Panorama

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Part of Panorama

Title: Panorama
Issue Date: December 1967
Year: 1967
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extracted text: PANORAMA needs intelligent readers of; 1. Informative work. All these are selective adapand condensations from foreign publica-y brief and compact, lasting from two to ten minutes each article offers a rewarding experience in one’s leisure. Relax with Panorama. We say this to the busy student d the te the the dentist the the politician the PANORAMA is specially designed for Filipinos — young, middle-aged, and old, male and female, housekeeper and houselizard. Special rates for new and renewal subscriptions to begin on November 1, 1966: 1 copy ......................................... ......................... P5.00 2 years ..................................... P9.00 Foreign rate: ................................ $3.00 (U. S.) For one year’s subscription of 5 pesos, a person receives of 12 co ict pocketbooks of lasting and variec interest. COMMUNITY PUBLISHERS/ INC. Inverness, (M. Carreon) St., Sta. Ana, Manila, Phil’ A THS PHIUPPIH1 MAGAZINE 09 9000 BEADING Entered aa second class mail matter at the Manila Post Office on Dec. 7, 1956 Vol; XIX MANILA, PHILIPPINES No. 12 THE SELF The old saying that the human person is composed of three parts — soul, body, and clothes — is more than a joke. We so appropriate our clothes and identify our selves with them that there are few of us who, if asked to choose between having a beautiful body clad in raiment perpetually shabby and unclean, and having an ugly and blemished form always spotlessly attired, would not hesitate a moment before making a decisive reply. Next, our im mediate family is a part of ourselves. Our father and mother, our wife and babes, are bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. When they die, a part of our very selves is gone. If they do anything wrong, it is our shame. If they are insulted, our anger flashes forth as readily as if we stood in their place. Our home comes next. Its scenes are part of our life; its aspects awaken the tenderest feelings of affection; and we do not easily forgive the stranger who, in visiting it, finds fault with its arrangements or treats it with contempt. All these different things are the objects of instinctive preferences coupled with the most important practical interests of life. We all have a blind impulse to watch over our body, to deck it with clothing of an ornamental sort, to cherish parents, wife and babes, and to find for ourselves a home of our own which we may live in and “improve.” — From The Philosophy of William James. ■ We celebrate Rizal Day, the 30th of December this year, with these thoughts expressed by him at various times and occasions. SAYINGS OF RIZAL Individual Liberty There is no sufficient gun powder in the world that can justify the attacks against the liberty of the individual, against the sanctity of the home, against the laws, against peace and honor. — Jose Rizal in La Solidaridad. Rizal on the Educator Yes, I believe that the time is approaching when I can return to the Philippines. Then, when I am already there, you (Blumentritt) will come with your whole fa mily and you will live with me. I have a large library. I shall order a little house built on a hill. Then I shall devote myself to the sciences, I shall read and write his tory, I shall establish a school and if you can stand the climate, then you will be its director. I am sure that all the young men, the cream of the youth of the country, will come to us. Blumen tritt and Rizal will remain in the memory of the Fili pino people, like Goethe and Schiller, like Horace and Virgil, like the two Hum boldt, in their respective countries. All these ideas came to my mind because the parliament has approved with pleasure the plan of granting Philippine represen tation. When we shall have obtained this great progress, then we shall rest and de vote our strength to the edu cation of the people, which is my supreme aspiration. — Jose Rizal to Blumentritt, 1890. Rizal Answered a Jesuit Fr. Sanchez, my professor of rhetoric, dared to defend me in public and praise my book (Noli me tangere), but secretly he told me that I would have done better writ ing an ideal book in which I could describe an ideal picture of ideal priests and 2 Panorama in this way show the con trast. I replied that I did not write for thinking readers but for the public that did not think; that there were so many books where ideal priests were described and they were utilized by bad priests to conceal their wolfish bodies with the skin of sheep. I told him that 1 wanted to awaken my countrymen from their pro found lethargy and one who wished to awaken did not use soft and gentle sounds but detonations, blows, etc. “Are you not afraid of the consequences of your auda city?” asked Fr. Sanchez. (He treats me familiarly.) If you go on your mission, are you not afraid of the consequences of its fulfill ment?” “Oh, that is entire ly different!” he replied. — “Not at all,” I replied, “your mission is to baptize the hea then, but mine is to make men worthy.” — Jose Rizal to Blumentritt, February, 1890. Rizal on Jesuitry Concerning Father Faura, I believe that he did not have evil intentions when he assured Dr. Pardo de Tavera that I had to die. In my way of thinking it was Je suitical astuteness. The Je suits have to show in public feelings that they may not perhaps feel. Towards me Father Faura behaved in a different way. But the pub lic ought to believe that he does not agree with me — absolutely not, not in any way. — Jose Rizal to Blu mentritt, January, 1890. The Meaning of Mindanao I can tell you little about the word Mindanao that I would prefer to write Mindanaw. The people here now call the whole island Mindanaw. It is true that Pigafetta mentioned Butuan, Chipit, etcetera, but not Min danaw, if my memory does not fail me; I do not have here my notes. However, danaw in Bisaya as in Ma lay means lake (dao pan). I do not know what is lake in Moro Magindanaw. How ever, inasmuch as there is a great lake Lanaw, that in my opinion means lake — for in danaw, ranaw, lanaw, there are only natural pho netical changes — I can al Decembeb 1967 3 low myself a bold conjec ture which I admit can be another lucus a con lucendo (light that does not shine). Ma gin dan aw can mean great, lake; magi would be a con traction of malaki (large), for in these regions that I in the middle of a word is usually omitted, saying kabaw, Tagilog, suat, instead of Kalabaw, Talagilog, sulat, etc. It is customary in all countries to name whole re gions after the most interest ing feature in it. What is surprising then that a whole island should be called af ter the greatest lake found in it? — Jose Rizal to Blu mentritt in Epistolario Rizalino Luna and His Spoliarium In the' history of nations there are names that by themselves signify an achievement, that recall pas sion and greatness, names that, like magic formulae, evoke pleasant and smiling thoughts, names that become a pact, a symbol of peace, a bond of love between the nations. The names of Lu na and Hidalgo belong to these; their glories illumine the two extremes of the globe — the East and the West, Spain and the Philippines... In Spoliarium, through the canvass that is not mute, can be heard the tumult of the multitude, the shouting of the slaves, the metallic creaking of the armor of the corpses, the sobs of the be reaved, the murmurs of pra yer, with such vigor and realism as one hears the din of thunder in the midst of the crash of the cataracts, or the impressive and dread ful tremor of the earth quake... The Spoliarium that thrills, seizes, and agi tates violently, drying the tear that looms in the eyes is the condemnation of the barbarism and despotism of a great people towards a small one that thirsts for light and liberty. The first copy made of it was ordered by a Russian! — Jose Rizal Keeping a Diary Yesterday, one year ago I left my home to come to this country. How many illusions one entertained and how many deceptions! Yes terday, all day and night, I kept recalling all that had 4 Panorama happened to me since then. I took my diary and read it, which reminded me of faded impressions. Though sick, I’ll continue my diary be cause I see that it is most useful and above all it con soles the soul when nothing more remains of its former treasures. — By Jose Rizal Cockfighting in the Philippines In the Philippines, for the observance of Sunday after noons, one generally .goes to the cockpit, as to the bull fight in Spain. Cockfighting, a passion introduced into the country and exploited a cen tury ago, is one of the peo ple’s vices, more transcen dental than opium among the Chinese. The poor man goes to the cockpit to risk what he has, desirous of earning money without work ing for it. The rich man goes there to amuse himself, using the money that remains to him from his feasts and thanks-giving Masses (misa de gracia) but the money he uses is his own. The game cock is trained with great care, with greater care perhaps than a son, the fa ther’s successor in the cock pit. — Jose Rizal in Noli me tangere. December 1967 5 ■ The record of Philippine institutions of higher edu cation has improved during the last fifty years despite obvious handicaps. THE PHILIPPINE PRIVATE SCHOOLS IN RETROSPECT The organizers of this ce lebration of the Golden An niversary of the passage of Act No. 2706 approved in 1917 recognizing the Philip pine Association of ’ Private Colleges and Universities has assigned to me this subject. It is quite appropriate for a man of over 70 years as I am. For somewhere in one of the ancient books we find these lines: “The old men dream dreams and the young men see visions.” A retrospect is in reality a dream of past events. It is a necessity for the mind and the emotion of man. To dispense with it is to be without a sense of history, thus to be thoughtless and hopeless, a pitiable victim of amnesia. On the other hand, young men with vision are indis pensable, for the experience of history tells us that peo ple without vision perish. For this purpose, our pro gram makers are right when they assigned to our able young man, Dr. Narciso Albarracin, the subject of “The Private Schools: Today and Tomorrow,” which provides us with a view of a bright actuality and a vision of an enhancing, encouraging, and effective assistance in our educational work. Then we need to realize, as the sub ject of our other speaker, Dr. O. D. Corpus, reminds us that our country is in a state of change. In persuading me to ac cept my assignment, Dr. Cresencio Peralta, the active and able