be used between the teeth. While they are cheaper, they cannot provide a hygiene as comprehensive as dental floss, since they are thicker than floss. When using toothpicks, you should choose those with blunted tips to prevent any inflammation of the gums. Food residue that has stayed too long between the teeth should not be swallowed, since large amount of harmful microorganisms may grow on it.

In elderly people, due to a lack of sufficient calcium, disorders like gum retraction and wobbly teeth may occur. For people who have lost their teeth completely, because of osteolysis of the lower jaw, dental prostheses may not fit properly in the jaw. During this time of life, extra calcium intake should be provided by following a calcium-rich diet.

With age, the amount of calcium also decreases in the body. In relation to this situation, teeth also become more fragile. Using the teeth to break open nuts may cause cracks that cannot be seen with the eye, which may later cause fractures in the teeth. Therefore, we must never use our teeth to break hard foods, such as nuts, at any age, and we must be careful about breaking teeth, especially during old age.

All methods of estimating “time” use the same principle: measuring the velocity of natural processes that show continuity over time. One of the most advanced methods of chronometry today is to use the velocity of quartz crystal vibrations when exposed to an electric field. The wristwatches we wear in our daily life are well-known applications of this method. Another method of measuring time is to measure the rate of decay of radioactive elements.

However, having a process with which to measure is not sufficient. To measure the time that has passed correctly there are three requirements that need to be satisfied. First of all, it is essential that the process is stable and immutable, even during the period before we were able to observe it. Secondly, the beginning state should be known. For example, the length of a candle before being lighted or the amount of water in a cup before being boiled should be known. Thirdly, the process should not be influenced by any outer effects.

Today, all these three factors have been applied in studies of measuring time. But, when the question comes down to Geochronometry (Measurement of geologic time, as through isotopic radioactive decay), they are somehow more difficult to apply. Since the selected process starts before the beginning of history, we do not have methods to observe the process directly or to make sure that these three requirements were met then as today. And this is where the problem starts.

For instance, we can use the salinity of the oceans as a means of measuring the age of the Earth (This method was developed in 1898 by Irish geologist John Joly). This is a promising method, because it is assumed that the amount of salt in the water of the ocean was originally zero, and that salt was propelled by rainwater and rivers from the soil. The encouraging fact about this method is that the amount of salt brought to the oceans by rainwater and rivers is constant (approximately 540 million tons of salt annually). Today, the average density of salt in oceans is nearly 32 grams per liter. By using this ratio, we can calculate the total amount of salt in the oceans as being approximately 50 quadrillion tons. When we divide this number by the amount of salt propelled annually, we can find the age of the Earth in years.

Joly calculated this as being 100 million years using this method. However, considering the study in light of the three requirements mentioned above, the shortcomings of this method are obvious. Firstly, we cannot really be sure that the amount of salt propelled was static in the geological past. There is good reason to think that the climate and annual rainfall might have been significantly different in the past. Ice ages, great droughts, excessive rains, and the undeterminable effects of these factors may have all played a part. Secondly, it is impossible to be sure that the oceans were salt-free at the beginning. They may have contained some salt (recent research carried out in the Atlantic demonstrates the possibility that salt could have penetrated through to the oceans from the magma layer). Thirdly, some external influences may have affected this so-called stable process. There is a large and self-replicating circulation of salt in the atmosphere. New clues lead us to think that the amount of salt in oceans today is stable. As soon as the salt propelled by rivers accumulates, it evaporates at the same speed. While a huge amount of salt evaporates in biological processes, a greater amount penetrates to the depths of the seas.

The Uranium-Lead Method

All the methods that estimate the age of the Earth suffer from the same shortcomings to some degree. The radiometric age estimation method, which can estimate age up to 4.5 million years, consists of measuring radioactive elements that have a long half-life and that maintain their radioactivity over a long period. These elements are uranium and thorium, which decay into helium and lead, rubidium, which decays into strontium, and potassium, which decays into argon. However, as we will see, the Uranium-Lead method has been given great importance, in particular by evolutionists.

The basic principle involved is that radioactive uranium 238, uranium 235, and thorium 232 atoms eventually decay into miscellaneous lead atoms, without any trigger (in addition, uranium 238 decays into helium gas).

Interestingly, the decay rate of each element is definite. Uranium and thorium atoms periodically radiate alpha particles. However, it is unpredictable which atom will decay when. But in any substantial mass of the mineral there will be many billions of atom, and with very large numbers of events the “law of large numbers” operates to produce a statistically predictable result.

