Experiments have proved lack of sleep as a cause of death. Lab mice that are deprived of sleep for three to four consecutive days eventually die. Lack of sleep for a long period of time, especially when combined with excessive fatigue, poses a serious threat to our health.

There are intensive research efforts to understand the mysterious workings of the biological mechanisms underlying sleep. Human beings spend almost a third of their lives in sleep. Yet, the basic sleep mechanism and its functions are still not completely known. Each of many theories proposed for understanding the secrets of sleep provide different evidence, but no guaranteed results have been attained so far. Initially, sleep was considered a rest period. However, although brain activity lowers during sleep, the brain continues actively working. It can be said that the brain rests itself by working during sleep.

Scientists classify a person’s state of consciousness as one of three stages:

1. Wakefulness
2. REM sleep
3. Deep sleep

According to this classification, sleep is divided into deep sleep and REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. During a night’s sleep, there is a loop of REM sleep and deep sleep. Approximately 90 minutes of deep sleep is followed by REM sleep, which lasts between 5 and 30 minutes. Approximately 75% of the total sleep span is deep sleep; 25% is REM sleep. REM sleep happens while slipping into sleep from wakefulness. Just before waking from sleep, a short-term REM is observed.

During the first hours of sleep, REM spans are shorter, and they grow longer during the last hours of sleep. If a person is extremely tired, they experience extremely short REM sleep spans within the first hour of their sleep. They may even slip into deep sleep without REM. Right after mid-sleep, REM sleep periods last longer. If a person is deprived of all or partial sleep – such as the deep sleep or REM – they will need to sleep longer at the next opportunity. If they are deprived of REM sleep or deep sleep for longer periods, they will have longer deep sleep.

REM Sleep

REM (Rapid Eye Movement) is given this name due to the intensive and fast eye movements during this sleep stage. During REM, not only the eyes but also hands, arms, legs, and fingers move. An onlooker may think the sleeper is fully awake. However, scientists are unable to fully explain the reason why it is difficult waking a person in REM, although they are active as if they are awake – this is a paradox. In fact, a person in deep sleep may be awakened easier, by either sound or touch. If it is difficult to wake a person during the REM stages in their sleep, it may also be considered as a paradox for that person to wake from REM sleep.

During REM sleep, contrary to rapid eye movements and gestures, a person’s muscles are extremely relaxed and soft, to the extent of a wrist drop. This is called REM paralysis.

The reasons, mechanisms, and even benefits of REM sleep are not known for certain. The newest theory in sleep research claims the relationship between REM sleep and acetylcholine secretion. Acetylcholine is a brain hormone that triggers movement. Yet, acetylcholine typically causes wakefulness. This, too, appears as another paradox.

Dreams seen during the REM stage are remembered more clearly. The limbic system, including the hippocampus and amygdala, is active during REM sleep, thus it is assumed that it is easier to commit dreams to memory during this stage. The hippocampus is tasked with committing (reinforcing) information.

During REM sleep, a person’s heartbeat and breathing are more frequent and irregular. This also relates to what a person sees in their dream. During this stage, the basal metabolism rate is higher or equal to that of wakefulness. Electroencephalography (EEG) readings register beta waves, which normally show during wakefulness. Alpha waves show during times of calm, when the brain rests during wakefulness, such as at times when one closes their eyes and dispels thoughts. However, when the brain is actively dealing with an issue or when a person experiences an upset, beta waves appear. Beta waves also show during REM stage. This shows that the brain is active during REM stage.

Deep sleep

This stage of sleep is also called low wave sleep or delta sleep. During this stage, movements are at minimum, and the muscle tone is harder. Heartbeat, breathing, basic metabolic rate, and blood pressure are low. Internal organs like the stomach, intestines, urinary tract, and even the liver minimize their activities and slip into an actual rest.

During this stage, dreams and even nightmares may also be seen. However, one cannot remember a majority of dreams when they wake up. It is assumed that the traffic between the cortex and the lower structures of the brain are disengaged during the deep sleep stage. People wake up from nightmares, only to usually remember the last part.

EEG readings during deep sleep stage show delta waves. The presence of delta waves hints at the disengaged traffic between the cortex and the lower nervous system components (thalamus, hypothalamus, brain stem, hippocampus). This condition also shows that the person is in deep rest, free from pain and other bodily stimuli.

Secreted at night, melatonin is a hormone that protects against cancer and slows down the aging process. Melatonin also plays a role in lowering bad cholesterol (LDL) and balancing body heat and blood pressure. Melatonin secretion starts around 10:00 p.m. and reaches its maximum around 5:00 a.m. That’s why, the most ideal sleep is after 10:00 p.m. when melatonin secretion starts. Bedside lamps are not suggested as they hinder the secretion of this night-bound hormone. People should also avoid conditions such as stress, smoking, extreme lighting, lack of adequate daylight, and working at lengthy periods, which lower melatonin level.

With half the world living on less than $2.50 per day and with 46.2 million people in the United States living below the poverty line, poverty is a growing concern.

The United States is known all over the world to be a very powerful and rich country. It is not just American people who believe in the American Dream, but also many people from other countries have been dreaming of coming to the US to live in better conditions. Although the US is thought to be a rich country, we still see hungry and homeless people, especially women and children in the streets. Women, who are either married or unmarried, whether supported by their husbands or single mothers with no support, struggle to earn money for food, clothes, safe shelter, and other intangible needs such as love and happiness. When observed closely, it is easy to understand the reasons why this is so. It is because of the wage gap between men and women, the decreased amount of opportunities in having high income jobs, and the fact that more women are the head of their household compared to men, means that the ratio of poor women is rising, and the increased need for governmental help makes “welfare” necessary.

Understanding the definition of poverty becomes very important because it categorizes people into groups which are poor and wealthy. Richard Ropers states that poverty can be understood and described in numerous ways, and that people will not understand the meaning of poverty if they do not recognize the situation of the poor. To be poor means to not have any sustenance, shelter, or any support from family. However nowadays, living alone, or being pushed out of society, being under depression of unchanging destitution also describes poverty. Being fired from a job, losing self-esteem, having no power, or being away from cultural values are also other parameters to describe poverty (Ropers, 25). Ropers also describes “widespread poverty” as a disloyalty to the democratic values’ failure to gain optimism. Successful leaders must aim to provide economical comfort for their citizens. If the majority of the people are not happy because of poverty, it means the government is not as strong to deal with the problems.

The official poverty line is inadmissible as an accurate system to determine the number of poor people. “The US government identifies the poverty line by multiplying the cost of a minimally nutritious diet by three,” then the number of people who live in the same house is calculated (Popers 35). According to the Census data for 2011, 46.2 million people in the United States lived below the poverty line. According to Peter Edelman, a law professor in Georgetown University, even though there are so many hard working people, they are still living in poverty or just barely above the poverty line (Bilitteri, 723). These people are not given the necessary governmental support. There is also a huge gap between the poor and the wealthy people in the US (Cooper, 337). The highest income is $102,000 for households, just 1% of the population, and the lowest earning is $250 for people, who make up 90% of the population, explains Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez (Bilitteri, 723).

One given image portrayed in the media is that “the poor have only themselves to blame” (Mantsios, 638). The problem of poverty is not just one individual’s problem. There is a strong connection between the poor and society. How can a defenseless child be responsible for being poor, not having shelter, and for not earning any money? How can a single or divorced mother with a little baby, without any family help, be expected to work full time without feeding the little one for hours. The term “poor are eyesores” (Mantsios, 637) is not a responsible and thoughtful depiction, rather, it is a way of not being able to see the problems of the people outside and breaking away from the realities of the poor.

