text:
Ethics/Nonkilling/Regional/Sri Lanka

 * This Course is based mainly on Professor Glenn D. Paige's (University of Hawaiʻi) paper Nonkilling Transformational Leadership for No-Poverty Development: A.T. Ariyaratne and the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement. The Course is part of the Program on Nonkilling Leadership Development at the School of Nonkilling Studies.

Introduction
The experience of A.T. Ariyaratne and the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement of Sri Lanka offers an example of transformational leadership for development toward “no-poverty” societies in a nonviolent world. This chapter seeks lessons that can be learned from it.

The significance of the Sarvodaya Sharmadana Movement can be appreciated in the historical context of the breakdown of the world colonial system after WWII, the violent competition between revolutionary communism and counterrevolutionary capitalism to demonstrate superior development capabilities during the Cold War era, and the present 21st century “globalizing” world confronted by five gigantic problems: violence, poverty, violations of human dignity, environmental despoliation, and the imperative need for global problem-solving cooperation.

The nonviolent revolutionary call in 1981 still rings true of 53 Nobel Prize laureates to end what they termed the “holocaust” of millions of preventable deaths from hunger, malnutrition, and underdevelopment. They declared: “All who denounce and combat this holocaust are unanimous in maintaining that the causes of this tragedy are political.”  They explained:

Origins
The Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement began in a December 1958 two-week student work camp together with villagers to open up the “depressed and socially ostracized” village of Kanatoluwa about 100 km. north of Colombo. It was led by a 27-year-old biology and mathematics teacher, A.T. (Ahangamae Tudor) Ariyaratne of the Buddhist Nalanda College. The work camp had been carefully prepared by research on Kantoluwa’s needs and by four months of comprehensive training, including study of community development films from India and the writings of Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave.

The work force from Colombo consisted mainly of students of the Nalanda College Social Service League, joined by about 100 from Kuliyapitiya Central College, plus trainees from Mahagarama Teacher’s Training College where activist Ariyaratne had studied and had organized a Social Service League. Some rural development officers, other government officials, and boy scouts participated. About 300 to 400 people each day were engaged with villagers in digging wells, opening up roads, constructing playgrounds, and other services. Out of the camp came a Sarvodaya slogan, “We build the bridge--The bridge builds us.”

As recalled by Ariyaratne, “The Shramadana Camp was like a university on the one hand and on the other like a carnival, where hundreds of people came and watched how these young students were fighting caste and class inequalities and social discrimination….The Kantoluwa Camp was actually a revolution.”2  Visitors to the camp suddenly brought national press and radio attention. Ariyaratne received hundreds of letters asking for details and with requests to explain the Nalanda College Shramadana Movement to schools and other institutions. He immediately followed the Kantoluwa camp by organizing four more, despite some disagreements with the rural development department bureaucracy.

Having demonstrated success in Sinahala areas, Ariyaratne moved quickly to organize a camp in the Tamil village of Panichchankeri in the eastern district of Batticaloa, where killing of a Tamil youth had ignited communal rioting. At first there was resistance to the camp, but the demonstration of Sinhalese and Tamil youth working peacefully together in useful projects overcame objections. The basis for subsequent Sarvodaya work in Tamil areas was established.

Sarvodaya Now
Forty-eight years later, with founder Ariyaratne at age 75, the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement is serving in 15,000 of Sri Lanka’s 23,000 villages, reaching four million of Sri Lanka’s twenty million people. Four thousand villages are registered as legally independent Sarvodaya Shramadana Societies and are participating in programs of the Sarvodaya Economic Enterprise Services (SEEDS) division. There are 5,000 pre-schools with 8,000 pre-school teachers. A Shanthi Sena (Peace Brigade) with members aged 15 to 30, numbers over 100,000 volunteers in 9,000 units. Sarvodaya has 34 district centers, including eight in Tamil areas of the northern and eastern provinces, and 345 divisional units. There are 12 development education institutes.