chairman of our program committee, told me that all I have to do on this occasion is to repeat what I have written in a booklet recently published with the title “The Case of Philippine Private, Education.” Frank ly, I did not welcome his 6 Panorama suggestion for if I would closely follow it, I would have to waste two or three hours of the valuable time of this audience. Instead, I thought I would confine myself this evening to a few remarks on the development of our private schools since the first days of this century. Long before the passage of Act No. 2706 in 1917 by the newly organized Philip pine Legislature under the Jones Law, the Taft Com mission, which was made up completely of American members, had passed a law creating the Department of Public Instruction in less than six months after it had began the exercise of its le gislative powers. This took place on January 21, 1901. That' law was primarily con cerned with the organization of public schools but it pro vided that nothing in it should “be construed in any way to forbid, impede or obstruct the establishment and maintainance of private schools.” Thus by implica tion, the operation of private schools was legally recog nized and respected. This was to be expected of the American government which has always been the advo cate and protector of demo cracy, intellectual freedom, and free enterprise. In those early years of the American occupation the pri vate schools were still run after the Spanish model. The Spanish language continued to be used in the existing institutions of higher edu cation. Their instructors and students were not sufficiently acquainted with the more modern American methods of instruction. Consequent ly, their graduates hardly had enough knowledge of English to meet the entrance requirements of the newly organized University of the Philippines and other gov ernment colleges or to qua lify for civil service positions. Under such conditions there was much dissatisfaction with their courses and me thods of instruction. But in a few years, those private colleges began to realize the necessity of adopt ing the newer educational procedures; and as the gov ernment discovered that they actually reformed their courses and methods, a num ber of them received official authorization to confer de December 1967 7 grees and award diplomas. This and other privileges en couraged more private insti tutions to apply for govern ment supervision of their courses of study, methods of teaching, textbooks, and equipment in the expecta tion of receiving similar pri vileges. Consequently, the Department of Public In struction’s curricula and plans of study, which was the principal basis of official re cognition, began to be vo luntarily adopted by them. No compulsion was used to force any private college to follow government regula tion; but it was the practical thing to comply with it for with the official symbols of distinction their graduates could be readily accepted in government schools and colleges and in the civil ser vice. But as Filipinos acquired greater knowledge and mas tery of modern education and its administration, the rule of prescribing a uniform and rigid schedule of courses and other instructional ideas which obviously prevented initiative and experimenta tion in private colleges be gan to show its disadvan tages to Filipinos of thought and foresight. Without be ing consciously and widely felt, it created a real dan ger to individual freedom. It made authoritarianism superficially advantageous and insidiously preserved the colonial spirit of intellectual parasitism. The Filipino newspapers at that time showed a remarkable grasp of principle and moral in dependence when their edi tors criticized the action of the Department of Public Instruction under American control as an arbitrary threat to the freedom of education and the spirit of nationalism. It is remarkable how those early ideas of Filipino wri ters were later practically up held in their essence by those decisions of the United States Supreme Court and State courts on educational free dom handed down from the year 1923 to 1947. Their basic theme has coincided with past and present views expressed by liberal thinkers and progressive writers in America and European coun tries on education, specially higher education. It is, therefore, strange that in 1917, when both Houses Panorama of the Philippine Legisla ture were already in the hands of the Filipinos, Act No. 2706 was passed provi ding for compulsory inspec tion of private schools and colleges by the Department of Public Instruction. Still that law did not require a person to secure a permit for the opening of a private school. Uncritical observers considered this omission a defect of the system which in their minds was respon sible for the poor education produced in private schools at that time as if a permit could necessarily assure an adequate educational quali ty. At any rate in 1925, the Monroe Board of Educational Survey in the report of its findings on the condition of the Philippine educational system recommended legis lation “to prohibit the open ing of any school by an in dividual or organization without the permission of the Secretary of Public Instruc tion.” Making the Secreta ry the Czar or dictator of Philippine private education, the Monroe Board suggested that certain conditions be laid down and followed be fore such permission should be granted. Those condi tions are good provided they are intelligently, not arbitra rily and mechanically, ap plied by qualified official chiefs and supervisors. Re alizing this prerequisite the Monroe Report particularly stressed the necessity of an adequate staff in the Depart ment of Public Instruction to be composed of “men and women who have the scho lastic, professional, and per sonal attainments” to pass on applications for opening private schools and to make their supervision effective and sensible. Among the defects of pri vate schools pointed out in the Monroe Report were the absence of a law or regu lation which would prevent a person “disqualified by ignorance, greed, or even immoral character from opening a school”; the lack of sufficient knowledge of the science of education on the part of private school heads; the absence of teach ers familiar with modern teaching methods; and the paucity of uptodate textbooks and laboratory and library facilities. December 1967 9 Strangely enough most of the reasons for the weakness and defects of the private schools outlined in the Mon roe Report were practically the same defects which the public schools 'also suffered according to the same Re port. The difficulty of securing new teachers with adequate qualifications was indeed felt not only by the private but also by the public schools. There were very few quali fied ones available. In the public schools the Monroe Report stated that about 18 per cent of them had less than four years of training beyond the intermediate school; less than 33 per cent had an education equivalent to graduation from a fouryear college. As to profes sional training, 68 per cent of them “had no professional work in education, however meager, in high school, nor mal school, college or univer sity.” Their teaching expe rience was meager and un satisfactory. These deficiencies were naturally present in the Fi lipino private schools at that time which received no gov ernment support of any kind. But as the record shows those Filipino private schools did not stagnate. They struggled to improve their faculty, their courses, and their products. Their gra duates even at that time were able to provide the nation with much of the man-po wer needed in the profes sions, in private business en terprises, in education, and in government service. In his book The Philip pines published in 1945, Dr. Joseph R. Hayden makes this noteworthy remark: “By 1929, the schools which had brought discredit upon the reputation of private educa tion had either been elimi nated or been brought up to standards of equipment, instruction, and administra tion which were comparable with those of public schools. As a result of these accom plishments, private education as a whole was rehabilitated in the eyes of the public.” As Secretary of Public In struction till November, 1935, these words of Dr. Hayden prove that the conditions of the private schools 5 or 6 years after the Monroe sur vey had markedly changed 10 Panorama for the better and, as a group, the private institutions no longer merited the criti cisms indiscriminately cast against them in the past. In another passage in his book Dr. Hayden categori cally declared: “Both sec tarian and non-sectarian in stitutions in many instances are taking advantage of their freedom from state control to adapt themselves more readily than government schools can to modern trends in education and to chang ing local educational needs. Through the secondary level, at any rate, the private schools are free to set higher standards than the Bureau of Education, which is limited by the capability of the ave rage child and some of them have taken advantage of this opportunity.” Whether we take these statements at their face value or with a grain of salt, coming from a man of responsibility, who was a scholar and was once Secre tary of Public Instruction, they show that in general private schools had apprecia bly improved to the extent that they had adapted them selves to modern trends in education more readily than public schools. Without tiring this au dience with a statistical com parison of the conditions of the private educational insti tutions at different periods in this country, it should be stated that in 1924, the total enrollment of private schools recognized by the Govern ment was 73,246. In 19641965, the annual report of the Director of Private Schools shows a total enroll ment of 1,379,868 students. In about 26 years, therefore, the increase of the student population in the private schools was more than 10 times while that of the coun try’s total population was hardly 3 times. The number of college and university stu dents alone two years ago reached a total of 390,454. There were 4,393 private schools from the kindergar ten to the university level. In the collegiate and univer sity level alone, there were 463 institutions of which 27 were universities. Dr. Hayden commented in his carefully written book that “in addition to relieving the government of an appre ciable propbrtion of the fi December 1967 11 nancial burden of education, the private institutions of learning are making a dis tinctive contribution to the intellectual life of the na tion.” The Director of Private Schools reported that for 1365-1966 the private secon dary schools