More and more women, especially single mothers, are experiencing poverty at a higher rate than the rest of society. Ropers notes that 58% of women are facing poverty, and in this category 48% of the women are the head of their household. According to Albelda and Tilly, 50% of single women are below the poverty line with no support of a husband. In 1993, while 16% of families struggled against poverty, simultaneously, 52% of single mothers, bereft of husband or family support, experiences real difficulty to provide for their basic needs. Most women work at least two jobs at the same time. On the one hand they work at home without earning any money, and on the other hand work outside to earn money (Albelle & Tilly 307). In 1947, about 38% of women were working mostly in paid labor jobs; however, in 1954, the number of working women who were African American, doubled to 54%. Then in 1996 the ratio of working women rose up to 88%, as reported by Albella and Tilly. Even though the number of hard working women is increasing year by year, they are still, except for a small percentage, earning low income and their situation still remains below the poverty line. According to Albelda and Tilly, “women’s earnings are considerably lower than men’s, approximately 70 cents to the man’s dollar.” This difference makes women’s lives miserable as they try to work outside and head the household all at the same time.

For so many years, women have been endeavoring to have the same rights, opportunities, and benefits as men have in their working lives. Although women’s working situations are not as bad as some years ago, women still face graceless and unpleasant discrimination when they look for jobs. Even though women are more educated nowadays and have more opportunities to get a job, there are distinctive wage gaps between men and women. Being the head of the family (Bernstein, 370), giving birth to a child, being under differentiation of occupation, and being sexually abused by employers are some of the common reasons as to why women are behind men when it comes to the benefits of the jobs (Wage Project, 373).

Family responsibilities are one of the most common reasons why women work in a part time job instead of having a full time job (Bernstein, 371). There are so many married or single women who do most of the household responsibilities while trying to work in a job. It is hard to deal with the chores and manage the expectations at work at the same time. For this reason, women in these kinds of situations prefer to work in part time jobs. According to Bernstein, only 25% of women are able to work full day, for the rest of the women cannot dedicate their whole day for work. This being the case, women cannot get the equal remuneration like other women who work in full time jobs. Interestingly, there is also a huge payment gap between women who work full time and men who work full time. Bernstein explains that “on average women work a lot less than men: 1,498 hours a year, vs. 2,219 worked by the typical man.” According to The Wage Project, part time women employees make only 38% of men’s full time yearly salary. Bernstein also mentions the Hartmann and Rose’s data which shows that women employees can have the same benefits if they leave all the family responsibilities behind and come to work behaving like a “traditional man.” The continuation of such unfair treatment is sure to wear down woman, a situation that’s already strained them enough.

Another reason for the wage gap between men and women is the choice a women makes to have a child (Wage Project, 378). Bernstein says after quoting Bergland that after delivering a child, women have to work part time or stay away from work for a while because they do not receive the necessary help from the society.

Nowadays, the position of women employees is assumed to not be as powerful as men’s by most bosses (Wage Project, 377). Even if men and women have the same educational level (Bernstein, 372) and women show more talent, the suggestions made by women are mostly not considered important until, of course, there is no other choice but to accept (Wage project, 375). Bernstein states that women’s yearly salary is much less than men’s, even when they are at the same educational level.

Sexual harassment is another important factor for women to leave their jobs (Wage Project, 377). Sometimes in situations like these, women are unfortunately seen as sexual means by their bosses. If the women, even if they are educated, do not accept the advances of their bosses, they have no choice but to leave or drop out of their jobs, benefits, emotional solidity, and sometimes even their lives (Wage Project, 377). Women encounter such discriminatory situations at the same time while they are dealing with difficulties which they have in their personal lives.

Some people think that people are getting welfare because they are too lazy and they don’t want to work. This theory can be true for just a few people. Making this kind of generalization for all people who are in poverty is derogatory against them. Albelda and Tilly say that the reasons for the poverty experience by single mothers and their families is not because of their laziness or lack of ambition. They are in poverty because they don’t have parent support, they face job discrimination, they earn less than men, and they have the added responsibility of taking care of their children. Blaming the poor is so easy, but being aware of their situation and helping them out of it would be the best thing for all.

Making reforms on the welfare program will make it work well. Some malicious people display themselves as poor to get support from welfare. Under the welfare program, the situation of the applicant must be clarified through an attentive investigation. Determining the really needy persons, eliminating their needs, and opening free high qualified career courses will make welfare a more beneficial program for the poor and will reduce the complaints made against the program.

Being in poverty is mostly not a personal choice. People in poverty don’t just lack food or safe shelter, but they have also lost their hope and happiness. Women, especially single mothers with no support, encounter the most difficult situations of all. Having an income less than men, taking care of their children without any support, facing job discrimination, and heading the family are the most common adversities faced by women today. Receiving no government support will not help reduce their problems; on the contrary, having access to effective government support will let people in poverty know that there are people with helping hands, people who care about them and who think about them. Poor people need helping hands, at least to not let them give up their hopes and dreams.

References

• Albelda, Randy.,& Tilly, Chris. 2001. “‘Women, Income, and Poverty’: There’s a Family connection.” Race, Class, and Gender in The United States. Ed. Paula S. Rothenberg. New Jersey: Worth,. 305-314.
• Billitteri, Thomas J. “Gender Pay Gap.” CQ Researcher 18.11 (2008): 241-264. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. Elisabeth Sturn Library, Reno, NV. “Domestic Poverty.” CQ Researcher 17.31 (2007): 721-744. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. Elisabeth Sturn Library, Reno, NV. Cooper, Mary H. “The Working Poor.” CQ Researcher 5.41 (1995): 969-992. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. Elisabeth Sturn Library, Reno, NV. 5 Nov. 2008 “Income Inequality.” CQ Researcher 8.15 (1998): 337-360. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. Elisabeth Sturn Library, Reno, NV. 5 Nov. 2008
• Glazer, Sarah. “Welfare Reform.” CQ Researcher 11.27 (2001):601-632. CQ Researcher Online. CQ Press. Elisabeth Sturn Library, Reno, NV. 5 Nov. 2008 Berstein, Aoron. 2007. “‘Women’s Pay: Why the Gap Remains A Chasm.” Race, Class, And Gender in The United States. Ed. Paula S. Rothenberg. NJ: Worth. 370-372. Mantsios, Gregory. 2007. “‘Media Magic: Making Class Invisible.’” Race, Class, And Gender in The United States. Paula S.Rothenberg. New Jersey: Worth. 636-643. Ropers, H. Richard. 1991. Persistent Poverty, New York: Plenum. Rothenberg, Paula S. (Ed.). 2007. The Wage Gap And Its Costs. Race, Class, And Gender in The United States. NJ: Worth. 373-378.

Dear Peter, in your body, which is built like a well-functioning factory, I am the most essential sanitary device. As the heart pumps blood to take food and oxygen to all your organs, you obtain the energy you need. But do you ever think about the disposal after so splendid activities are carried out in your body? If you burn a stove, you need to dispose of the smoke and the ashes if you want to keep it working. Likewise, as you burn your calorie intake, you dispose of the smoke (carbon dioxide) with your lungs and the waste with nitrate-poisonous after a certain level of intensity-thanks to my quietly and perfectly working filters. That is, I am an organ which saves your life by removing the poisonous substances in your blood. I do not only filter your blood, but also play a role at controlling the balances of the sensitive levels of water, sugar, amino acids and different minerals in your body. In short, I am a tiny but strategic laboratory.

The acid-base balance in your body and the amount of water and different salts are significant values which concern all of your bodily activities. When their balance is upset, different troubles arise in different units of your bodily mechanism. I am such a blessing, which works so sensitively to adjust the levels of water and mineral salts in your body while you don’t even realize it.

A watery environment is needed for the thousands of biochemical activities taking place in your body. In addition, activities like the contracting of the muscles and transmission of electrical stimuli between your neurons are realized with the presence of a pinch of mineral salt you don’t even give a thought about. Sometimes you sweat due to running or hot weather. The white stains on your shirt are the salts you lose after the water evaporates. When you suffer from diarrhea, you lose salt again, for the salt in the nutrients are thrown out without being absorbed. Especially when little children are concerned, this loss is of vital importance. The transfer between the blood and the liquid in the tissues is mainly realized through the concentration differences which are kept in a certain balance. If your body holds too much water, your tissues swell. You particularly feel it when you press your finger over the flesh near your shins.