A full-time staff of 600 supports the work of 19 units devoted to the achievement of six empowerment goals: spiritual, social, economic, technological, and legal. Examples of services are:

 * Spiritual empowerment: meditation.
 * Social empowerment: community capacity-building, early childhood development; women’s empowerment; development education; information technology; school for children with hearing disabilities; empowerment and social care for the orphaned, disabled, abused, elderly and victimized; and “5R” program for relief, rehabilitation, reconstruction, reconciliation, and reawakening.
 * Economic empowerment: banking division, enterprise division, training division, export division, woodwork unit, wheelchair unit, printing, and book publishing.
 * Technological empowerment: water supply and sanitation, alternate energy, low cost housing, and rural infrastructure.
 * Political empowerment: village self-governance; culture; people’s policy dialogues; good governance; and ceasefire and peace process.
 * Legal empowerment: conflict mediation, awareness raising, legal advice and representation, and advocacy of reforms.3

Sarvodaya's Tsunami Response
The December 26, 2004 Asian Tsunami brought Sri Lanka’s largest natural disaster. Sarvodaya, as the country’s largest voluntary social service organization, responded with what Ariyaratne called “waves of compassion” to counter “waves of destruction.” Ariyaratne was the first leader from the Sinhala Buddhist south accepted to assess disaster assistance needs in the separatist Tamil Hindu north. Sarvodaya was the first organization welcomed to assist recovery there. Full-time staff and thousands of volunteers worked around the clock in response to unprecedented conditions of 31,320 dead, 23,189 injured, 516,500 displaced people, and over one million affected people in twelve districts of the southern, eastern, and northern provinces including 226 Sarvodaya villages.

Confronting this enormous tragedy, Sarvodaya drew upon decades of experience in response to environmental and man-made disasters—including cyclones, floods, landslides, droughts, hunger, riots, massacres, assassinations, and relief of remote villages. Appealing to local and global supporters, Sarvodaya put into action its immediate, mid-term, and long-term “5R” disaster management action plan, coordinated by the Sarvodaya Disaster Management Division:

 * Relief: Supply of immediate assistance in the form of food, clothing, shelter and essential commodities of affected communities.
 * Rehabilitation: Involvement of those affected in the process of rebuilding their lives together with Sarvodaya and providing them with support to maintain their lives in dignity.
 * Reconstruction: Rebuilding of damaged and destroyed infrastructure and homes.
 * Reconciliation: Implementation of all programs while keeping in mind the need to integrate communities and help them work together to heal the wounds of conflict and trauma and build back their lives together.
 * Reawakening: The providing of affected communities with psychosocial and spiritual support which they need to assist them on the path to recovery.  Sarvodaya believes this would enable them to be reintegrated into the mainstream of development.4

Demonstrating extraordinary growth in participation and services since 1958, Sarvodaya has become Sri Lanka’s largest NGO and widely regarded as perhaps the world’s most successful integrated rural development organization.

ROOTS OF TRANSFORMATIONAL PHILOSOPHY
Ariyaratne’s leadership has been a major transformative factor in Sarvodaya’s creation and success. His articulation of the Sarvodaya Shramadana philosophy has been a key contribution to evolution of the Movement. The philosophy has emerged out of a combination of profound thought, cultural tradition, and practical experience. The goal is a violence-free, poverty-free, egalitarian society with happiness for all. The path to realization is to engage individuals and social groups in an empowering process of sharing capabilities for community spiritual and material well-being. Sarvodaya Shramadana’s transformational philosophy is rooted in Gandhian, Buddhist, traditional, historical, and critical socioeconomic and political analysis. The basic assumption is that poverty-free societies are possible.

The concepts of “Sarvodaya” and “Shramadana” are related to Gandhian experience in India. Ariyaratne first heard the concept of Sarvodaya analyzed by the great Gandhian rural educator Dr. G. Ramachandran at a conference in India in 1959. “He compared the awakening of Sarvodaya to the blossoming of a lotus flower. The ideas embedded in Sarvodaya he compared to petals which, when fully opened up, were tantamount to the blooming of the complete flower….Without much effort I was drawing a parallel between his idea and my own Buddhist philosophy.”5 On the same visit Ariyaratne sought out Vinoba Bhave, the renowned Gandhian leader of the Bhoodan (land gift) Movement and accompanied him on a five-mile walk to the Punjab village of Nirvan to request donations by rich landowners to the poor. Vinoba asked him to launch a similar movement in Sri Lanka. Ariyaratne, who had learned about Vinoba’s work from literature acquired in Delhi on his first trip to India in 1957, replied, “I told him that I had already begun the Shramadana Movement that aims at reforming society.”6

From a Buddhist perspective Ariyaratne reinterpreted the Gandhian term Sarvodaya (“well-being of all”) to mean the “awakening of all.” To the Buddhist concept of “dana” (compassionate sharing) he added “shrama” (labor) to mean a wide range of sharing capabilities such as spiritual wisdom, knowledge, time, labor, skills, wealth, land, and other contributions. The combined inspirational and practical concepts to guide the Sri Lankan no-poverty developmental movement thus became “Sarvodaya Shramadana,” awakening of all to share capabilities for the well-being of all.