alone would have cost the government, if it had operated them, from P21,356,055 to P170,864,563 on the basis of the wideranging cost per student in different public high schools, or an average of about P96,000,000 a year. These fi gures do not include the cost of buildings and equipment. The same report states that more than 80 per cent of the college students of the country are in private insti tutions of higher education. In the academic year 19641965, the total number of college and university gra duates from private institu tions was 67,359. The de grees granted to them were in practically all careers and professions including agricul ture, technology, medicine, teacher training, social sciences, philosophy, fine arts, nursing, etc. This impressive record of growth has not been con fined to mere quantitative terms. A comparative study of both academic and pro fessional achievements of their graduates as against those who have completed their courses in public secon dary schools and colleges dis closes a marked improvement of the competence and qua lity of their products. In most professions and areas of intellectual work, the ave rage public school product is far from being superior to the private college grad uate. Given adequate freedom and encouragement to the spirit of initiative and crea tivity by the removal of gov ernment control on their aca demic activities and deci sions, private educational in stitutions may reasonably be expected to strive after a superior degree of achieve ment in their work. In retrospect, we need to remember that the tradition of higher education obtain ing in this country today has its roots in the American system, a system based on diversity and liberty. While it is our duty to develop educational practices and 12 Panorama programs adjusted to our special needs and our na tional demands, we should not ignore the basic princi ples of that precious tradi tion of educational freedom if we do not want to see the growth of our educa tional institutions stunted and our educational system marred by the rigidity of ideas fostered by a policy of narrow standardization and uniformity almost amounting to regimentation. It is time that we begin pulling down our monolithic structure which mars the educational landscape of the democratic community we have chosen to establish and develop. This can be done only by adopting in actual practice the constitu tional principle of autonomy for our institutions of higher learning. — V.G. Sinco, From a speech delivered early this month to celebrate the 5Qth anniversary of the recognition of the Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities. NOBEL PRIZE The fact that the Nobel Prize was not accorded tb me1 was doubly pleasant: first, because it saved me from the painful necessity of dealing in some way with money — generally regarded as very ne cessary and useful, but which I regard as the source of every kind of evil; and secondly, because it has afforded to people whom I respect the opportunity of expressing their sympathy with me, for which I thank you all from my heart. — Leo Tolstoy. December 1967 13 ■ Quality in one’s life and work is what makes a man valuable and important. BETTER A FULL THAN A LONG LIFE In Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess — I almost wrote Pogi and Bess — the villain, Sporting Sam, in his song “It Ain’t Necessarily So,” says; Methuselah lived one thou sand years Methuselah lived one thou sand years But who calls it living When no gal would give in To a man that’s one thou sand years. Now comes a report from Athens that they have loca ted the oldest women in the world. Her name is Maiathe Nyfli and she is alle gedly 132 years old! “I at tribute my longevity,” she reportedly said, “to the fact that I have never had any affairs with men.” Perhaps, that’s why she refuses to go. She feels cheated. Going by her comment, it is ob vious to any discerning per son what her death wish is. In the ultimate analysis, it is not how long we have lived, but the kind of life that we have led that will be important. It is not the maximum amount of time, but the optimum use of that time. As they say, there is a time to live, a time to love, and a time to die. Ri zal had very little time. But all Filipinos today still feel his presence. Many people today don’t even know what to do with their time. And some people are not buried — but they have been dead for years. There are two kinds of death — physical and spiritual. It is the things that die within us that we have most to fear. Death comes to all — “even for Kings,” as Saint Thomas More said in the trial for his life. In our case, we have never measured time by du ration. We measure it by intensity. Longevity is something to be desired, but it is not an 14 Panorama achievement in itself. There was the man who was ask ed what he did for the French Revolution. “By God,” he said, “I survived!” It is better to live a full life — than a long life. We have people, for instance, who believe that they have had, let us say, 20 years ex perience at a given job, when in reality, it would be more accurate to say that they have had one year’s experience twenty times. Most people never lived. They simply existed. If you live a ripe old age, you must have something more to say than just mere ly attributing your longevity to refraining from tobacco, alcohol, or the opposite sex. Otherwise, people won’t know whether you are brag ging or complaining. We believe that it is the state of mind that keeps most people alive. One must look for ward. And one must keep an interest in all things. It is, of course, easier said than done. — Alejandro R. Roces, Manila Chronicle, December 12, 1967. December 1967 15 MASS EDUCATION AND MASS CONSUMPTION ^Mass education is adult and community education per se. It is an effort to make the people in general basically and functionally literate. Basic literacy is con cerned with the development of the ability to read and write. Functional literacy goes beyond basic literacy, enabling the individual to read with understanding, to write letters, compute in the mathematical processes, ac quire fundamental knowledge in health and citizenship, use his reading and writing skills to improve his social and eco nomic lifp. A functionally literate individual is an en lightened and well-informed person capable of participa ting in the affairs of the community/} (^Considering the present knowledge explosion brought about by new discoveries and advances in science and technology, the populace needs continuing education if it were to adjust itself in a fast changing economic and social environment, j. Mass education is the con cern not only of the schools but also of the homes, the churches, the radio and TV stations, the newspapers and book publishing houses, ci vic organizations and busi ness and commercial estab lishments. These agencies and institutions can dissemi nate knowledge and informa tion, a cursory analysis of the pamphlets, posters, cartoons, films, lectures and communi ty assemblies. In order to show the cor relation between mass edu cation and mass consump tion, cursory analysis of the Philippine economy should be made. £ The Philippines is blessed with rich natural resources, yet it has remain ed a developing country the past several years. Its eco nomic system is still under subsistence economy. The lack of concerted and effec 16 Panorama tive effort in mass education, explains why its natural re sources remain untapped. The people have not acquired the necessary vocational and technical education that would enable them to utilize fully the country’s natural resources. The Philippines exports raw materials such as logs, abaca, ore, copra and other products, only to import them in processed and ma nufactured forms. As a con sequence, the margin of pro fit is greater for the manu facturers than for those ex porting them in raw form. The implication of this ob servation is that [unless the human power resources are developed through education and training the country can not rise to greatness above the 1 degree of educational achievement level of its peo ple. Educated and trained individuals usually occupy key positions who serve as agents of development. In simple terms, mass education facilitates the entry of the people, young and old, .into productive employment. / The educational achieve ment level of the Philippines is low compared with more progressive countries. Stu dies on school dropouts point to the fact that almost half of the pupils enrolled in Grade I drop out after Grade IV. This means that the average Filipino is a grade fiver. In the rural areas, the figure is even more skew ed because the average rural folk is a third-grader. Based on a recent study in Rizal province, grade-pupils are still not functionally literate. In other countries, the edu cational achievement level is within the high school years. If one-half of the 33 mil lion Filipinos are not func tionally literate, there is need to exert more effort on mass education. Education of the masses, by all means, must be the concern of all, be they in the Government ser vice or in private life. C Some people live in af fluence, others live in desti tute and misery. What hap pens to the persons next to them, affects their life. #As such, the cleavage between the rich and the poor would lead to social unrest and un less a form of safety valve is applied, the situation may lead to an explosive point — that of unwarranted violence December 1967 17 The importance of mass education is made more im perative today than before in view of population and knowledge explosion. Eco nomists point out that popu lation growth exerts pressure on the economic resources of the country that deters economic development. By necessity, production and consumption must be equated in order to prevent social and economic dislocations^ Consumption of the bare necessities in foods and ma nufactured articles is on the minimum among the low-in come group. The figure on average family annual in come gathered from the Bu reau of Census and Statis tics as of 1961 is Pl,800. By computation, the monthly in come is P150 and the daily income is P5. If the average size of the family is six, each member has P0.83 for daily expenses. It should be mentioned that the figures refer to the average Filipino family or the middle income group. What about those who be long to the low-income brac ket such as the farmers and the laborers? The daily in come of these people would be obviously less than the average, an income in which it is not possible for the fa mily to have a decent house, presentable clothes, good food and adequate educa tion of the children. These are the