Dear Peter, I will not list all of my duties in detail in order not to confuse you. However, let me tell you one more. Since not everyone knows this duty of mine, they just see me as an organ of liquid disposal. But I also take part in controlling the blood production! Surprised? Well, I also have the duty of secreting the hormone which stimulates blood production in the bones. I must always stay alert and maintain this balance in the best way; if you start losing blood, for instance, I must increase the hormone and accelerate blood production.

Yes Peter, I’ve told you about a few of my basic duties, but haven’t told you about how wonderfully designed I am. I am a bean-shaped organ and a single kidney like me weighs 130-160 grams on average. We are approximately 10 grams lighter in female bodies. I am surrounded by a soft but protective membrane. I need 35 grams of daily oxygen supply to survive and I use 13 % of your total body energy.

As an army is made up of individual soldiers, I am like a complex army, and a single soldier of mine is called a “nephron,” which does the real job. Thus, you can see me as a body of nephrons. Millions of these nephrons are brought together to make up one kidney.

A single nephron is a thin tubular structure with closed ends, and its length is about 3-4 cm. So the total length of my nephrons is about 50 km. The cup-like sac at the beginning of a nephron is named the “Bowman’s capsule.” The main artery bringing blood to the kidneys branch into smaller units, and one road leads to every nephron. The knot of capillaries (glomerulus) inside this double-walled capsule is more complicated than any road map you might have seen. The total length of the capillaries is nearly 25 km. The unwelcome substances in the blood are passed to the capsule thanks to blood pressure, and they proceed through the tubule. The total surface area of my tubules is about 20 m2. Within five minutes the whole of your blood passes through us. That is to say, an average of 1.2 liters of blood per minute, and 1800 liters a day are filtered by my nephrons, leaving the toxic substances in me. As this amount of blood (nearly 400 times the normal amount in your body) pass through my tubules and return to the veins they leave behind an average of 180 liters of liquid in me. In this case, you could be supposed to throw out 180 liters of urine a day. However, if you really did that, you would neither be able to find a sufficient supply of water nor salt. Fortunately, Providence granted you the mechanism to absorb back nearly 178.5 liters of this filtered substance. This way, the thickened urine throws out the toxic nitrogen-containing byproducts together with a little amount of water. Therefore, I give you back the substances you need with an amount of 1.5 liters of liquid disposal a day. This reabsorbing is realized in what you call the Henle loop. The cells in the walls of my tubules have neither intellect, nor consciousness, nor any knowledge of physiology; in spite of this, they work as if they were perfectly aware of their duty to adjust the amounts and types the substances to be kept or released. To give you an idea, you can think about the huge dialysis machines your engineers design to fulfill the job my tiny tubules do. You decide which one of us is the perfect work of engineering.

A rich network of veins surround the Heinle loop and the reabsorbed substances are released into the bloodstream. The drops to be disposed of are collected and then passed to your bladder. When the liquid in your bladder amounts to a certain value it tightens the bladder walls. The muscles blocking the way out give way and the urine is disposed of. However, know that the bladder has the capacity to expand as large as 1.5 liters when you cannot find the proper time and place.

Peter, most people take for granted the blessings they enjoy. If you visit the nephrology service in a hospital and talk to the patients waiting to be dialyzed, you understand what I mean better. Do not forget that many people who suffer from kidney failure need that huge machine to filter the whole of their blood and they pray for a kidney suitable for transplantation to be found at once.

Incidentally, thinking of chronic kidney failure recalled various reasons which ruin me: long lasting infections, long-term use of certain medicine, different chemicals like ethylene and mercury, heavy loss of blood, high blood pressure, serious burns, and wrong blood transfers etc. In such cases I can receive irreparable damage.

Another issue which troubles me is the formation of kidney stones. The stones which form owing to failures in different metabolic processes really hurt. When excessive decrease of liquids or increases of salts in the body upset my sensitive balance, some dissolved substances remain, begin to collect, and form stones. These stones hinder urine flow and might cause infections. You may drink water abundantly to prevent these stones. Most importantly do not wait too much before going to the toilet. If you excuse me, I also strongly recommend you to urinate in sitting position; this helps emptying your bladder completely and reduces the risk of kidney stones.

I do my job properly until I lose 90 % of my working capacity. When a considerable part of me loses its capacity, the remaining good part boosts its activity to make up for the loss. When one of our twins are taken out with an operation, the other one does not complain at all; it grows a bit bigger and keeps working.

As the nature of honey depends on the nectars bees collect, the ingredients of the urine I produce depend on what’s in your body. Therefore, a urine analysis tells much in the case of illness. For example, I normally do not release valuable substances like glucose and protein in your blood into the urine, but return them to the bloodstream. As my friends cannot fulfill this function in diabetic patients, their urine analyses reveal glucose. As for medicines, I throw them out right away since they are alien substances to me.

Peter! You are young and healthy but be careful and do not get cold around the waist, otherwise I might trouble you. There’s a lot to tell you Peter, but I do not want to confuse you. Like any other organ, I do not like being taken for granted and I just wish for you to appreciate what a blessing I am. Let me note that my perfect cooperation with the rest of your body is another wonder in itself. Anyway, the urea in your blood is increasing, so I must go help my twin now. Goodbye Peter!

Irfan Yilmaz is a professor of biology at Dokuz Eylul University, Izmir.

Conventional water and wind turbines cannot function properly in a whirling current; the working of turbines depends on the existence of a steady and regular flow. In order to be able to obtain energy from vortices, turbines would need to mimic the movements of fish, adjusting their position to the differing angles of flow. A mechanical device to be developed in this respect should perceive the angle of the current flow instantly and adjust itself accordingly.

Normally, wind turbines are set up in high and open places. However, in cities the eddies that are formed by winds moving around buildings and roofs prevent conventional turbines from working efficiently. In order to overcome this challenge, scientists are aiming to develop turbines that benefit from the dynamic principles apparent in the movement of fish, though without imitating the fish exactly. They hope that in this way it will be possible to produce energy from turbulent currents as well. The projects being devised aim to develop different types of turbines to work in air and water. The energy production of these turbines will naturally be relatively low in comparison to common wind turbines operating in strong winds. However, these new types will make it possible to produce energy from winds moving at less than 32 feet per hour, when conventional turbines do not function. So, the total annual energy they are expected to produce will be no less than the regular wind turbines. If scientists can successfully model the admirable engineering applied in the bodies of fish, they will be able to boost the efficiency of these devices dramatically.

Notes

1. For further information see Liao J. C. et al., “Fish exploiting vortices decrease muscle activity,” Science 302, 1566–1569, 2003.
2. Dabiri, J. O., “Renewable fluid dynamic energy derived from aquatic animal location,” Bioinspiration and Biomimetics 2, L1-L3, 2007.

There are two different types of rules in the universe. One of these consists of the principles of the sciences, such as physics, chemistry, astronomy, astrophysics, biology and medicine, all of which occur in the universe. These sciences can be considered to be the “book of the universe.” This book does not have a language in the usual sense, but contains signs of God that are read through the eyes of wisdom. The second of these sciences consists of the rules that God has sent to us through the prophets; there is the Qur’an, brought by Prophet Muhammad, as well as revelations brought by other prophets, like the Psalms, the Torah, and the New Testament. It is essential that the revelations and the Book of the Universe, along with their contents, are known and the requirements within them adhered to. Generally speaking, the reward of reading and applying the Book of the Universe is granted in this world. The reward of adherence to the Qur’an is given in the Hereafter. Therefore, if believers only read and adhere to the sections concerned with worship in the Qur’an, they will be rewarded only in the Hereafter. If they read the Book of the Universe and adhere to it, they will be rewarded in this world. Happiness in both worlds is dependent on both these books being read and applied in balance. In actual fact, these two books are like the two sides of one reality. The same hand and authority is present in both. God, Who presents the universe to us, with all its richness and depth, speaks of this in the Qur’an. He tells us about ourselves-we are also a part of the Book of the Universe-through the Qur’an.