In envisioning practical measures to realize no-poverty futures, Ariyaratne drew upon traditions of the past as a contribution to transforming the present. For Ariyartne, respect for human life and nature in the traditional agricultural village serves as a model for emulation. To illustrate this, he offers in translation from the Pali an ancient prayer recited daily in villages even today:

In historical analysis, Ariyaratne raises consciousness of the effects of colonialism that led to a European-oriented elite, decline of traditional values, and neglect of village welfare. The deleterious effects continue in the independent post-colonial period marked by party competition for power, ethnic conflict, urban-rural disparities, growing rich-poor gap, and ill-advised theories of economic development unresponsive to basic human needs. The result has been corruption, revolutionary violence of the left, counterrevolutionary violence of the right, terrorism, communal schism leading to separatist civil war, and continuing inequality and unhappiness growing out of greed, hatred, and failure to recognize the nonviolent transforming power of Sri Lana’s combined spiritual traditions.

Sarvodaya philosophy is reflected in 1972 legislation that incorporated the governing body of the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement. Included among 15 “objects” and 10 “general principles” governing the Movement is:

Sarvodaya’s economic theory arises out of Ariyaratne’s critique of the gap between the unmet needs of poor villagers and the policies of professional economists employed in national and world economic management bodies. He observes:

In contrast to top-down theories of globalizing economic development, Ariyaratne affirms bottom-up, human-centered, localizing development based upon satisfaction of ten basic human needs. These are for “a clean and beautiful environment, a clean and adequate supply of water, a minimum of clothing requirements, an adequate supply of food, basic health care, a modest house, energy requirements, basic communication, total education, and spiritual and cultural needs.” Ariyaratne explains that in responding to these needs, “It is not purely economic activities we are engaged in. It is a total, holistic and integrated approach to bring about a non-violent but revolutionary social change.”10  Class struggle is rejected. The creation of wealth, in the Gandhian sense of “trusteeship,” is not denied. In Sarvodaya practice, a fusion of socialist and capitalist elements has emerged as illustrated by the banking, enterprise services, and income generating projects of its Social Empowerment Program. Also by creation of the Sarvodaya Endowment Fund.

In politics, Sarvodaya’s policy is to maintain strict independence from party competition for state power. Although individual members are free to participate in democratic electoral politics, Sarvodaya as an organization abstains. Sarvodaya does not seek to seize state power or to directly challenge the institutions of the state. Its goal is to bring about nonviolent political transformation of society by demonstrating the capabilities of self-reliant people to meet their own needs. Where goals coincide in the provision of social services, Sarvodaya cooperates with state and international agencies.

STAGES OF TRANSFORMATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Sarvodaya’s thought and actions exhibit stage-like developmental progress among overlapping interdependent elements. In Sarvodaya terms, there are six interdependent stages of “awakening” from individuals to the world.11 Individual awakening evokes “loving kindness” toward all forms of life (metta), compassionate concern to remove all sources of suffering (karuna), sympathetic joy for compassionate actions (muditha), and equanimity in successes or failures (upekkha). It is expressed in compassionate action to share gifts of “labor, knowledge, skills, medical services, land, wealth, spiritual wisdom, and sacrificing one’s life in service of the whole world.”