people who cannot purchase some luxuries in life because of the high cost of living. The masses cannot afford to stay on a rut of ignorance and poverty for a long time. Society has the responsibili ty of helping the masses ex tricate the people from the bondage of want. Mass edu cation is a significant factor in narrowing the socio-eco nomic stratification in a so ciety. As the people are en lightened through mass edu cation, they will soon gain added vocational skills and brighter outlook in life. The consequence is increased in come and with increased in come, increased purchasing power follows. In addition, the increased purchasing po wer of the masses will sup port the industrial and com mercial establishments in the form of greater consumption. Therefore, economic plan ts Panorama ning should integrate educa tion in the facets of the na tional plan. Infrastructure and education should receive priority consideration if the country were to accelerate socio-economic development. The principle behind such plan should be that educa tion in an economic invest ment. Positive steps have to be taken to provide ade quate education for the mas ses today and several years hence. The more educated the masses, the higher the income level that will cer tainly increase production and consumption. — Petronilo A. Buan, Senior Execu tive Assistant, UNESCO Na tional Commission of the Philippines. BANKRUPTCY The following note was found among the effects of a businessman after his death. He had long been known for his frequent lapses into bankruptcy. “I hereby name the following six bankers to be my pall-bearers. Since they have carried me for so long during my lifetime, they might as well finish the job now.” December 1967 19 E In 1968, Japan will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Meiji Restoration. The following are some of ’he prize-winning compositions submitted by boys and girls of primary and junior high schools — the driving force of the Japan of the 21st century. "JAPAN OF THE Let Us Be Tender “Japan of the 21st centu ry,” — these are words full of hope and promise and I have given much thought to them. I am now a 12-yearold, sixth-grader. Thirtyfour years from now I will be 46. I wonder if I shall be living then? But statis tics tell me, “Don’t worry. Even now the average life expectancy of Japanese is 67.” But that is only the begin ning’ of 'the 21st century. It’s the start of another 100 years. It is really like hav ing a dream to predict what will happen in that period. It is said that the year 1968 marks the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the Mei ji Era. When I read books, watch television or see mo vies, I learn that there were no airplanes and no automo biles in the early days of that period, much less tele21ST CENTURY" vision, radio or movies. There was not even the elec tric light. But today, there are ma ny airplanes in the sky and automobiles fill the roads. We are living in a world where almost everything is electrified. Judging from the way things are now, man will make great progress in the coming thirty-four years. Ground traffic will be re placed largely by aircraft. There will be handy oneman helicopters, giant air planes with a speed of 3,000 kilometers per hour, rocket aircraft with seating capaci ties for 300 to 400. The existing spacecraft and arti ficial satellites will have been improved so much that people will be able to travel to the Moon or explore Mars. What I am most interested in is daily life. My home will be facing south, so there will be plenty of sunshine. 20 Panorama It will be built of a steel frame, instead of wood. On the roof there will be heli copter, and in the garage, a modern automobile. A ro bot will take care of every thing, from cooking to wash ing and cleaning. Meals will be high-calory, and de licious, too. People will spend their free time enjoying literature, fine arts, music, television, sports, traveling, and so forth. I think that education will become more important along with man’s cultural progress and high school education will become compulsory. And when learning has ad vanced, everybody will be wise, and there will be no bad men, and everybody will be able to lead a pleasant life. By that time I will be over 49. And soon I will have my grandsons, and I will be an old woman in retirement. But, at that time, old people will be taken good care of because effective mo ral education will have made the young more respectful of the aged. Last year, ‘Respect for the Aged Day,’ a national holiday, was created much to the joy of old men and women. I, too, will be old soon. It pleases me to see others happy. In the 21st Century, living in Japan and other countries will be like a dream. But even when we are living in comfort and plenty, I think we should not forget to be kind and tender-hearted. When education becomes advanced and cultural pro gress is made, industry is promoted and the country becomes wealthy. And our life, too, will become rich. If education is advanced and life prosperous, there will be fewer crimes. And there will be little need for po licemen and other law-en forcement officers who will have very little to do. In a family, after the fa ther leaves for work, the mo ther will do all kinds of household chores by using a robot or electrical applian ces. The children will go to school. The old people will spend the rest of their lives doing whatever they like. On Sundays or holidays the family will go on a trip and have lots of fun. It’s like a dream, but a dream based on the cultural dev elopments of the present age. December 1967 21 Science does everything for man. It will produce many things man cannot. But I don’t think that this alone can make man really happy. We must have a tender and a beautiful heart even when we are living in an age of the machine which can do everything. Only then I believe can we live a truly human life. — Nobue Shimizu, 12 years old, prima ry school. Our Village One fine day during May, I looked down on our vil lage from the top of Mt. Shiritaka. Houses were seen scattered among the rice fields of sparkling green. Rice planting in the Kaga Plain was over. The land facing the Japan Sea, ex tending 12 kilometers east to west, dotted with fifteen woods, large and small — this is our village. It’s like ships on a green sea. It’s like a fleet of ships — flat ones, round ones, square ones. Our village is made up of these beautiful woods. Issa, the famous “haiku” poet, once composed a “haiku” which went as follows: “Our hamlet ap pears/ Warped on matter how much/ Haze may cover it.” But I would say: “Our hamlet appears/ Like a ship no matter how much/ Haze may cover it.” And this is a merchant ship. I like to hear a steam whistle of a ship sailing out of a port. It is the sound of peace. This ship is like a forest park. My imagination ex pands across the sky, like a rainbow. It soars higher and higher until it reaches a brilliant world of the 21st century. The new century is here. Our village is spreading before me. There, in the brilliant sun light, scattered among the rice fields, I see our homes. Shaped like domes, they have nothing but windows out side. Rooms are air-condi tioned, and temperature, hu midity and ventilation are all automatically controlled. Atomic power is used, so that winter is not much of a hardship even in this north ern region. Snow can be removed and crops in the fields kept warm easily. Flowers bloom all the year round. I turn my eyes to our village, a forest park. There, trees are well taken care of, tennis and volley 22 Panorama ball courts are available, too. But the shrines and temples are just as they were before. The cemeteries are always tidy and clean. I have now become com pletely a boy living in the 21st century. The park is our ground for recreation. It is open to all, city dwel lers and foreigners. Many rainbow trout and carp are swimming in the ponds of the park, into which flows the water of the Tedori Ri ver. There are extensive pastures and farms, and milch cows are grazing. The shallow soil, peculiar to the alluvial fan, has been im proved as deep soil. Even the smallest unit of a rice field is three hectares. The number of households is now one-tenth of that in the mid dle of the 20th century. This is a nationwide trend. Al most every village is a fo rest park with its own dis tinctive character. How did such a rapid change come about in only one century? Kawakita-mura, our village, has 800 hectares of land un der cultivation. Kusabuka, the hamlet in which I was born, alone has 150 hectares. Human labor equivalent to 0.8 man was once required; now only 0.05 man is neces sary. No wonder the number of households has decreased to one-tenth. Atomic power is being used for peaceful purposes in every industry. Develop ment projects are making rapid progress not only in Japan but in all parts of the world. Demand for indus trial products is increasing steadily, and production keeps rising. Economic con ditions are improving fast, and many people, particular ly of the farming villages, have found better jobs else where — with the promise of unlimited happiness. Ma ny people migrated to attrac tive foreign lands — with joy and courage, equipped with excellent skills and po tentialities. They did so in a very natural way, without compulsion. Then, what about us — the 10 per cent left behind here in Japan? Failures in life? No! The others left here, and we stayed, both as a matter of course. In fact, people are grate ful to us. We must dev elop our land, handed down to us by our ancestors, to December 1967 23 meet the needs of the new century. It is our mission to rebuild it into a commu nity as good as the living environment, of those ninetenths of the people who left our village. Let us take Kusabuka, our hamlet, as an example, to see how it has changed. There used to be 100 fami lies, but now in this forest park, large cedars, old pine trees, and garden rocks are the only reminders of the homes which once stood there. In front of the temple is a large ball park. In the compounds of the shrine now stand a music hall, a sacred Shinto festoon still hangs on the trunk of a large zelkova just as it did in the old dayd. At the western end of the village, where my home once stood, there is a large pond for rainbow trout. There are many promenades, and it is very quiet there. Outside the park, farmland spreads far and wide. There are excellent roads, too. No electric poles are seen. There is plenty of water in the canals. Orchards, bota nical gardens, dairies and factories for the processing of agricultural produce are also to be seen. The atmo sphere in the town, where people go shopping occasio nally, is lively