Within the guidelines of physical laws, He tells us about all creatures. He informs us of the irrevocable damage that will occur when something is missing from either of these two books. The verses in the Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet concerning work are focused for the most part on earning a livelihood. This situation should not be interpreted to mean working in a limited circle and neglecting other areas. There are two essential components concerning working. One of these is the necessity for the individual to work to secure their basic needs in order to survive, that is, working for their livelihood. The second is to work on the principles of making life easier. The Prophet encouraged working on both these points and personally taught the Companions how to work. In the Hadiths of the Prophet, working for earning a living has been is esteemed. For example “There are some sins that neither prayer, nor fasting or Pilgrimage can assist in forgiving, they can only be forgiven through the work carried out for one’s livelihood,”¹ “No human being has eaten anything more virtuous then what they have earned themselves. A messenger of God, the Prophet David also used to eat what he had worked for.”² It is also worthwhile to mention the following events to highlight this point. One day the Prophet met with Sa’d ibn Muadh and shook hands. The Prophet saw that the hands of Sa’d were calloused and asked the reason why, to which the latter replied ‘they are like this because I was working for my family’. Then the Prophet stated that ‘here are the hands that God likes.’” The Prophet set an example through working himself and also in teaching others how to work. On one occasion, after telling a man who was begging how bad begging was, the Prophet asked him, “Do you have nothing in your home?” to which the man replied he had nothing other than a cloth and a pot. Upon this, the Prophet asked the man to bring those to him. Then the Prophet auctioned off these objects to the Companions, raising two dirhams (the currency of the time). He gave the two dirhams to the man, telling him to use one dirham for his family and to buy a rope and an axe with the remaining dirham. The man came back with the rope and axe and the Prophet told him to cut and gather wood from the forest and sell this at the market, giving him a fifteen-day period. After a fortnight the man returned with ten dirhams.⁴ It is important to note that one aspect of how this topic is dealt with in both the Qur’an and the Hadiths is the balance between the two worlds. This balance is described in Sura Qasas, verse 77: With the things that God has endowed on you try to gain the Hereafter. Do not forget your share from the world. The Prophet indicates this balance in the hadith “do you know who is best of you? Those who do not forgo their world for the Hereafter or their Hereafter for their world, people who are this way will gain both the Hereafter and this world and will not be relianton any other.” It is apt to focus at this point on the theme of reliance on God (tawakkul). Understanding the connection between resigning oneself to God’s will and working has occasionally been problematical in the Muslim world. Even though reliance on God means to expect results from God and to have full faith in Him after having completed all the necessary requirements, there have been, amongst Muslim communities, those who have come to believe that reliance onGod means abandoning all rationale and believing that work is against such an entrustment of oneself in God’s hands. These people have argued that resignation to God’s hands means “to trust purely in God and refrain from carrying out any activities in relation to work; to do so enables people to connect with God and provide protection against (attaching one’s heart to) worldly possessions.” It is also possible to find religious principles that endorse this belief. People who think in this way give the following hadith as proof of their ideas “Your God orders as follows ‘O Mankind! Put aside time to worship so that I may fill your heart with richness and your hands with livelihood. O Mankind! Do not stray from me, otherwise I will fill your heart with poverty and your hands with preoccupation.’” “Whoever leaves all other activities and gives themselves over to the worship of God will fulfill all requirements for livelihood from where they least expect it. Whoever devotes themselves to the world, then God will make them a deputy to the world.” However such an understanding of placing oneself completely in God’s hand can only be applicable and reserved to those few who have devoted themselves purely to worship; it is not for the general public. The grindstone of social life is working. If there was no labor, communal life will come to a standstill. What we are saying is not that everyone forego the requirements of this trust, but rather they should hold steadfast, and the heart should be content after having done all that is necessary, and wait for the outcome. An Arab asked the Prophet “O Prophet, shall I rely on God after I tie my camel or after I let it go? To which the Prophet replied “Tie your camel then put your faith in God’s hands.”⁷ This answer is enough to resolve the issue. It is appropriate to give an explanation of the hadith that is used as evidence for reliance on God, but which is often misinterpreted. In this hadith the Prophet says “Had you placed yourselves in God’s hands sincerely, you would be fed like the birds. Birds leave their nests in the morning hungry and return full.” This hadith, on the surface, seems to mean that one should not do anything but wait for everything from God. But if you look at the sentences carefully, you will see that it stresses that the birds leave their nests to look for food and that they find their food in this manner; they do not stay in their nests waiting for food to come to them. Accordingly, true reliance on God means to do all that is necessary, then to wait for the results from God. This hadith also clearly highlights the difference between reliance on God and laziness. In fact, the annotator Qurtubi points out that the verse “Take your provisions for the Hajj. In truth, the best provision is righteousness and piety…” (Baqara 2:197) which deals with the pilgrimage, is another warning. He quotes this hadith in parallel to the following event: “The Yemenis who come to Mecca without provision to perform their Pilgrimage, begging there to satisfy their hunger then classing themselves as ones who have put themselves in Gods hands. When this verse was revealed it was a warning for people to get their own provisions on their travels.”⁹ It can be understood from the statement that “the best of provisions is piety” that it is considered pious to be content with what one gets without asking for more from others.

The two sides of piety

1) “(Piety is)… abiding by what is allowed and prohibited,in other words, adhering to what the religion says to ‘do’ and ‘not to do.’

2) “Abiding by the laws of creation, in other words, acting in accordance with the prevalent rules in the universe.” “It is important not to neglect this aspect of reliance on God. If we look at the life of the Prophet we can see that he lived his life by reading the rules of the universe and adhering to them, without neglecting all the causative factors. For example, he asked his Companions to “extinguish all fires in the house before going to sleep.” In this and similar examples one can see that it is important to adhere to causative factors so that no harm comes to the house through a fire.”¹⁰ Umar ibn Khattab, who was well aware of this fact, expelled all the Yemeni people who used to beg, saying they had resigned to God’s will, from the streets of Medina. He told them that they had not actually resigned themselves to God’s will, but rather they were like parasites. He went on to say that “One who resigns themselves to God’s will plants a seed”¹¹

It can be seen from this that resignation to God’s will and work are not opposed to one another. Scholars who see no contrast between working and resignation to God’s will have offered the following explanation: “One can work and place their faith in God’s hands at one and the same time. Reliance on God means placing your faith in God and believing that everything is from God and the place for this is in the heart. Fulfilling the requirement of causes is through the organs. Accordingly, it is possible for things to do with the heart and the organs to co-exist in one person”¹² It is also possible to give the following explanation: As much as it part of God’s will that we expect results from God, it is also His wish for us to adhere to the causal factors. Therefore it is inconceivable that these two wishes contradict one another. On the contrary, adherence to these two wishes is compulsory and it is the one who adheres to these who will be successful in both this and the other world. In conclusion, we can say that both the Qur’an and the Sunna glorify any form of work that increases productivity and production. In other words, in line with Islamic principles, Islam places great value on any production that meets the needs for continuing life or to making life easier and more enjoyable. This being the case, it is also possible to see that the Muslim world does not present a picture that is parallel to this thought. This must be related to ideas that are placed in our mentality through basic teachings. We see it as necessary to rethink these values that have been embodied in our minds.

Notes

1. Sahawi, Ahsanut Taqasim, Beirut, 1994, p. 157.

2. Bayhaqi, Sunanul Kubra, Ijara, 15.

3. Sarahsi, Al-Mabsut, vol.30, p:246, Darul Marifa, Beirut.

4. Abu Dawud, Zakat, 26; Ibn Maja, Tijarat, 25.

5. Ajluni, Kashful Khafa, I, 393.

6. Tirmidhi, Qiyama, 30; Ibn Maja, Zuhd, 2.

7. Tirmidhi, Qiyama, 60.

8. Tirmidhi, Zuhd, 33; Ibn Maja, Zuhd, 14.

9. Qurtubi, al-Jamiu li Ahkamul Qur’an, 2:411.

10. F. Gulen, Kirik Testi (Broken Jug), Istanbul 2004, p. 165.

11. Ibn Abud Dunya, Kitabut-Tawakkul, p.1; Ahmet Naim, The Principles of Islamic Ethics, p.70).

12. Bajuri, Sharhu Jawharatit Tawhid, p.442–446; Kushayri, ar-Risala, p. 163.

International companies around the world have used most of the child labor for years. For example, one famous worldwide shoe company in the United States employs five thousand people in the United States and employs ninety five thousand people in Far Eastern Asian countries. Therefore, most of the production by this company has been made in the factories in Far East Asia. The company, however, has been using children as work power, while paying them only $1.5 per month. Just this example shows how difficult the working children’s situation is in the world, and makes people shudder. Although the situation is very serious, there have not been important efforts to protect children from working in unsuitable places. While we see children labor in developed countries, the situation is even worse in developing countries.