The significant part of this theory is that radiogenic lead 206, which is not radioactive and which is decayed from radioactive uranium 238, is found in rocks. However, it differs chemically from lead 204, which is neither radioactive nor radiogenic. To estimate the age of a rock, it is split and the amounts of radioactive uranium and radiogenic lead found are measured. Since the decay rate is known, it is possible to calculate the age of the rock.

The half-life of uranium 238 – one of the isotopes used – is calculated as being 4.5 million years. This means that half of any amount of uranium 238 will decay into lead 206 in 4.5 million years. For instance, if an investigation shows that half of a rock consists of uranium 238, and the other half consists of lead 206, which is the final product of uranium 238, the rock is then 4.5 million years old (although this number has not been calculated by a direct measurement, it is an average age for the crust of the Earth).

If radiogenic lead (lead 206 that has decayed from uranium 238, lead 207 that has decayed from uranium 235, and lead 208 that has decayed from thorium 232) are truly the products of radioactive decay then it is assumed that these rocks contained no radiogenic lead at the very start of the process of rock formation. This is a reliable starting point for calculations. Simi-larly, it is assumed that radiogenic lead cannot penetrate rocks in any other way, and conse-quently there is no process that can affect the decay process. However, when examined carefully, we can see that this is not really the case. A new process in which “natural” lead transforms into a form that cannot be distinguished from radiogenic lead was discovered by experimentation (Cook, 1966). This transformation occurs by natural lead taking hold of free neutrons. These neutrons are atoms that have the energy to transform natural lead into radiogenic lead. Then what is the source of the free neutrons?

The Origin of Lead 208

The source of lead 208 lies in a radioactive mine bed where natural fission (the division of the nucleus of uranium) has taken place. (A uranium bed were such natural fission occurs has been found in The Gabon.) In this uranium bed, while some uranium 238 atoms decay into lead 206, others divide by natural fission and produce neutrons. These neutrons simultaneously transform natural lead (lead 204) and radiogenic lead (lead 206) to lead 208 isotopes in a gradual process. This isotope cannot be distinguished experimentally from lead 208, a product of the alpha decay of thorium 232. Therefore, the lead 208 isotope emerges from two different sources. However, Darwinists state that all lead 208 isotopes detected are the product of thorium 232, which would mean that there is a large amount of radiogenic lead, and subsequently that the process continues for a long time. Significantly, this is a mechanism that would tip our measurements in favor of an “old” Earth.

In the neutron capture process, the isotopic values of lead would be systematically changed: lead 206 would be converted into lead 207, and lead 207 into lead 208 by taking on a single neutron. What is interesting is that lead 208 makes up more than half of the lead in the bed. According to Darwinists, this means that there was a large amount of naturally occurring thorium 232 in that bed, which later changed into lead 208. However, Melvin Cook, who carried out research in uranium beds in Zaire and Canada (the largest uranium beds in the world) states that, although the beds do not contain thorium 232, they do contain a large amount of lead 208. This can only mean that lead 208 results from lead 207 taking hold of a neutron. He also states that all radiogenic lead can be accounted for in this way.

Other people have tried to denigrate Cook, a man who believed in “creation”, and his studies. Among these is the geologist Brent Dalrymple from the U.S. Geological Survey. Neither Dalrymple, who argued that the level of free neutrons were too low to make any significant difference in the number of lead 208 as lead isotopes in the beds, nor could anyone else provide a satisfactory explanation to why, although there was no thorium 232 in the beds, lead 208 was found in huge amounts. Uranium decay not only degrades the most important criteria of a reliable geocronometry method, but it also degrades the criteria of the process, i.e that it is stable, immutable, and not intervened with. Uranium, which naturally emerges as an oxide rather than a metal, and which shows a very high capacity of dissolving in water because of this property, ekes out of its original bed with water. Its effect in age estimation is unpredictable, as while some parts of the bed are poor in uranium, other parts are rich.

The Helium Problem

Beside lead, one of the final products produced in the decay of uranium 238 is radiogenic helium, the atomic weight of which is 4. It is thought that a significant proportion of helium in the atmosphere is radiogenic helium that emerges in the decay process that has continued throughout history. If the uranium-lead age estimation method is reliable, then the amount of helium in the atmosphere must suggest an age in agreement to the age provided by radiogenic lead estimation. However, the ages acquired from the two methods are significantly different. If the Earth were 4.6 billion years old, then there would be roughly 100 trillion tons of radiogenic helium 4 in the atmosphere. Actually, there are only around 3.5 billion tons present – several thousand times less than there should be (0.035 % to be precise).