but restful. The pine trees in the wind break forests and the cedars in the hills of Mt. Shiritakft have grown big and tall. We would be happy to hear from our friends in the cities and abroad, thanking us for the job well done in rebuilding our village. All working people here are making the best use of their time and living a comfor table life. We are now friends with all peoples of the world. Birds and ani mals, worms, grass and trees, the sun — all bless us now. Parks built in old villages, scattered against the back ground of beautiful scenery — this is Japan. This is the land we have built. In dustrial nuisances, the plague of agricultural chemicals, traffic accidents, old people’s diseases are now things of the past. Traveling is safe, cheap and easy; so, many people use these parks every day. Last night, there was a song contest in the park. A friend of mine, who. returned 24 Panorama to Africa after taking part in the contest, has written me. In Africa, he grows and processes peanuts, my favo rite food. His letter was mailed through a space sta tion. The letter said: “You have preserved this beauty of our native place, this tenderness of people, the ho nor of we Japanese. You have turned our village in to a community full of vigor. This forest park has been our ideal. It’s a social meeting place for all peoples of the world. It’s the ‘merchant ship of the heart,’ as you say. I’ll write you again from the Moon. Ichiro, at the space station.” I am a little embarrassed by his praise. Oh, the sun is now setting — over the beach of Komaiko. The Japan Sea spar kles white like a mirror. The shadow of our village is now a deep purple. It’s becoming dark. The chilly wind atop the mountain blows against my cheeks. My back feels chilly. It’s cold. It seems I have been returned to the 20th century. — Yasuo Kawahara, 12 years old, male December 1967 25 ■ A critical comment and analysis of the slow de velopment of the Philippines and its causes. THE CHALLENGE OF NATION-BUILDING Twenty-one years have come and gone since the founding of our Republic, and still our task of nation building remains unfinished. Painful though it is to state, the sad truth is that in eco nomic and social progress we are far behind other newly-emergent nations with poorer and lesser natural and human resources than ours. Let me cite a few of these other nations that have pro gressed much faster than we. Take first the case of Is rael. She was a land of desert and sand dunes when she emerged as an indepen dent state in 1948. In less than two decades she had been transformed into a land of flourishing gardens and plantations. In size she is only 7,993 square miles as compared to our area of 115,758 square miles, or about 1/16 our size. Her population is only 2 1/2 mil lions as compared to our population of 32 millions, or about 1/13 our population. And yet, she has progressed by leaps and bounds. So much so, that recently she startled the whole world by defeating in battle in six days the hostile Arab na tions surrounding her with an aggregate population of 60 millions. Then take the case of Tai wan, our neighbor to the north. She is only 13,886 square miles in area, or about 1/10 our size, and on ly 12 million in population, or about 1/3 our population. And yet, her production of rice per hectare is about 4 times greater than ours, and she has progressed so well that the United States con sidered it unnecessary to continue extending economic aid to her since last year. I was invited by her gov ernment to go there in 1964, and I was jolted when I was told by one of their 26 Panorama agricultural experts that if they could borrow three of our big provinces in Central Luzon, they could make these three provinces pro duce enough rice to feed our entire population. Then there is Japan and there is West Germany, both of them defeated in the last war, both of them suffering heavily from carpet bombing and from atom bombs in the case of Japan, both of them demilitarized after their sur render and subjected to mi litary occupation by the vic tors. And yet, both of them have risen from the ashes of their defeat and destructions, both of them have startled the world by their rapid strides not only towards an economic prosperity even greater than they were en joying before the war. To day they are categorized among the rich and highly developed nations, needing no aid from others, and even able to afford to extend aid to poor and underdeveloped nations. It cannot be due to our natural resources, which are rich and which we have in abundance. It cannot be due to the extent of our human resour ces, for we have them in vast numbers. I attribute the slow pace of our economic progress to lack of proper orientation and to lack of proper train ing of our human resources. We spend too much of our time, too much of our energies, and too much of our money, in politics. We profess interest and concern in the development of our agriculture, industry, and commerce, but read the daily newspapers, turn on the ra dio or television, listen to conversations in the street, in coffee shops, in business offices, in government offices, and what do you read or hear? Very little, if any, of economies, and much too much of politics. We have elections every two years. We just had an election this year 1967, and the air is already filled with talks of who will run against whom and what will happen in 1969. The mind reels and the imagination staggers when we read and hear of the money spent by the govern ment and by the candidates in every election. December 1967 27 Take the last election for instance. The Comelec chairman was asked by the President to account for the millions spent by the Come lec, and the Comelec chair man countered by asking the President to instruct his Bud get Commissioner to give an accounting of the millions spent for public works dur ing the last election cam paign. It would even be harder to get a true and correct ac counting of the expenses of candidates. We have a law making it a criminal offense for a candidate to spend more than one year’s salary corresponding to the office for which he ran. Natural ly, in the affidavit that he files after the election, the candidate certifies that his expenses did not exceed the limit fixed by law. It is an open secret however, that this law is honored more in the breach than in the ob servance. It is an open se cret that the candidates who get nominated and elected are, more often than not. those who have the money to burn and/or who are backed by party machines or personal machines. The ever-mounting expenses of candidates in party conven tions and in elections are shocking and dismaying. We hear of senatorial candidates spending millions of pesos, of gubernatorial candidates who spend as much, of con gressional candidates who spend as much, of candi dates for city mayors and for municipal mayors who spend hundreds of thousand of pesos. Where do these millions spent by candidates in con ventions and elections come from? Only God and the candidate know. We all do know, however, that if this unlawful, corrupt, and scandalous spending continue unabated, only mil lionaires or the tools of mo neyed and vested interests will be nominated and elec ted to public office. The democracy ordained in our Constitution will be reduced to a mockery and a farce, and in its place will be erec ted a government of pluto crats, and for plutocrats. Surely, we do not want that to happen. We do not want this orgy of over-spending by the gov ernment and by the candi 28 Panorama dates in times of election to continue. We want election expenses to be reduced to reasonable proportions, so that a larger part of the fi nancial resources of the gov ernment and of the private sector may be used to ac celerate development of our agriculture, industry, and commerce. We do not want such elec toral over-spending because it causes inflation which is the worst thief of the pur chasing power of the masses of our people. Over-spend ing by the government in times of election works hard ship on the private sector and on the poor, because when inflation results, the usual remedies resorted to by the Central Bank and by the government is to impose more restrictions on private credit and to levy new or additional taxes which weighs heavily on the poor. We do not want such elec toral over-spending because it breaks the moral fibre of the corruptors as well as of the corrupted involved in the evil practice of vote-buying, it destroys the honor of the vote-buyer and the self-res pect of the vote-seller, and when people lose their sense of honor and of self-respect they cannot be expected to be enthused to join in any undertaking designed to make the nation great eco nomically or otherwise. We do not want this over exertion and over-emphasis in politics because it only increases the number of our professional politicians, and it only multiplies the number of spoilsmen and job seekers after each election who in voke alleged political ser vices rather than fitness and merit for their appointment to government offices. What our country sorely needs to day are not political hacks and parasites, but first-rate entrepreneurs, honest and competent administrators, responsible labor leaders, agricultural experts, engi neers, chemists, skilled tech nicians, laboratory workers and researchers, knowledge able men in science and technology who can plan well and build well, whose crowning achievement is the fruit of their labors rather than the sound and fury of their words. It is high time that the habits, the attitudes, and the December 1967 29 mores of our people and our leaders be re-oriented, and their training and everyday activities readjusted and at tuned to the needs and ex igencies of the times. To you, the graduates we are now honoring, I appeal to you in particular, and T charge you to rise up to the challenge and lead in this vital task of reorientation and readjustment. In the 1970 election of delegates to the coming Con stitutional Convention, sup port and vote for those who can be relied upon to work for constitutional amend ments which will lessen the frequency and bring about synchronization of elections, which will insure the hold ing of elections free as much as possible from over-spend ing by the candidates and by the government and from the evil of vote-buying and power play in conventions and elections. As you go to your respec tive communities, use your talents and skills not only to project yourself and to advance your own interests, but even more so to promote the common good especially to minister to the needs of the least of your brethen. Practice more and preach less about the imperative ne cessity