THESE CHILDREN BELONG TO US

Children have been being worked at places that need less technology. In industries, many heavy jobs require cheap labor; therefore, children are the best workers for this kind of jobs. There are many reasons why even small aged group children have been pushed to work at unsuitable workplaces. Over population, poverty, migration from rural to urban areas, the education level of the parents, etc. are the main causes for working children. Especially in developing countries, when families migrate to cities, most of the time they live at a ghetto without a healthy environment and well-paying job. Therefore, every member of the family is a potential worker to bring food and money to the home. Many times, children are the most suitable workers for this kind of situation because parents do not have qualified work eligibility; therefore, it is hard for these parents to earn good money. Some cultural misconceptions also put children in work places. For example, in some cultures some families think their children should he taught to get ready for future life. This thinking sometimes force children to work at small ages to see how difficult life is. While child labor is a part of the daily life in third world countries, the problem has not been solved in developed countries either. Because children are considered the free work power, they are the only source of money for poor families. Even today, child labor problems are still a big problem in Spain, Portugal, Turkey, and some other countries. The income anomalies, poverty, high unemployment rate, low school finishing rate, etc. are the main reasons why child labor has been used in Turkey, a developing country with high young population rate.

WORKING CHILDREN; PROBLEMATIC CHILDREN

If children at early ages are allowed to work at dangerous places, without good meals, with unsafe health environments, poor education, and neglect, we have to accept that these children will bring big problems to our society. Yet these children have the rights to receive a good education, security, a secure place to work, and the ability to join social activities. They need to be provided with all of their needs. When children stay away from their family’s control, and especially children who work on the street, will automatically be put in some risk from the streets and be vulnerable to exploitation. Any kind of drug uses, sexual abuses, and harassment are the main risks that children may come across in a short time on the streets.

CHILD LABOR AND CHILDREN RIGHTS IN THE WORLD

Though the exact number of children workers in the world is not known, according to the United Nation International Children Fund’s estimation (UNICEF), the number of working children are more than two hundred million. According to International Labor Organization’s report, more than eighteen percent of the 14-18 age group of children are working in developing countries (Latin America, Asia, and Africa). In other words, children laborer is eight percent of the world’s potential 2.4 billions work power.

Today, not only most of the children’s future are in danger, but also their health and life are under threat around the world. It is possible to see working children continuous in history because the labor is cheap, and they are unable to protect their rights; especially industrial capitalists, factories, mining companies exploited children a lot. At that time, a generation was forced to pay the bill of Western Industrialization. Days and Nights from children to elderly people, everybody has worked. The first studies for children’s legal rights and protection started around the 1880s. The first applications to protect children and give them security by government began in 1802 in England. With this law, children were forbidden to work between 9.00 p.a. and 6.00 a.m. during nights. For the first time in 1890, the working children rights were discussed internationally at Berlin Conference in Germany. Children from both sex groups were prohibited to work unless they turned a specific age and finished their primary school education. The first international documents on children rights was signed with the Zurich Children Right Announcement in 1923. In addition, the United Nation Children Rights report was accepted in 1959.

DEVELOPED COUNTRIES ARE UNCOMFORTABLE WITH THE SITUATION

ILO, the main international children organization, was working to prevent child labor with classic methods. That is, the main methods used by them were prohibiting children under a specific age and punished companies that allowed children to work. This classic method started to change in the 1990s. Under the United Nations umbrella role, ILO and some other children organizations began to develop new strategies and projects to protect children. For example, Germany founded the IPEC project. However, there are still some obstacles that need to be solved. Children from developing countries have been used as a study case, which brought some doubts about the success of the project.

Child labor is cheap, yet this is a disadvantage for developed countries. Some developed countries argue that it is not fair to compete with developing countries because they allow working children as cheap work forces while developed countries can not. Therefore, the G-7 (the most developed seven countries in the world), and 24 countries have taken some actions at the ILO and OECD level in order to stop this acting unjustly competition. Here is a typical example from Germany: Germany has been importing carpets and rugs from India for years. German people started protesting these products from India because children produced these carpets and rugs. Finally, India agreed that they would send an official certificate to Germany showing that the products were not made by children.

Some experts think that labor by children is not productive. According to Jean Maurie Derrien, an expert at ILO, children work power is a vicious circle and does not make nations rich, but only causes poverty. The reason is because if children work, the level of education, qualified work power or profession, and the rate of earning will get lower. The lack of healthy food, poor housing and lack of immunization from diseases brings low working capabilities and, thus, poverty. All of these unsuitable working conditions have many impacts on children for the rest of their lives. In order to solve these problems, ILO started a program called IPEC in developing countries, such as Turkey, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Kenya, etc. which includes serial conferences, seminars, and other activities. The program is still continuing, therefore, the results are yet to come.

Imitation of nature

Some scientists assert that the 21st century will be a century of biology. They are of the opinion that an ideal, peaceful community life is attainable by imitating nature. This kind of thinking is not new. There is a history of application of some socio-biological information about animal behaviour in some studies of human social behaviour, and the application in manmade artefacts of the design and structure of some living creatures (so-called bio-engineering). Adaptation of the structures which enable birds to fly in the design of planes is a well-known example.

Whether the sensitive measures in the human body, which is the most perfect of biological structures, and the ideal, economical balance in its bio-chemical and biological mechanisms, are applicable in the organization of human societies is a question that has attracted the attention of many scientists. If a living body is a perfect organism composed of billions of cells and millions of physiological and bio-chemical processes take place in it without any error or failure, and, in parallel with this, the living system itself both grows and reproduces and defends and repairs itself, then must it not be possible to apply such a system to a community of such living creatures?

Share of values

Although the brain and spinal marrow have the main functions in directing the operation of human or animal bodies that have a nervous system, the ‘lower’ systems such as stomach and intestines also make a contribution. Each of these organs or systems plays a significant part in the working and maintenance of a healthy body. However conspicuous the function of organs such as the brain, heart and liver, it cannot be said that any of the other organs like kidneys or stomach or intestines are less vital. Especially when we bear in mind that the existence of anything depends on the existence of all its parts, and that its death or non-existence may be effected by the lack of any of those parts, or that a single, cancerous cell may ultimately cause the death of a whole body, we realize that each part has a vital function in the operation and maintenance of the living whole.

The health of the parts is necessary to the health of the whole. If the stomach and intestines fail to secrete the necessary enzymes for digestion, however healthy the brain and heart are, you will die of hunger and lack of necessary energy. Likewise, if your pancreas does not work well enough to secrete the necessary insulin, it will cause the failure of the metabolism of sugar. If, again, fat accumulates in your veins because of a failure of even a single bio-chemical mechanism, then the health of your heart will not suffice for you to survive. These simple examples suffice to show that there is nothing unnecessary or superfluous in the system. Even if some organs have relatively greater value in maintaining the body, that does not mean that other organs are less valuable. The same should be the case with the health and maintenance of a community.

No negligence however little it may be

The least failure in any of the organs or systems of the body manifests itself as a pain or uneasiness. For example, a pain caused by a callous on your toe which prevents you from treading normally, may lead to pains in your waist or knees. An insignificant-seeming callous may upset the balance of your legs and waist vertebra.

The same is true for a community. Seemingly negligible failures in the life of a community may frequently give rise to great problems later on. The health of non-central parts of a community corresponding to such bodily extremities as the toe is almost as important as the health of those parts corresponding to the brain and heart in a body. If any defect or failure in any of the former is seen as negligible and attention needed to remove or remedy the problem is not given, it may lead to disorder of the whole system.

