Class 062Y55AOO 27/02 Splitting the Atom - Good or Bad?

It was great too see, by the bits of paper so many had in front of them, that the research for to-days discussion had been taken seriously. Although I might not call on everyone the research ensures that, if I do so, you are prepared. I hope that, as the semester goes on, it will also enable you to start talking directly to each other and not through me. What I mean by that is, that if someone is giving an opinion, and your research or opinion is different, that you will tell the person who is talking what you think.



I also hope that, by doing the research, even if you don't get a chance to use it in class, you will gradually see that the purpose of education is the PROCESS and not the end result. While you may not have used your research in class on any particular day, the knowledge you have gained will stay with you to help you become what we mean when we call someone an "educated person". It has nothing to do with exam results!

This class is called Topic Discussions and my hope is that you will discuss things with each other so that I will have less to say and act as mediator only.



What I had hoped for by setting to-day's topic about whether discovering how to split the atom was a good or a bad thing, was that you would come to certain conclusions by yourselves.



The Theme of this whole semester is "Harmony". While everyone can parrot[recite without thinking] the Government's ambition to build an "Harmonious Society", this is a process that does not happen by itself. We need to fully understand the important process of harmony and how it applies to every aspect of our lives. We need to find harmony within ourselves and harmony with the entire world. Not an easy thing to do.



The first step in discovering what harmony is, is by seeing how nothing in the world happens in isolation [by itself]. All things are connected. Thus, each action is part of a chain of events that can have either a good or a bad outcome.



One thing we found that was that there are various different people and dates given when we try to discover who first split the atom and when. This doesn't mean that one person's answer was "wrong" while another person's was "right". This (I hope), merely shows the importance of researching our information from more than one site. No one person was responsible for this discovery - many different scientists contributed to it.



It is very difficult to point to an absolute or single truth. Many people, however, think that Science provides absolute truths - they think that the laws of Science provide the world with facts that cannot be argued with. Any real Scientist, however, will tell you that Science is simply one way of trying to find how things work and that things that were considered facts one day are disproved the next.



When a certain obscure [unimportant; little-known] man in the middle of the Eighteen hundreds gave his only daughter permission to study at a University he could have no idea how this radical [new; out of the ordinary; revolutionary] idea would change the world.Though no doubt his friends, relatives, colleagues and acquaintances told him repeatedly that he was crazy and was throwing good money away: - because at that time it was a scientific "fact" that women's brains were different to men's and could not function the same way. He was probably even told that he was a bad father: no husband would want an educated wife - it was unnatural.

Yet Marie Curie, using the discoveries of other branches of Science, set in train the process that changed life forever: - nuclear fission. (She also had a wonderful husband !)

Many people consider the nuclear bomb to be the most evil weapon in to-day's world. Only two nuclear bombs have ever been used in warfare but that has been enough to hold the entire world in fear ever since.

But, as we discovered, the discovery of radiation and of the process of splitting the atom has both changed and possesses the capacity for change, the world in an equal number of wonderful ways. Anyone who has ever had a loved one who has survived cancer will agree. And that's merely one of the changes this process has brought about!

Splitting the atom was neither good nor bad. The results it produced however, are both good and bad. It is up to humanity to keep these results in balance: to ensure that each remains in balance so that the particular Yin and the Yang of this great discovery remains in harmony.

From this realisation we moved to a discussion of current events to show how the concept of Yin and Yang; harmony; and good and bad is important not just in abstract matters but in our lives.

The matter of the two artifacts [things made by human beings] seemed very black and white [clear; allowing no argument] to most of us: France stole something from China. France must give it back. But if we truly understand the concept of Yin and Yang we are aware that no truth is absolute...there are two ways of looking at everything.

Of course this is not simply a matter where France hates China. France just took this way of being mean to China. France wanted to make all the Chinese people feel bad. The logical conclusion of this argument would be that France wanted China to hate her. Which would be an absolutely ridiculous idea.

So we set out to find why France acted the way she did. We discovered that rather than the FACT of the controversy being that one side is wrong and the other is right, perhaps both sides think they are right and both sides think the other is wrong. So even here this question is neither all black nor all white it is, as is everything, both black and white in equal parts. It is Yin and Yang.

Now, imagine if all the people in France realised this. Then imagine if all the people in China knew this? There would not be any people taking sides, getting angry, or making silly threats towards each other as is happening on blog sites around the world. There would be harmony of thought. And a harmonious outcome would be possible.

It may be too late for a completely harmonious outcome to this question. Whatever happens, there will be people who will continue to think in terms of right and wrong..and to consider the other side wrong.

But by learning to search for the balance in everything at least we ourselves can become more balanced and harmonious.

Imagine a world in which every single person lived that way!