of abandoning the bad habits and wrong va lues which afflict our pre sent-day body politic, and of developing instead the virtues of honor, self-respect, and self-reliance. Lead peo ple to engage in home gar dening, cultivate farms, turn to poultry or piggery or cat tle raising, construct fish ponds or engage in deep sea fishing, invest in any other productive enterprise which will make them as self-suf ficient as possible in the ne cessities of life. Help in the establishment of home and cottage industries which can provide means of livelihood to our womenfolk. Help disseminate information re garding better methods of farming, and the credit fa cilities afforded by govern ment agencies and the rural banks to small farmers and merchants. Be the first in patronizing locally made goods in pre ference to imported ones whenever the quality and the price are more or less the same. Stress the need for diversification, exploring the 30 Panorama things we can produce, with comparative advantage in the competitive world market, so that if and when we lose the U. S. market we would still have other export goods to sell in the other markets of the world. Help organize cooperatives to do away with alien middlemen. To the extent that we succeed in making our people do these things, to exactly the same extent will we succeed in hastening the day when the task of nation-building will have been brought to a suc cessful conclusion. In so doing, you will have justified the faith of Rizal in the youth of our land, and will have reflected honor and credit to your beloved alma mater. — Senator Lorenzo Sumulong. From a speech at the Far Eastern Univer sity, December 9, 1967. December 1967 31 ■ How much do people know about this most pre cious stone. DIAMONDS: THEIR LEGENDS AND USES In the newly independent nation of Lesotho in South Africa, the wife of a poor farmer found a 601-karat dia mond — the seventh largest in the world — which she sold for $300,000! Karat was originally the weight of the carob seed, against which diamonds were weighed — but the term today applies to metric karat. There is a story that the father of Winston Churchill while gaping down the pit of the Kimberley diamond mine remarked.' “All for the vanity of women!” One of the ladies present countered by saying, “And the depravity of man.” A Persian legend says that in all creation the diamond is the most useless. In fact the legend says that it was the devil who created dia monds to excite avarice after Satan noted that gay flowers in the Garden of Eden fasci nated Eve. The earliest diamonds used in jewelry were found in In dia and Borneo, and these two places remained the chief sources of this precious stone until 1725 when diamonds were discovered in Brazil. The world’s largest and finest diamond was found in South Africa. It weighed 1-1/2 pounds and was without any blemish. The South African Government presented it to King Edward VII for the crown jewels and it was sent from South Africa to London by ordinary, unregistered mail! Valued at $2-1/2 mil lion, it was eventually divided into nine stones and incorpor ated into the royal regalia. Some stones are legendary — like the Blue Diamond, to day known as the Hope Dia mond. The Frenchman Jean Baptiste Tavenier was said to have stolen it from the fore head of the god Rama-Sita after disposing of the temple 32 Panorama priests, and the god was said to have taken his revenge by having the Frenchman eaten by wild animals. But this is pure fantasy as it is known that Tavenier is buried in Moscow where he died of fever. Another famous dia mond — the Orlov — is also said to have been stolen from an Indian statue by another Frenchman. The Regent, or Pitt diamond also came from India. It weighed 410 karats and it is said that the man who found it smuggled it out by slashing his leg and hid ing the stone under the band age. Diamonds, of course, have other commercial uses. An article entitled Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend says: “The diamond is still the hardest substance known. Where the hardest tool steel will cut a groove five miles long in bronze; a tungsten carbide tool stays sharp for 21 miles; the diamond-tipped tool will make a cut 1200 miles long. Diamond dies now produce most of the world’s fine wire; diamonds also polish automobile 'piston rings, drill oil wells, cut all types of stone, polish dental fillings, play much of the world’s recorded music. Yet if heated sufficiently in the presence of air, a diamond will vanish in a puff of car bon dioxide.” If diamonds are found in Borneo, isn’t it possible that they can be found in places like Palawan? — Alejandro R. Roces, Manila Chronicle, Nov. 11, 1967. December 1967 33 ■ Mastery of a few but essential subjects is far preferable to tasting a conglomeration of super ficially studied disciplines. THE ESSENCE OF HIGHER EDUCATION Educational grace and vir tue lie in the friendly and reverent struggle of the mind with great books and authors and ideas, compelling them to yield their gracious fruits of wisdom and meaning. Such an experience, even with a few books, can be educationally far more sig nificant than the cursory, uninterested and superficial reading of many more books of the moment. The pro cess, therefore, is two-fold. On ,the one hand, we have to enrich the curriculum with significance and encourage the reading of classics and other books that matter — books that illumine the mind and do not merely titillate the senses. On the other, we must be careful to eli minate the trivia from it, which have found a place because tradition set them there and inertia keep them there. There is, either, no spring cleaning for decades or, in some so-called progres sive educational systems, there is a to-the-minute upto-date-ness, as if the latest need or fad of the moment could be included in the cur riculum, merely because it was new. Neither the Ame rican “book-keeping of cre dits” nor the Indian prac tice of gearing all work and study to the annual or pub lic examination can provide any real intellectual educa tion. It can only prepare for specific jobs, not for any commerce with greatness. Real education involves a sincere, flaming dedication to% knowledge and pursuit of truth and a training of the mind to reach for new know ledge. It will draw into the process the head as well as the heart. If the heart re mains untouched and there is no “passion”, the student cannot endure the many dis 34 Panorama appointments and frustrations which beset this pursuit. It is good for a student, whe ther he is engaged in the study of natural or social sciences or arts and humani ties, that the road to knowl edge and intellectual and artistic achievement is steep, involving many headaches and heart-breaks. It is his business to adventure on this road with courage, for it is in this process that he can discover himself and his re alizable possibilities. The teaching method, which is consciously or un consciously favoured in most of the educational institu tions, is “spoon feeding” in some form or another, when lessons and lectures become the substitute for intellec tual activity and passive ac cumulation of information takes the place of active ac quisition of knowledge. Its results are always disastrous, for they undermine or arrest the development of all the qualities of the mind which education is meant to foster — initiative, independent work, resourcefulness, origi nality of approach. Instead, there is intellectual confor mity and diffidence, an aver sion to mental adventure and a fear of the challenge of the imagination, even in science and art. The average Indian student, for instance, is usually unwilling to face exacting intellectual challen ges and prefers shortcuts and by-ways to reach his end. Is that because he is mental ly inferior to his fellow stu dents in other lands? There seems to be no valid justi fication for such ' a belief. In fact, under similar condi tions of education abroad, many Indian young men and women have distinguished themselves a c a d e m i cally amongst their colleagues from other lands. The fault lies, in considerable measure, with educational methods and techniques normally em ployed, which are content to place their sights low, to make do with narrow cur ricula and unstimulating ways of work and not to ex pect from the students ade quate standards of excellence. There is no reason why, in a democratic set up, we should take it for granted that the life of the mind and academic interests are only meant for a mall elite and they need not find an ho December 1967 35 noured place in the life of every man, so far as his na tural talents and limitations make that possible. If this view demands that we en rich the curriculum of the school and the college with the best of our cultural he ritage, we should do so: if it implies that we encourage promising talent in every one, using active and crea tive ways of teaching and learning, we should explore that possibility to the fullest. Democracy would be stulti fying itself if it confined its ambition to enabling an in creasing number of citizens — and eventually all — to have enough food and cloth ing and houses and more and more material goods and leisure but left their minds uncultivated and failed to fill their life and increasing leisure with significant intel lectual, cultural and artistic activities. — by K. G. Saiyidain, Excerpt from his book Universities and the Life of the Mind. Panorama MUSCLE SUGAR" Arteriosclerosis, or harden ing of the arteries, may be prevented with inositol, de clared Miss Stephanie J. Ilka. Drs. William C. Felch and Louis B. Dotti collaborated with her and were co-authors of the report. Arteriosclerosis is caused by deposits of cholesterol, which has some of the charac teristics of an alcohol and some of a fat. Galstones are composed of cholesterol. In ositol, which has been called "muscle sugar" because of its sweet taste, can reduce the level of cholesterol in the blood, Miss Ilka found. Laboratory rabbits fed both cholesterol and inositol showed a far smaller increase in cholesterol in the blood serum than did animals to which cholesterol alone was given. There is no guarantee that similar results will be obtained with human sub jects, but it seems reasonable to assume that any substance which prevents the rise of cholesterol in the blood of rabbits will do the same in the human body. Cholesterol is found in animal fats, especially in milk, eggs and cheese. When the body is no longer able to utilize food in the normal amount and in the normal way to provide energy, cho lesterol piles up in the blood, to be deposited in little glo bules along the walls of the arteries. The passageway for the