Family awakening means sharing in response to needs of family members, use of pleasant language, creating healthy conditions to satisfy the ten basic human needs, and “respecting the personality of every member of the family on the basis of equality.” Village awakening proceeds from recognizing causes of poverty, through affirmation of hopeful alternatives, to engagement in cooperative actions toward organizational, educational, health, cultural, and spiritual development. Urban community awakening follows the pattern of village awakening. National awakening calls for affirmation of spiritual, moral, and cultural values; satisfying basic human needs with emphasis on the most deprived; pursuing development education for leadership and community participation in all areas of national life; reorganizing the political power structure by developing participatory democratic institutions and decentralizing power to village and urban communities; and restructuring the national economy toward self-sufficient capacity to meet human needs without internal or external exploitation; and by adopting appropriate technologies that respect the environment and culture. World awakening seeks similar developments and peaceful sharing among all countries based upon their own historical and cultural realities toward universal removal of “psychological and economic impoverishment.”

Sarvodaya villages have increased in planned stages from one in 1958 to 100 in 1968, 1,000 in 1978, 4,900 in 1988, 6,000 in 1992, 8,000 in 1994, 10,000 in 1995, and to 15,000 in 2005. Within each village, five stages of development are pursued:

 * Stage 1: Villagers from the village itself and other Sarvodaya volunteers from neighbouring villages participate in Sarvodaya Shramadana Camps to provide the village with essential services such as roads, latrines, wells, tank bunds, irrigation canals, reforestation programmes etc., with the emphasis on the mutual benefit of the community.
 * Stage 2: Peer groups such as mothers’ groups, children’s groups, youth groups, farmers’ groups and so on are formed.  These groups are given training in leadership on child-care, health and sanitation etc. so that they can effectively participate in basic needs satisfaction programmes.
 * Stage 3: Through self-reliance and community participation basic needs in the village are satisfied and a village level Sarvodaya Shramadana Society (registered under government regulations) is formed to give organized leadership to all village level activities that lead to the improvement of living standards.
 * Stage 4: Sarvodaya Economic Enterprises Development Services are introduced to the village, progressively developing the capacity of the villagers to save, to borrow, to improve existing enterprises, to start new ones, to repay loans and to evolve their own village development bank.
 * Stage 5: Economic relationships with the neighbouring villages are built, strengthening their capacity in money, products and services so that development takes place in a cluster of villages.  The clusters of villages throughout the country contribute to the building of an alternative approach to economic development which benefits the rural areas.12

A step toward the goal of completely self-governing villages is the organization of Village Sarvodaya Shramadana Societies. These are legally incorporated, fee-based membership societies with child members (7-14 years), youth members (14-25 years), ordinary members (over 25 years), life members (open), and invited members (no fees). There is a 25-member executive council composed of 18 executive members (3 children, 3 youths, 3 mothers, 9 ordinary) and 7 members of the elders council (selected from ordinary and life members). There are 6 sub-committees: spiritual, cultural, moral, social, economic, and political.

TRANSFORMATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AS CONTINUOUS LEARNING
Sarvodaya’s engagement in continuous learning throughout all activities is remarkable. This may be related to the fact that the movement was begun by a college teacher and volunteer students. Early in life Ariyaratne awakened to a passion for learning. He recalls, “I used to think what an abundance of knowledge the world offers us through society and nature to master. And my thirst to master that knowledge never seems to get quenched.”13 Prior to the 1958 Kantoluwa camp, eagerness to learn had taken him to study the miserable conditions of villages in the jungles of eastern Sri Lanka. In 1959 it took him to learn from Gandhian experience in India. In the same year he went to study the Kibbutz movement in Israel where he lived and worked for three weeks in a completely “communalized” village, one week in an “in-between” village, and two weeks in an “ordinary” village.14

The Shramadana concept of sharing implies continuous improvement by all of capabilities for sharing. The Annual Report for 2003-2004 reports a wide variety of learning activities throughout the movement from villages to the national headquarters. The word “training” appears more than 90 times in 142 pages. In addition, there are abundant references to “workshops,” “skills development,” “education,” “courses,” “programs,” “orientations,” and “providing information.” Progress in stages of village development is termed “graduation.”

A wide variety of training activities at village, district, and national levels are reported. Figures are provided on number and gender of participants and beneficiaries served. Women are well represented in externally funded projects at the village (46%), district (57%), and national (60%) levels. At the village level one finds training in Shramadana camps, leadership training, training of pre-school teachers, and management training for Sarvodaya Shramadana Society council members. Among 42 programs at the district level are found workshops for volunteer workers, workshops on economic well-being for pre-school teachers, awareness training for health workers, vocational training for masons, vocational training in computers, advanced training in biodiversity, youth leadership training, programs in conflict resolution, and training for members of the Sarvodaya Shanthi Sena (Peace Corps). Among 19 national level activities are Shramadana camps, workshops on training of trainers, training of Telecenter staff, advanced training in library management, workshops on traditional medicine, peace dialogues, and peace meditations.