Economic structure

Inflation, shortage of means of livelihood (employment), poverty, insecurity, and social ills such as bribery and abuses, and social crimes such as theft, are among the primary diseases undermining the health of a community. Every duty to be done within the structure of a community is like the wheels or parts of a machine, each with a unique function and value of its own. Each of the parts of a social structure should contribute to economic development and take its share in that development in return, and on occasions of economic crisis, then each of those parts should share the responsibility and results. Again in this respect the working of a body can be imitated.

When a body cannot get sufficient food, its metabolic rate, the rate it uses up the food taken in, is reduced. The body, as it were, tightens its belt, adapts to a lower standard of living. It slows down its work- rate and uses energy economically to survive. A lower pulse rate uses body energy more economically.

A body works automatically in accordance with the rules its Maker has established for it. By contrast a community is composed of people having free will. Therefore, the imitation of a body by a community depends on its members disciplining themselves. They must know how to restrain their bodily urges and control some bad qualities common to men such as greed, selfishness and refusal to be content. In a biological system, the commands issuing from the central nervous system and the stimulants coming from glands take into account the structure, working system and endurance and tolerance capacity of each and every organ and tissue and their molecular structure. Also, since all sorts of stimuli and responses coming from organs and tissues are carried by the central nervous system with due care and attention, nothing wrong emerges in normal conditions. Thus, in order for a community to be as well ordered as a body, those who hold its reins, those who occupy the governmental positions should know all the units forming it well enough with all their compositions and needs and give due consideration to their reflections and the responses coming from them.

Sharing happiness and sorrows

If, for example, there is not sufficient sustenance in blood and the stomach and intestines suffer shortage of food, the brain never lets the body amuse itself or relax in pleasures and extravagance. Any pain or problem which emerges in any part of the body is shared by the whole body itself. If, by contrast, the leaders of a community indulge in luxuries and pleasures while some sections of it suffer from deprivation of the basic necessities of life, then it is not possible to talk of it being a healthy community.

The balance of income and output

It is inevitable for a body to grow fat and become diseased when too much food enters it and, by contrast, get thin and become diseased if it cannot get enough food. A healthy, balanced nourishment depends on the balance between the food taken and used up as energy. This balance of supply and demand or income and output changes according to the periods of babyhood, youth, full development and old age. Like the body, a community must be careful about establishing a balance of supply and demand. Unbalanced development, imbalance between income and output, and deepening of the gap between the rich and poor are some of the social diseases leading a community to disease or death.

System and energy

A system needs sufficient energy to survive and preserve its vitality and to develop. There is no difference in needing energy between an insect and a whale and between an elephant and a man, nor does a state or community differ from a factory or work-shop in needing and using it rationally. In order to be able to grow and make new syntheses for production, besides raw material, a living system is in dire need of energy. We can use the substances which we take by eating and drinking and will serve as building material for our bodies only by burning carbohydrates and fat to produce energy. A body which cannot take the kinds of food supplying energy loses its vitality. Tissues begin to separate and cells break down and die. Similarly, the amount of the energy a community needs for a good economic life and the cost of it are of vital importance for the health of that community. The more abundant and less expensive energy is, the more balanced and productive its economic life is.

Feed-back

One of the significant features of a living organism is, that it operates under control by a feed-back system. Every event in this system is connected with others, none of them being independent. If any substance increases above a certain measure, the increase is blocked up by a mechanism beginning to work just at that time. For example, in the process of the kidneys separating waste liquid from the blood to discard it from the body with some amount of water, the density of the waste substances in it such as urea, uric acid and superfluous salt is sensitively regulated. If it is hot and the body requires to be cooled through sweat, the kidneys hold more water and prevent dehydration. If, by contrast, it is cold and there is no need to sweat, this time, they discard more water and thereby regulate the inner balance of the body.

Maintenance of the balance of the body requires sensitivity to whatever happens within and outside the body. There are sufficient receptors in each of the sense organs, particularly the skin, in tendons and in the walls of the veins, to feel any change of heat, pressure, light, food and oxygen, etc., in the inner and outer environment, and inform the central nervous system accordingly. In this way, the body is adaptable to a wide range of conditions in the world.

Similarly, in order to maintain the order of a community, it must have the same adaptability. This is possible through a loose structure of bureaucracy, a sophisticated communication network and a well- ordered system established on well- working principles.

Co-ordination within the system

Co-ordination and making good each other’s shortcomings are important characteristics of a living body. For example, when we are eating or are full after eating, the veins in the stomach and intestines swell and more blood is pumped into them so that the stomach and intestines can work efficiently. While one is running or doing physical exercise, the muscles need more oxygen and glucose which are carried in the blood: the veins in internal organs become narrow so that more blood can be sent to the muscles. If someone unaware of this attempts to do severe physical exercise on a full stomach, the body will have to exert more effort to send blood to both the stomach and muscles and become exhausted, as well as causing the heart to become overworked and tire.

Similarly, co-ordination among its institutions and members, division of labour and putting things in order of importance are vital for the institutions of a healthy community as well as for the community itself. Just as too much heavy exercise or overeating may cause the brain to be left without sufficient blood or the kidneys to stop filtering, excessive expenditure on some sections of labour or discrimination between the sections or institutions of a community may result in great disruptions and uneasiness in it. 

Education and collective consciousness

Many more examples may be given for the correspondence between a living body and a community. We can take lessons from a living body to realize a healthy social life. However, what is particularly worthy of mention here is that while a body works automatically according to a magnificent program or system which requires infinite knowledge to prepare and establish — knowledge of the structure of all the cells, tissues and organs of the body and their way of working, and of the nature of their relation among themselves and the relation of the body with its near and remote environment, in short, knowledge of the whole of the universe — the members of a community have free will and therefore require to be disciplined and controlled. This is possible through a perfect educational system fully aware of the nature of man and his material, spiritual and social needs and having the necessary equipment to satisfy them.

So that he may survive and fulfil his functions among the creatures in the world, man is empowered with three principal faculties. These are his appetites — for the opposite sex, offspring, livelihood, commodities, etc.; his anger or forcefulness in defence and struggle; and his power of reasoning or intellect. In order that man may attain moral perfection by struggling against excess in the use of these three faculties, they are not restricted in nature. However, mans individual and collective happiness lies in his disciplining them for the sake of a harmonious, peaceful individual and social life. He also needs to be in transactions with his fellow-men to exchange the fruits of his skills and labour with those of others. This requires an overall justice in society. So, unless man disciplines his faculties, they may drive him to immorality, illicit sexual relationships, unlawful livelihood, tyranny, injustices, deception, falsehood, and other vices. To prevent the chaos and suffering that must follow undisciplined exercise of human powers and establish justice in society, man must submit to an authority that will guide and regulate his collective affairs. Seeing that there is a perfect harmony in the working of his body, a working which displays infinite knowledge, wisdom and consciousness, although his body is made up of parts completely unconscious, ignorant, deaf and blind, the authority to which man must submit must be the same as that which governs his body and environment. And, just as the body works, although unconsciously, in perfect co-ordination, the members of a community must endeavour to establish a like co-ordination and achieve an effective collective consciousness, that is, responsibility to and for each other.

The personal computer industry has created an enthusiastic, ever-growing market for multimedia technology for use in homes and businesses, the high profile of Internet (‘the data superhighway’) and continuing pressure to work and learn more efficiently have added to the demand for new concepts in education and training. The characteristics in demand are flexibility, user- friendliness and lower costs.

Ten years ago computers were command-driven and mostly used for simple tasks such as word-processing. These days graphical interfaces and user-friendly programming have revolutionized the old ‘cold face’ of computer working. Applications such as Windows, OS/2, and Mac Systems are now mouse-driven, capable of multi-tasking, and less intimidating for the novice. Computers are now used for CAD (Computer Aided Design), CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing), graphics, communication, automation, simulation, animation, and much more. Complex tasks are easier then ever before and have replaced human labour in many areas.