blood is greatly reduced in size, so that the heart has to work harder to pump the blood through. — From Science Digest. December 1967 37 ■ This is another so-called exposure of an alleged mistake or untruth of the achievement of Columbus. SCIENTIST CALLS "DISCOVERY" BY COLUMBUS A FAKE A British scientist recently told the British Association for the Advancement of Science that Christopher Co lumbus faked the log of the Santa Maria on his first vo yage to America in 1492-93 because he knew that the new world already had been discovered. The scientist, Prof. A. Da vies, of Exeter University geography department, said the credit for the discovery of land in the west prior to Columbus should go to a Portuguese explorer named Dualma. After leaving Spain, Davies claimed, Columbus would record in his private journal that the day’s run had been 34 leagues, but would tell his crew that it had been 17 leagues. Near the Bahamas the journal recorded the run as having been 1,076 leagues while the shorter version for the crew put the figue at 852 leagues — a difference of 900 miles. [A league is about three miles.] Davies scoffed at the sug gestion that Columbus scaled down the figures so as to re assure his crew of the cer tainty of finding land 750 leagues west of the Canary Islands. This suggestion, the scien tist said, was “almost certain ly untrue,” becaue the daily run was estimated by the pilot, the ship’s master, and all the expert seamen on the ship, and no attempt was made to disguise the figures on the two accompanying vessels. “Columbus clearly was ar ranging the run shown in his log to be much longer than it really was for purposes of his own,” Davies said. The falsification of the log and other records was done to hide the true position of the land Columbus was to “dis cover,” he added. 38 Panorama “He had foreknowledge of a land already discovered in the west and was arrang ing his own log in order to claim that it was a new dis covery,” Davies said. This advance knowledge, he said, would account for the con viction of Columbus that he would reach land 750 leagues west of the Canaries and his rigid adherence to a course due west at 28 degrees north latitude across the Atlantic. — Chicago Daily Tribune. OBSERVATION Before turning to those moral or mental aspects of the matter which present the greatest difficulties, let the inquirer begin by mastering more elementary problems. Let him, on meeting a fellow-mortal, learn at a glance to distinguish the history of the man and the trade or profession to which he belongs. Puerile as such an exercise may seem, it sharpens the faculties of observation and teaches one where to look for. By a man’s fingernails, by his coat sleeve,' by his boots, by his trouser-knees, by the callosities of his forefinger and thumb, by his ex pression, by his shirt-cuffs — by each of these things a man’s calling is plainly revealed. That all united should fail to enlighten the competent inquirer in any case is almost inconceivable. — Arthur Conan Doyle. December 1967 39 ■ A woman’s influence over a statesman. INCOMPARABLE ASPASIA In a half circle, against a background of Olympian clouds, I see a lovely Greek. She steps forward, she raises her lovely arms, she smiles. Orators commence singing her praises; satirists ridicule her; philosophers consult her; the statesman turns to her with unfathomable questions. Is she a queen whose power extended from one coast to another, whose ships dotted the sea, and whose warriors peopled distant wastes? Did she trace her descent from the gods? Or was she at least the wife' of a ruler or the mother of a poet? None of these. Her ancestry is un known, as is also her real name. The dates of her birth and death are not known to a certainty. Not even the face that gave her her power is known, although many a mar ble head is supposed to re present hers. She herself chose the name of Aspasia, the Beloved. Whether or not she actually came from Miletus to Athens, the daughter of a slave, no body knows. It is only known that at the age of twenty-five, thanks to the charm of her mind and body, she was one of the circle of brilliant, au dacious skeptics who existed in Athens at its prime. And here she met the man who at that time was on the threshold of great power. He was Pericles, and he was probably twenty years older than she. Pericles had a wife and children but in ancient Athens the wife was confined to the house, and had no claims on the husband, while he had all rights over her. Marriage served for no thing but the production of pureblooded children. At this time — the fifth century B.C. — it was even a subject for ridicule that a great war had once been caused by the ab duction of a king’s wife. Wives lived in obscurity, without honor or position, without social pleasures and line clothes. Meanwhile, other women who had cap tured the fancies of the Athenians displayed their 40 Panorama beauty and wit, culture and charm at all the banquets for all the graces of art, love, conversation, and ironic dis course were expected of them. Pericles, after meeting As pasia, separated from his wife and began a brilliant life with Aspasia. He re mained with her, one might almost say under her in fluence, for twenty years, un til the plague carried him off. Just as he was far and above the greatest Greek of his time, so was she the only Greek woman who was decid edly a match for him. A great man willingly grants this position to a woman, since she is not in competition with him. Could Aspasia, or any of the Aspasias who have followed her through the cen turies, have interferred with the ambitions of a Pericles? No, they could act as nothing but a stimulus because they always strove to please him. The importance of such a woman is that she existed — nothing more. In the morn ing she awoke thinking of her beauty; hours were spent in caring for it, for if she failed to please the man of her choice as a woman, all her influence vanished. When ever he came to her with a question, all her own inte rests had to be laid aside. Since a woman’s insight into humanity — especially the insight of a superior woman — is naturally greater than that of a man, Pericles in volved in wordly entangle ments, found her his natural adviser. The devotion of her love — his mastery and his submission — bound the ties closer and closer over heart and mind, those ties which between friends of the same sex are so easily broken. And through one crisis after an other a relationship gradually developed which vacillated constantly between mind and heart. Yet an ambitious man rarely concedes such as as cendancy to another man. On arrival and departure Pericles always kissed Aspa sia on the forehead, Plutarch informs us, and this is a sym bol of their relationship. The fact that she induced him to enter the war against Samos, and even the Peloponnesian War, which destroyed Athens’ power, is not necessarily against her. It merely de monstrates her influence in politics, for a Pericles does not permit himself to be in December 1967 41 fluenced in such decisions by an ordinary woman. And now let us follow the two friends to the Sympo sium. Here Aspasia plays the zither. And then a general conversation begins truly pla tonic in nature. Aspasia re poses on the divan beside the reclining men, talks with Hip pocrates about medicine, with Phidias about art, with Anaxagoras about philosophy. Yes, even Socrates himself, who both domestically and socially was not an admirer of women, had called him self her pupil only half iron ically. Forleles* great funeral oration in The second year of the war was supposed to be her work. But jealousy spread, and since it cpuld not attack her powerful friend, it was direct ed against Aspasia. The scan dal became courageous; an accusation against her was inevitable; she remained in stead of fleeing. Pericles himself came before the judges in her defense. His tears evidently saved her, perhaps also his prestige. But not long afterwards, he himself was on trial. He was deprived of his office, his career was threatened, and, moreover, his two sons were taken away from him. And always the fearless wo man stood close by to sup port him. But the reversal of Athenian favor, just an er ratic and whimsical then as now, called him back. Final ly the plague carried Pericles off, and Aspasia remained alone. — Emil Ludwig, con densed from The American M agazine. 42 Panorama ■ The credit system has been taken for granted as a standard measurement of the amount of learning a student receives in Philippine colleges; but this is an erroneous idea and it is nowhere used in other parts of the world outside of the U.S.A. ACADEMIC UNITS AND THEIR USE In its efforts to see some variety in the offerings of our private colleges and univer sities, the Bureau of Private Schools permits the use of a curriculum by a college pro vided it is substantially as good as or better in some ways than what it generally prescribes. In his work entitled Ex cellence, John W. Gardner the present Secretary of Health, Education, and Wel fare , of the United States, emphasizes the need for di versity in education in or der that schools and colleges may be able to meet the enormous differences of hu man capacities and levels of preparedness and attitudes of young people. From the depth of his knowledge and experience, he strongly urges every educational institution to play a distinctive role in the pursuit of its own pro gram and to win for itself honor and recognition. It should be the policy of the Bureau to encourage respon sible institutions managed by competent educators and ad ministrators to construct and adopt the curriculum of their choice as long as it is care fully and intelligently plan ned. In determining how much a student has learned about a course the measurement is the total number of units he has earned. The academic unit, how ever, is but a mechanical and convenient indication of the length of time spent in a classroom for a subject. In our system in this country one unit is equivalent to 18 hours of class meetings in one semester. It is not a measure ment of the degree of knowl edge a student has acquired or of the mental development he has attained. It serves as December 1967 43 a measure of the number of class meetings set aside for a subject in a semester or a term. It does not even indi cate the actual amount of time a student devotes per sonally to the study of the subject. A serious student may spend three or more hours of study outside the classroom for a subject which is given only a one-unit weight; while another student taking a 3-unit subject might give no more than one or two hours of study out of his own time. The number of units taken by