Each of Sarvodaya’s sub-units has its own training programs. For example, the community capacity-building unit conducts training in organic farming, crop cultivation, appropriate technologies, gravity-fed water systems, and protection of biodiversity. The early childhood development program engages in training of teachers and parents in psychosocial development. The community health program provides training in the fields of reproductive health, AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, and violence against women. Training was provided to engage 105 monks as spiritual and cultural advocates of community health.

Five aspects of Sarvodaya’s commitment to continuous learning invite special attention. The first is providing opportunities for spiritual development such as in meditation programs for individuals, groups, expectant parents, persons with physical or mental disabilities, war-traumatized people, prisoners, and police. The second is a strong commitment to providing access to information needed for development. Beginning with programs to establish village libraries and to train librarians, the project now has been extended to provide village access to knowledge for development through advanced information technologies. Accompanied by staff training, telecommunications centers are being established at national, district, and village levels to link and support activities. Talented village youth are being trained in computers to access resources useful for village development. A high technology multimedia mobile unit is carrying information capabilities to remote villages.

A third cluster of learning activities pursues adaptation of appropriate technologies for village well-being. Among them are training programs of the Rural Technical Services Division to develop gravity water systems, community rainwater catchment tanks, wells, housing, ferro-cement latrines, and micro hydroelectric and solar-powered systems for villages in remote areas. Training accompanies adaptation of technologies to establish “ecovillages” that use natural resources in the environment.

Sarvodaya’s shift from donor dependency toward self-reliance in all its activities has produced a wide range of learning needs related to what might be termed “village capitalism.” This requires learning to adapt some institutions and practices characteristic of capitalist society. It means developing a Banking Division that in 2003 celebrated district managers for their excellent record in loan disbursements, savings mobilization, repayment rates, portfolio at risk, and the performance of Sarvodaya Development Banks.15 The Training Division assists the Banking and Enterprise Services Divisions “to deliver their services more effectively to their client members.”  By training village Sarvodaya Shramadana Society officials and managers to function independently it “facilitates the transformation of a community-based organization unit capable of rendering a range of services to the community.”  Training is provided for “rising young village entrepreneurs.”  The Enterprise Services Division promotes learning new skills to develop micro enterprises as viable business ventures. It conducts training in entrepreneurship, marketing, and related matters while assessing the impact of services provided by 12 district Enterprise Promotion Centers. Overall the effect is to add skills in entrepreneurship for wealth creation to the Shramadana tradition of sharing.

One of Sarvodaya’s most moving activities might be termed “compassionate learning.” Both for teachers and the taught. All benefit from the love and care of Mrs. Neetha Ariyaratne who since 1960 as the wife of the founder has gifted her life in Shramadana action. Her “office” is a little table with a telephone in the kitchen of their modest Moratua home. Among programs is care for abandoned babies (imagine 30 of them sleeping on their stomachs in little cribs at nap time with women caregivers attentively standing by). They are not abandoned again but are nurtured to enter the educational system. Another learning program is for teenage mothers with their babies, some victims of incest and rape, protected in a high-fenced little house. Handicapped women are assisted to learn vocational skills from sewing to computer competence. Another acclaimed program offers learning opportunities for drug and alcohol addicts to awaken themselves and develop vocational skills to pursue happy lives for themselves and others. Another gem among Sarvodaya’s compassionate learning institutions is the Dr. Reijntjes School for the Deaf with students aged 6 to 18 mainly from rural poor villages who have been identified by Sarvodaya workers. On leaving the School at age 18 students are provided vocational training. The School is proud that all graduates have found employment.

Thus the entire Sarvodaya Movement, from the villages to the headquarters, is characterized by a continuing progress of developmental learning, reflecting educator Ariyaratne’s passion for knowledge.