Development of new and better computers, local area networks (LANs). remote access software (especially ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) and ISDN (Integrated System Digital Network)), using the latest in leased and digital telephone lines, have opened up new horizons in working, teaching and learning practices. These developments in remote communication systems have greatly reduced the need to travel. Wide availability of this technology has changed the working practices of some companies fundamentally. Teleworking is recognized as a practical alternative to conventional office working. Video-conferencing facilities enable direct visual and audio contact between emote offices, and almost instantaneous information/document transfer. Working from home means not having to be in the office, more control over daily schedules, the freedom to live further from the workplace, and relief from the stresses (and costs) of commuting. The company benefits from reduced office rental and personnel costs: expertise and skills can he dialled up as needed,

Reduced hardware and software costs and increased computing power have extended and popularized teleworking applications. Medical specialists can now examine patients on a screen and give advice down a phone line: just such a link-up exists between some hospitals as far apart as the USA and Saudi Arabia. It is possible to attend a lecture without leaving one’s favourite chair, while still having the opportunity to ask questions and have them answered. ‘Distance learning’ technology has especially important implications for the disabled who can access education without the stress of getting to a class or (unless they want to) facing class-mates. New York University’s School of Continuing Education is building its own Virtual College. Other institutions, such as California Polytechnic and the New Jersey Institute of Technology, are exploring similar projects.

Interactive distance learning is not just a future project. In many isolated places in the USA school children already enjoy such facilities via dial-tip modems: they do not have to travel through rain and snow any more. And getting on to the school communications network does not cost the user any more than an ordinary telephone call.

In the past, computers in schools ate into school budgets without providing any appreciable return. In companies, investments in information technology were used mostly to automate old learning processes instead of to enable new ones. All that is starting to change. Enormous growth in CD-ROM drives, LANs and Internet connections, multimedia, and collaborative software environments, is fuelling a wave of new, better teaching tools. Networking enables virtual workgroups to be set up almost instantly. There are dial-in services that permit anytime/anyplace access to course materials and fellow students.

The technology promises more than just an improvement in educational productivity: it may deliver a qualitative change in the nature of learning itself. Because computers have no feelings, they make very patient teachers, incapable of exasperation or anger: and they can work 24 hours a day. Also, because they have enormous memory capacity and don’t make choices about what to remember, they can be responsive to questioning in many disciplines. The information they can offer can therefore be multi-disciplinary, multilevelled. Multimedia interactive packages exploit this to the benefit of system users. The consequence is a dramatic change in educational methods. Instead of a one-way information flow to the learner – typified by TV broadcast, video cassette or a teacher addressing a class of students passively taking notes – the new teaching techniques are two-way, collaborative, interactive, and interdisciplinary. Multimedia enables teaching material to change from a flat, one-dimensional text to something that moves, speaks, sings, has innumerable examples and references and lines of inquiry on hand if the individual user feels inclined to follow them up. Cut- and-paste features, now more or less standard, mean the user can compose notes, essays and reports which are just as lively and varied as the source he or she is accessing.

Studies on multimedia argue in favour of its effectiveness as a learning tool. The Software Publishers Association’s 1994 report on technology effectiveness cites accounts of measurable improvements from the use of animation, video, laser discs, CD-ROM books, and hypermedia. Cognitive studies show thaw people get 80 percent of their information visually but retain only 11 percent of that. They acquire significantly less through hearing but then remember a much higher proportion of it. A combination of the two methods is, unsurprisingly, the most effective of all boosting retention rates by as much as 50 percent. Therefore, the new system of ‘Education on demand’, in homes and on-the-job, is likely to become part of everyday learning activities.

Producing educational systems and materials has long been very big business in the world. The US spends $300 billion yearly on education from nursery through high school. More than half the schools in the country now use computers in almost every discipline, and 99 percent of schools have at least one computer. According to a report from IBM Academic Consulting, American institutions of higher education have spent an estimated $70 billion on computer-related goods and services over the past 15 years; of that amount, as much as $20 billion was for teaching and learning technology. Training magazine, in its annual industry survey, estimates that US corporations with more than 100 employees budgeted $51 billion for training in 1994. Some estimates put the total spending per year by all companies and their employees at $90 to $100 billion.

The Software Publishers Association’s Report on the Effectiveness of Technology in Schools, 1990-1994, a summary of 133 studies, found that educational technology clearly boosted student achievement, improved student attitudes and self-concept, and enhanced the quality of student-teacher relationships. In this area of learning, the most promising technologies are interactive video networking and collaboration tools. Computers are amazingly diligent teachers, they can stimulate creative thinking, promote enterprise, and sharpen curiosity. Of course, availability of hardware and software is not by itself the solution to current educational problems. Reaping the benefits of available technology first requires extensive teacher training, adapted or new curricula, and, most important, changes to educational models. Modern educational concepts emphasize individualized, hands-on learning: teamwork; and guided discovery of information. All of these require technological assistance, and they are almost impossible to achieve without the help of computers. It is right to note that for teacher training and for the preparation of individually designed course materials, the latest software packages, even with relatively little preparatory training, provide the appropriate tools.

The interactive technology has made education more accessible and more enjoyable. With the help of computers educators can tailor tutoring to the individuals own needs. There is more information about any topic these days than anybody can handle. Therefore, storing and retrieving readily available study materials on computers mean teachers can focus on explaining in form at ion instead ol conveying information. The implications of this transformation affect both students and teachers. Teachers become more like coaches, while students are free to discover knowledge on their own – they can browse, pick and choose what and how, and how fast, they want to learn.

Multimedia applications include analogue and digital video, 2-D and 3- D animation, audio, and even hyperlinks and digital links: CD-ROM discs and drives, graphics display hardware and sound cards. Digital signal processors for speech recognition and signal processing are starting to appear in desktop systems and will play an increasing role in learning systems. Given the enormous growth of CDROM-equipped PCs in homes, multimedia could soon become the key ‘crossover’ application linking the home and school markets.

Instead of the conventional broadcast model of distance learning, which requires participating students to watch a live video transmission via cable or satellite links or wait for days to receive a videotape in the mail, new schemes allow students to dial in at their convenience and participate in a class asynchronously. While it isn’t in real time, the opportunity for feedback and participation is enhanced by rich two-way communications channels.

The new employee-training concept of training on demand, learning while working. promises to bring information to employees at their workstations. Training as a separate centralized department in a company may soon be a thing of the past. The changing nature and growing diversity of the work force require new kinds of training in cultural sensitivity, communications skills, and problem solving. Employees are more geographically dispersed than in the past, and staff turnover is higher because companies and employees are less loyal to each other. Hardly anyone holds a job for life. Technology is evolving so quickly that skills require frequent refreshing. Taking workers to traditional classrooms means losing man-hours, heavier training costs and less hands-on training. Also, employee-training is a risky investment, given that the employee is free, after training, to go elsewhere. Companies are therefore trying to link learning to the job itself. This can take the form of expert systems integrated into the work area or even hand-held computers connected via wireless communications to a constantly updated information base. This kind of distant’ and ‘on-the-job’ learning is significantly less expensive than transporting employees to a central location, putting them up in hotels, and forfeiting their lost productivity. If the training material is distributed throughout the Local Area Network, trainees can pick it up for themselves. This increases retention of information and decreases learning time.

The single recent advance that is making the biggest difference in training and education is the Internet. It gives everybody easy access to information they cannot find locally or even, sometimes, nationally. Via Internet anybody can access almost any library resources in the world, talk to any interest groups or obtain any information from more than 30 million users in the Internet ‘community’. Thousands of Gopher, WWW, FTP, WAIS, ARCHIE servers offer terabytes of information on every subject imaginable. One can visit virtual galleries, virtual museums, virtual schools, virtual libraries, virtual communities, shop at virtual malls – and play games.

But, but….

Clearly the new technology facilitates access to information and in doing so makes many tasks easier, more agreeable, often more exciting. However, as we are all social beings, the importance of direct contact between people in the creation of the more subtle human skills should not be forgotten. Being paid for the efficient performance of tasks is not the only reason people work; they may also need to be out at work, away from their home-base, for purposes other than recreation, and to he physically part of a team. The sharing and exchange of experience between people. both in the context of the family and the work-place, is certainly instrumental in the creation of sound, responsible human character. That in turn is relevant to the capacity people have for making good’ decisions relating to their own and other people’s lives.