students is thus far from being a measurement of his knowledge of a subject. For instance, manv if not most students finish 24 units of Spanish in our colleges (in cluding the U.P.) without knowing how to speak or write the' language tolerably. The unit or credit system is an American invention. It is not used in British, Euro pean, and other institutions of learning where examinations and the ability to pass them successfully are the test adopted in measuring a stu dent’s knowledge of the sub ject. The fact is that for sometime now, outstanding American educators and col leges have ceased to give im portance to credits or units as measures of a student’s learning. In our own country Government Board and Bar examinations must be passed by a person who desires to practice a profession and to secure an employment in the civil service. This shows that in the last analysis we do not rely on units earned but on the successful passing of an examination to determine one’s knowledge of a subject. The units we now use, otherwise known as Carnegie units, have become the basis of the credit system. It was first adopted merely as a mechanical and convenient way of appraising the formal work of a student at the time when electives became the fashion in the curricula of American schools. The proli feration of electives created a difficult problem for deter mining college entrance re quirements for graduates from different secondary schools. Gradually a system of uniform number and kind of subjects and uniform weights for each of the re quired subjects had to be adopted; and the most conve nient and easy method was 44 Panorama to use a quantitative rather than a qualitative standard. This was found to be the number of hours of class ses sions for each required sub ject in a year or in a semester. The system has been intro duced into the college classes and in graduate courses. A competent American pro fessor, Kenneth E. Eble, in his work entitled “The Profane Comedy” says of this system: “The credit system is one of the large academic sins. Upon it depends the dull student whose A’s in tether ball and leadership offset E’s in reading and numbers... A scholarly investigation of the growth of the credit sys tem appeared in the AAUP Bulletin (Winter, 1955).” Then he goes on to say the following: “The writer Diet rich' Gerhard, traced its be ginnings to public demands for a more varied list of courses and more practical courses in both high schools and colleges in the 1870’s and 1880’s... The tart critics of American higher education, like Thorstein Veblen and Ab bott Lowell (President of Harvard), were even harsher in their criticisms of forty years ago. Veblen, writing before 1918 against the sys tem of academic grading and credit, called attention to ‘the pervasive way in which it resistlessly bends more and more of current instruction to its mechanical tests and pro gressively sterilizes all person al initiative and ambition that comes within its sweep.’ Its acceptance today does not change the fact that only an educational system grown large and impersonal and re mote from learning would tolerate it. Like all bureau cratic growths, it remains be cause, like weeds in hard soil, it cannot be pulled out without destroying the plants around it.” The well-known American writer, Martin Mayer, in his famous work entitled “The Schools” makes the following comments on the Carnegie Unit System: “Alone among the world’s schools the Amer ican high school builds its curriculum on prefabricated identical blopks called Carne gie units. By this system, every ‘course’ meets the same number of hours every week and yields one ‘credit point,’ whatever the subject studied. Nowhere else in the world are all the subjects of study December 1967 45 given equal weight or equal time.” The use of units, which was originally confined to high schools in the United States but which was later adopted in its colleges and then blind ly imitated in the Philippines, is being recognized for some time now as a meaningless way of evaluating a student’s educational achievement. In the work entitled Improving Transition from Schools to College, the report of Arthur E. Traxler and Agatha Town send contains the following critical remarks and explan ation of the Carnegie Unit System: “Secondary schools and colleges need to work co operatively toward the substi tution of. more meaningful statements of accomplishment for the clock-hour kind of evaluation represented by the Carnegie Unit. Historically, the Carnegie Unit served a useful purpose in secondary education and contributed to the transfer of secondary school graduates to college by bringing order and system out of a chaotic college en trance situation. Also, the unit method of reporting is so thoroughly embedded in thinking and practice that it cannot abruptly be dropped. But the Carnegie Unit is out dated by modern techniques of evaluation, and the com mittee reaffirms the position expressed in the Fourth Re port to the effect that the Carnegie Unit should be abandoned as rapidly as other procedures for measuring secondary school work — measurement of fundamental educational objectives, for example — can be evolved and brought into practice.” Finally, the following lengthy quotation from the paper of President Dietrich Gerhard of Washington Uni versity on “The Emergence of the Credit System in Amer ican Education” gives us the critical views of famous edu cational leaders and should deserve our serious attention: “Undoubtedly the best in terpretation of the system stems from Abbott L. Lowell and from Norman Foerster. Foerster, in his book on The American State University (1937), talks of ‘purchasing a diploma on the installment plan,’ and he adds: ‘Once a credit was earned, it was as safe as anything in the world. It would be deposited and indelibly recorded in the 46 Panorama registrar’s savings bank, while the substance of the course could be, if one wished, hap pily . forgotten.’ Lowell, Eliot’s successor at Harvard, spent a great deal of his presidency on undoing the havoc wrought on the college by Eliot’s system of indiscri minate electives. The pro gram of distribution and con centration, soon more or less to be adopted by most other American universities, work ed at least as a partial cure for the credit disease — with as much and as little success as these reforms of the curri culum can have in institutions which cannot cut loose from business accounting in edu cation. You can follow his endeavors in his reports from 1909 on, in his collection of essays with the characteristic title.i ‘At War with Academic Traditions in America,’ in cluding the succinct state ment, in his report of 1917: ‘One of the most serious evils of American education in school and college is count ing by courses — the habit of regarding the school or college as an educational sav ings bank where credits are deposited to make up the balance required for gradua tion, or for admission to more advanced study.’ “Let me, finally, give you a quotation from the work of a professional educator, once more from George Counts’ The American Road to Cul ture (1930): Tn both the secondary and higher schools, the entire curriculum is or ganized into relatively mi nute units of work. Although efforts are always made to insure the pursuit on the part of the student of certain sequences and of a unified program, the result is all too often a mere collection of points and credits. More over, as the student remains in the institution from semes ter to semester, his successes and failures in accumulating these precious credits are meticulously recorded even to fractions of percentages in some office or bureau. After he has acquired the appro priate number of such dispa rate units, with but little provision for the integration of his knowledge, he receives either his certificate of gra duation from high school or his college degree. Even the granting of their highest aca demic honor, the degree of doctor of philosophy, has December 1967 47 been reduced in certain of the large universities almost to a matter of meeting routine requirements. “Having been a student ad viser for more than a dozen years, I can certainly testify to the truth of such criticism. And even if I had not been under the obligation through half of these conferences with advisees to render the serv ices of an adding machine, the impressions would have come unwanted to me — if in no other/way, then in such recent experiences as a gra duate student’s retort to my question: ‘Did it ever occur to you that you could read a book not for credit?’ ‘It is not the custom in this cen tury, Dr. Gerhard.’ I shall always regard it as a jnost gratifying proof of the edu cational success of the His tory Department at Washing ton University that at one time two of our students were informed that they had ful filled all the requirements for the degree without having realized it. This happened in the beginning of 1950 — they were G.I.’s. I am afraid that the story is not likely to repeat itself.” (American As sociation of University Pro fessors Bulletin, Vol. 41, No. 4.) 48 Panorama Panorama Reading A^ociation PANORAMA invites ’' the educated public to ibin its Association of Readers. PANORAMA READING ASSOCIATION is dedicate? to men and women who appreciate the variety and qualilv of its articles as sources oT liberal ideas. PANORAMA READING ASSOCIATION includes stu dents, businessmen, professionals, proprietors, employers, and employees. It is also open to clubs, schools, and other ac>» credited organizations. PANORAMA has been in existence for over Thirty Years. PANORAMA piovides excellent material for classes in history, government, economics, political and social studies, lite rature, and science. It may be adopted for secondary and college use. PANORAMA is not a fly-by-night publication. It mis horn in March, 1936. COMMUNITY PUBLISHERS, INC. Inverness, (M. Carreon) St., Sta. Ana, Manila, Philippines Contents Sayings of Rizal ,............................................................................ 2 The Philippine Privgte Schools in Introspect ................... 6 Better a Full Than a Long Lift ......................................... Mass Education and Mas* Consumption................................ 16 "Japan of the 21st Century" .......... 20 The Challenge of Nation-Building 26 Diamonds^ Their Legends and Uses .................................. 32 The Essence of Higher Education 34 "Muscle Sugar" 37 Scientist Calls "Discovery" by Columbus a Fake ............ 38 Incomparable Aspasia ..................................................................... 40 Academic Units and their Use ..................................................... 43