Writing in Nature on the “mystery” of the Earth’s missing radiogenic helium, Melvin Cook says: “…Hence more than 1,020 grams of helium should have passed into the atmosphere since the ‘beginning.’ Because the atmosphere contains only 3.5×1,015 grams of helium 4, it must also have passed out through the exosphere, and that the present rate of loss through the atmosphere balances the rate of exudation from the lithosphere.”

Cook says that uniformitarian geologists have attempted to explain this discrepancy by assuming that the other 99.96 percent has escaped from Earth’s gravitational field into space – but this process has not been observed. In 1984, Dalrymple argued a mechanism that can explain this difference and that provides a reply to Cook’s proposal: “Banks and Holzer have shown that the polar wind can account for an escape of 2 to 4 million ions/cm2 per second of helium 4, which is nearly identical to the estimated production flux of 2.51.5 million atoms/cm2 per second.”

There are two things that make Banks and Holzer’s findings unsuitable for the purposes to which Dalrymple tries to fit them. First of all, if the Earth really is 4.5 billion years old, then its atmosphere would have to lose helium at a rate somewhere around 1,016 atoms/cm2 per second, or some ten orders of magnitude faster than Dalrymple’s figure, to account for the missing helium.

Secondly, the numbers Dalrymple used were calculated 30 years ago. In that period, most scientists believed that the Earth moved in empty space (i.e., that nothing encapsulated the Earth but emptiness), and that hydrogen and helium atoms escaped to emptiness. New studies have shown that, rather than losing helium, the atmosphere gains a significant amount of helium. Since the Earth rotates around the Sun, it does not move in empty space, it moves in the atmosphere of the Sun, which is made up of mainly helium and hydrogen that have emerged from the nuclear processes that occur on the Sun. According to research, the Earth gains helium in this way as well.

In his book (1987) Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth, space scientist James Lovelock writes: “The outermost layer of the air, so thin as to contain only a few hundred atoms per cubic centimeter, the exosphere, can be thought of as merging into the equally thin outer atmosphere of the Sun. It used to be assumed that the escape of hydrogen atoms from the exosphere gave the Earth its oxygen atmosphere. Not only do we now doubt that this process is on a sufficient scale to account for oxygen, but we rather suspect that the loss of hydrogen atoms is offset or even counterbalanced by the flux of hydrogen from the Sun.”

Lovelock mentions hydrogen, not helium. Helium is four times heavier than hydrogen and exists in abundance in the Sun’s atmosphere, since it is the main product of the nuclear fusion process on the Sun. If hydrogen were gained instead of being lost, it would be reasonable to expect this to occur for helium as well. Cook says: “If we take the amount of helium 4 measured in the atmosphere and then apply the radioactive age estimation technique, we will find that the age of the Earth is approximately 175,000 years. This invalidates our reliability criteria; the possible flow of helium from external sources interrupts this process.”

Cook is not alone in his thoughts. In articles published in influential journals, similar suspicions have been stated. Funkhouser and Naughton from the Hawaiian Geophysics Institute calculated the ages of volcanic rocks that had emerged from Mount Kilauea by using the potassium-argon method and calculated them to be nearly 3 million years old. However, it is know that these rocks were formed during a volcanic eruption in 1801. McDougall from the Australian National University calculated the age of lava in New Zealand to be up to 465,000 years old, even though it was known to be less than 1,000 years old (Milton 1997).

As a result, the reliability of radioactive age estimation is doubtful. What is being measured is the amount of products that have decayed, not the rate of decay. It is also difficult to discuss the origin of these products. Subsequently, all radioactive geocronometry methods can be said to be highly flawed and to lack reliability. The only reliable result that emerges from the incompatibility between uranium-lead age and uranium-helium age is the conclusion that radioactive age estimation is totally unreliable. The methods based on the decay of potassium into argon and rubidium into strontium suffer from the above mentioned shortcomings, in addition to others. However, some scientists try hard to advocate one single idea: evolution. The evolution lobby dampens the volume of courageous scientists, such as Milton and Cook, damages their prestige and frightens others by the overwhelming atmosphere they have created. All methods developed to estimate the age of the Earth are full of inconsistencies. Only one among them (based on the radioactive decay of elements, such as uranium) provided an age of millions of years for the Earth. While that single technique was supported enthusiastically by Darwinists, all others were ignored. This was because according to Darwinist theory, evolution required a long geological past in order to display its results in the long term. This propaganda program by the Darwinists was so successful that almost everyone, including scientists from different fields, have come to believe that radioactive age estimation is the only unquestionable and valid method for age estimation. Yet, as we have discussed above, all of these widely accepted beliefs lack sufficient support.

References

• Milton, R., Shattering the Myths of Darwinism. Park Street Press. Vermont, 1997.
• Lovelock, J. E., Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth. Oxford University Press, 1997.