Information is not quite the same thing as knowledge, still less is knowledge to be confused with wisdom. Few parents can equal the capacity of television programmes, for example, to convey information to their children. Nevertheless, the role of parents in conveying (however indirectly and inexpertly) their experience of life to their children is the more decisive influence in moulding their children’s characters. It is certainly true that, in some families, children have more contact with the ‘present, immediate’ world of TV images than with the ‘past’ of their parents’ experience of life, but in these cases the TV is being abused, which is not the fault of the technology. Similarly, the new interactive multimedia information technologies should not be rejected because they might be abused. Rather, the dangers, the possible abuses, should be pondered and understood and proper regimes introduced to avoid the dangers. These new technologies are there and make available a vastly increased potential to get at and handle information. They cannot be a substitute for human relations, nor can they replace the learning and understanding that come through the experience of human relations.

Working patterns have changed drastically over the last decade with few reaping the benefits of advances in technology. Occupational stress has become a fact of life in most professions. Recently, a British court classified stress as an industrial injury in the ease of a social worker, strengthening the view that the pressure on the ‘caring professions may be greater than on others. Several research studies carried out in a number of countries suggest that stress and ‘burnout’ among teachers is a common problem.

The Meaning of Stress

For many people work proves to be a source of stress. Work stress is usually short-lived and overcome successfully. However, for some, it represents a continual threat and can lead to serious damage to health. The term ‘stress’ originates from physics in which it is used to describe ‘any force, strain, or pressure to a system.’

In the case of teacher stress, it is used to describe ‘a demand made upon the adaptive capacities of the mind and body… which if continued beyond the ability of these capacities to respond, leads to the physical and psychological exhaustion and possibly the ultimate collapse referred to by Seyle’ (Fontana, 1989).

Seyle (1956) laid down the foundation for later research in this area. He described stress as ‘the non-specific response of the body to any demand’. This diversion from the conventional meaning-became popular among physiologists.

Teacher Stress

If you are a teacher, ask yourself the following questions: Do you feel ‘used up’ at the end of the working day? Do you feel emotionally drained? Do you often feel overworked and underpaid? Do you feel alienated from the school in which you teach, from your colleagues, or from the administration? Are you having trouble dealing with paperwork? Do you often feel burnt out, irritable, or depressed at the end of a school day? Do you often miss school because of minor illness? If your answer to one or more of these question is ‘yes’, you are a teacher under stress and a candidate for ‘burnout’. If you are, unfortunately, you are not alone.

Education in most parts of the world has undergone rapid changes in the last two decades. The relationship between teachers and pupils is more informal and pupils are much more reluctant to accept a teacher’s authority. Parents and pupils are increasingly aware of their ‘rights’ within the education system. All these changes were designed to benefit the ‘clients’, and have resulted in an even greater burden on staff to justify what and how they teach. Whilst welcoming the situation where teachers are no longer on pedestals but are more approachable, we must recognize that it is now more difficult to motivate pupils when the ‘because I say so’ line has been removed from the teacher’s vocabulary. The status of the teacher in society has declined considerably. At one time, teachers were held in high esteem by society, on a par with doctors, solicitors, etc.

The effect of teacher stress is not restricted to the classroom. It is obvious that a teacher under stress does not produce good results, but the problem does not end there. Faber’s aptly titled book, Crisis in Education: Stress and Burnout in the American Teacher (1991), concludes that ‘teacher stress and burnout have affected and will continue to affect the lives of teachers and their families’ The work of Friedman (1992) and Borg et al (1991) show that the changes in education and resultant increase in stress is not restricted to western Europe and America.

The causes of teacher stress

Borg, Riding and Falzon (1991), through answers to questionnaires provided by 545 Maltese teachers, identified four main causes of stress. They were:

• pupil misbehaviour
• poor working conditions
• poor staff relations
• and time pressures.

Each of these categories could be broken down further. For example, the most common cause of stress was ‘pupil misbehavior’ and the most common aspect of ‘pupil mishehaviour’ was ‘pupil’s lack of motivation’ followed by the sheer numbers in the class, etc. Their work suggested that almost all teachers suffered from a degree of stress.

Levels of stress

Educational research identifies four levels of stress.

Low: where the stress presents no major problems

Moderate: where the level is bearable but the individual should examine ways of reducing it

Serious: where there is a risk of a psychological breakdown

Very serious: where the individual is nearing a state of total collapse described by Selye (1976). Fontana and Abouserie at the University of Wales, using the above categories identified the scale of the problem, found that 72.6% of teachers suffered from moderate stress and 23.2% had more serious problems. The stress level for men was slightly higher than women.

Coping with stress

Ability to deal with stress varies from person to person. It has been found that ‘stronger correlations to burnout existed in terms of how teachers perceive themselves rather than how they feel others perceive them’ (Friedman, 1991). The one who copes best is the one who manages to feel that the benefits out- way the problems’ or to say ‘I enjoy working with students’.

Several stress management programmes have been developed. They aim at teaching coping techniques. An alternative approach is religion as there is a positive relationship between religion and decrease in stress.

Teachers have to, under today’s stressful conditions, develop strong personalities in themselves and others. The function of education should not be limited to imparting knowledge alone, but concurrent with the teaching of subject matter, it should be concerned with the emotional aspects of development. This will best be realized by emphasizing the aim of self- knowledge. This is a pivotal issue in personality development and human education. How can teachers be helped to cope with their stress? What needs to he done or what changes should be emphasized in education so that teachers can best actualize their potentialities and function optimally in their respective groups? Religion is very similar to certain forms of psychotherapy in the way it alters cognitive appraisal. It provides a set of personal and social values and methods of self actualization which are consistent with one another. Religion produces a positive self concept. In terms of the transactional model, religion offers relief from stress by altering the perception of demand, of capability and of the importance of coping. For example, toil and drudgery may be seen to be praiseworthy forms of worship, faith brings renewed physical and psychological strength, where admittance to a heaven is more important than success or even survival in the world. For many millions of people the practice of religion appears to be effective in enhancing their ability to cope with life and, on this evidence alone, its effects must be judged to be important both by the individual and his society. In one study of combat soldiers in the Second World War, three-quarters of the infantry-men questioned said that prayer helped a great deal to control intense fear, while 60 per cent of the airmen surveyed in another study reported that prayer helped them cope with stress. An individual’s belief system or world view provides a sense of coherence and a means of coping with stress. For some, this sense of coherence makes frustration, failure and pain more tolerable.

Some are able to cope with stress better than others, and others actively seek it out. It could perhaps be argued that committed teachers are in some cases more likely to suffer adverse effects of stress than uncommitted ones. If a teacher is indifferent to his pupils’ progress or the standard of their behaviour then there is no sense of frustrating, stressful failure if standards are not achieved. On the other hand an idealistic member of staff with high expectations is likely to experience feelings of stress if his expectations are not shared either by his pupils or by his colleagues. Research suggests that religious people are able to cope with stress. Pargament (1990) showed that religious belief, faith and rituals:

1. make stressful events more bearable by providing a meaningful, coherent explanation and orderliness to events in the universe
2. provide a source of hope and comfort as well as established guidelines on how to handle stressful events
3. nurture a sense of belonging as promoting identity and a sense of intimacy and support with both God and with the religious community.

References

• BORG, MG. (1990) ‘Occupational Stress in British Education Setting: a review’. Educational Psychology, 10, p.103-126.
• BORG, M.G. et al ‘Stress in Teaching: a study of occupational stress and its derminants, job satisfaction and career commitment among primary school teachers’, Educational Psychology, 11, p.59-75
• FONTANA, D. (1989) Managing Stress, London, Routledge.
• FONTANA, D. & ABOUSERIE, R. (1992) ‘Stress Levels, Gender and Personality Factors in Teachers’, British Journal of Educational Psychology, 63, p.26I -70.
• FRIEDMAN, I. & FARBER, B. (1992) ‘Professional Self Concept as a Predictor of Teacher Burnout’, Journal of Educational Research, 86, p.28-3.
• SELYE, B. (1976) The Stress of Life (rev. ed), New York, McGraw Hill.