'Abdu'l-Baha was recorded speaking in 1912, for the book "Some Answered Questions," the following. From it you will see how prescient he was. He said many things of equal importance and interest but this one has something to do with the necessary relationship between religion and science.
"Education must be considered as most important,
for as diseases in the world of bodies are
extremely contagious, so, in the same way,
qualities of spirit and heart are extremely
contagious. Education has a universal influence,
and the differences caused by it are very great."
SAQ p. 214
In the United States at least, lately, the news media have been spending much time on the so-called disagreement between science and religion, notably over a few highly politicized issues. But in some arenas of study these two disciplines
have been drawing nearer to each other.
Here are some interesting facts about health in the United States that I read in
the September/October 2005 "Healing Through Unity Newsletter" forwarded to me by a friend. The newsletter quoted the following information from "Facts of Life
: Issue Briefings for Health Reporters, Vol. 7, No. 12, published by the US Center for Advancement of Health. I have paraphrased much of it for your easier reading. Statistics remain unchanged.
Education has been shown to be a powerful and unique predictor of healthoutcomes -- lower levels of education are associated with poor health, and higher levels of education associated with better health. Questions remain about which aspects of education may relate to health. What are the pathways or mechanisms that allow education to exert an effect on specific health outcomes. Are there other characteristics/factors that affect both educational attainment and health outcomes?
This is what is known so far:
Death rates overall, as well as for specific disease such as heart disease and cancer are higher in the US for people with lower educational or income status.
Exceptions include death rates for breast cancer and from external causes, in women.
1995: death from chronic diseases in man with less than 12 years of education was 2.5 times the rate of more educated men. Women were slightly more thantwice as likely to die if they had less than 12 years of education. (12 years is about high school graduation, with no college.)
The leading cause of preventable disease and death in the U.S. is smoking cigarettes. Smoking declined substantially between 1975 and 1995. The rates of decline were quite different for people of different educational levels. By 1995 those who did not complete high school were more than twice as likely to smoke as those with a college diploma.
Diabetes, hypertension ;and heart disease are more common in people with lower levels of education. The prevalence of these diseases also varies by income, race and gender.
Excess body weight and obesity have increased according to levels of educational
attainment and gender. In general, individuals with lower levels education are
more likely to be overweight or obese than those better educated.
2001 data indicates that adults aged 25-44 with less than high school education
have a death rate from motor vehicle crashes at 27.3 per 100,000. High school graduates die at a rate of 20.7, and those with at least some college die at a rate of only 8.7 per 100,000 people.
1995 stats show that low birth weight and infant mortality were more common among babies born to less-educated mothers. The relationship between maternal education and child health outcome varies somewhat by racial and ethnic group.
Pregnant women with less than 12 years of schooling are less likely to have received care in their first trimester than those with 16 or more years of
education. Women with less than a high school diploma arae ten times more likely to smoke during pregnancy.
In other countries around the world, both developed, and developing, a strongpositive relations;hip exists between education and health. Better health is associated with higher levels of education whether health is measured using morbidity and mortality rates, or self-reports of health status.
In the USA researchers were intrigued and challenged by the findings of the Whitehall study of British civil servants begun by Michael Marmot and colleagues in
the 1980's This was one of the factors that led to more research in the U.S. on
the role socioeconomic status (SES) plays in health.
The British research showed that helath improved with increasing civil servicestatus, all the way to the highest occupational levels. This was quite contrary
to assumptions that the effecxts sof socioeconomic status on health were solely
due to the adversities of poverty.
The study also made clear that it was not possible to explain the relationship betweend civil service status (also an indicator of socioeconomic status) bybiology alone. It became clear that there were ps;ychological and social influences on health vs. illness. This led to much research on the subject.
Dr. Len Syme, professor emeritus of epidemiology at the University of California
, Berkeley was asked what he would want to know if he had to predict a person's
health status.
He replied that he only needed one piece of information, and was SES (socioeconomic status. This is the most powerful predictor of the state of health.
A critical step was to discover if the relationship between SES in the Whitehal
studies held in the United States. Sufficient studies soon proved that SESpredicts health at all levels.
"...health behaviour which include smoking, physical inactivity and
a variety of other health affecting behaviours....the frequency of almost every
one of them differs by level of education. EG: the decline in smoking vs. level of education is causing a relationship to appear between education level and lung cancer rate. Less educated people who smoke more have more lung cancer.
Education may make it possible to avoid stress, and to cope with stress better when it happens. In terms of environmental exposures, individuals with less education are more likely to have more hazardous jobs and, because they have less money, to live in areas where they are exposed to toxins such as emissions from factories or freeways, and to pathogens (disease-causing organisms). The focus of
the environmental justice movement has been on unequal environmental exposure for poor and minority communities, but education plays a role in occupation an therefore, in income.
Education may cause changes in intellectual flexibility, leading to better skills in using and evaluating information. In a highly technical health and health
care environment, this could mean that increasing the average level of education
would also lead to improved population health.
Education may also act as a kind of super-resource -- an avenue to achieve what
is good and avoid what is bad in any particular social context. For instance, education leads to credentials and skills that provide access to prestige, jobs and moneyu. ON the negative side, disease may not be as avoidable amonag people
who have lower levels of education. Education can also be viewed as a flexible
resource.
One area of research that holds promise is examining the relationships among education, stress and health. Chronic stress has been shown to have a negative effect on health. Recent research suggests that education may have a protective effect among adults who have a child being treated for pediatric cancer. Researchers found that parents with higher levels of education were less likely to experience the types of changes in immune functioning experienced by parents with lower levels of education.
From a religious perspective it makes sense that certain tyupes of education can
affect health. Religious teachings emphasize the importance of self-knowledge,
as well as spiritual understanding as a pathway to health and happiness. Moral
education ;and faithful commitment to ethical standards can result in changed behaviours (for instance, abstinence from mind altering drugs) which will improve
both individual and societal health.
Abdu'l-Baha said "Personality is obtained through the conscious effort of manby training and education. A fruitless tree, under the influence of a wise gardener, becomes fruitful. A slab of marble under the hand of a sculptor becomes a
beautiful statue. The ruined places are built up again by captains of industry
; the ignorant children learn the secrets of phenomena under the tutelage of a wise teacher. The crooked branch becomes straight through cultivation." Divine Philosophy, p. 132.
"One wing is not enough. EVery religion which does not concern itself with Science is mere tradition, and that is not the essential. Therefore, science, education and civilization are most important necessities for the full religious life
." 'Abdu'l-Baha in London, p. 28
Furthermore, both science and religion agree that simply "knowing" is not enough
. The individual must make efforts to use that knowledge, as well as pursue it:
"Knowledge is the first step; resolve is the second step; action, its fulfillment, is the necessary third step." fIbid p. 54
It looks like science is catching up in awareness of the importance of both lifelong education, and about how critical individual commitment and action are to healing and health. Some leaders of scientific thought are even going so far as
to assert that a spiritual life may be a necessary component for such commitment
and action to take place.
Part 2 will be about a new approach to psychology.
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contagious. Education has a universal influence,
and the