SUPPORT AND OPPOSITION
The “lotus” of Sarvodaya’s transforming contribution continues to open amidst life-giving and life-threatening factors in the Sri Lankan and global environments. Inside Sri Lanka success can be attributed to Sarvodaya’s responsiveness to village needs. How else could it spread from one to 15,000 villages? The contributions of Buddhist culture to awakening, sharing, and openness to others are apparent. Shramadana camps engage Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Sinhalese, and Tamils in common “bridge-building” projects. Beginning with self-sacrificing Ariyaratne and his family, the contributions of early supporters kept the Movement moving forward. For the first decade, until discovered by international donors, it was virtually self-reliant. The early recognition of its merit by respected members of the Buddhist Sangha and some presidents and prime ministers brought national attention.

Transnational discovery of the Shramadana Movement brought moral and material validation and support from the globalizing humanitarian development aid community. Prime ministers in Colombo hosted receptions to honor Ariyaratne as the youngest recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership in 1962 and for the Belgian King Baudoin Award for International Development in 1982. Among twenty validating commendations have been the Buddhist Niwano Peace Prize (1992), the Hubert H. Humphrey Award for Alleviating Poverty and Economic Inequality (1996), the Jamnalal Bajaj Award for Promoting Gandhian Values Outside India (1990), and the Indian Government’s Gandhi Peace Prize (1996). Ariyaratne has contributed his monetary awards to Sarvodaya.

Early on, Ariyaratne began to be invited overseas to explain the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement in inspiring talks to international contributors to community development such as to the UN agencies, the World Bank, religious bodies, and universities. Sarvodaya became a teacher in the globalization movement for rural development as well as a recipient of technical and material assistance. Researchers and volunteers responded by coming to Sri Lanka to learn from and participate in Sarvodaya’s innovations.

Over time, public and private foreign assistance began to flow to complement Sri Lankan resources. In its 2003-2004 Annual Report, “Sarvodaya acknowledges the support and cooperation extended by…state agencies, local and international organizations and foundations, private companies, nongovernmental organizations, United Nations agencies, multilateral organizations and many others, for their unstinted support to carry on our work without interruption.”16 The report lists 48 “resource partners” including 21 organizations from seven countries (Canada, Denmark, Japan, Netherlands, Switzerland, United Kingdom and United States); three Sarvodaya International affiliates (Japan, Netherlands, and the United States); three diplomatic missions (Japan, Netherlands, and Sweden); four UN agencies (ILO, UNICEF, UNHCR, and UNFPA); six bilateral and humanitarian aid agencies (SIDE-Sweden, Aris AID-Australia, CIDA-Canada, USAID, Danish Refugee Council, and CARE-Sri Lanka); and 11 Sri Lankan government agencies and NGOs. Sarvodaya’s credibility as a provider of humanitarian relief made it a natural recipient of overseas support in the wake of the 2004 Asian Tsunami.

Despite favorable domestic and international support, Sarvodaya has encountered serious opposition. Among sources have been religious and nationalist extremists, landlords, bureaucrats, jealous politicians, and media. Ariyaratne’s radical critique of the injustices of Sri Lankan society and efforts to seek peace among combatants have brought recurring threats of death. Threats began from the first Kantoluwa camp when outraged members of the elite hired a gangster to kill him for taking upper caste students to work in an outcaste village. Warned the night before about the assassination plan, Ariyaratne sought out and confronted the intended murderer, the Colombo ganglord “Choppe.” He explained the purpose of the Kantoluwa camp and offered himself to be killed. “Choppe” refused and became a Sarvodaya supporter.

Ariyaratne has explained: "Many were such incidents in my life…threats of bomb, murder. But unarmed we went to these people and explained what was truth and untruth, what was bad and what was good, and once convinced they assisted us.”17  The most serious attacks to discredit Ariyaratne and undermine Sarvodaya took place during the presidency of Ranasinghe Premadasa (1989-1993).  They came during a time of rebellion in the south by Sinhala Marxist revolutionaries and fighting in the north against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).  The government-sponsored attacks on Sarvodaya ceased after the assassination of Premadasa by an LTTE suicide bomber on May 1, 1993.

For Ariyaratne, the political hostility behind governmental attacks upon him was inexplicable. Repeated requests for an interview with the President, earlier as prime minister an ally in projects for the poor, were rejected. When lower level officials were asked for explanation of the offensive the reply was “orders from above.” Unprecedented governmental repression and harassment preceded and followed proclamation of a Presidential Commission of Inquiry into Non-Governmental Organizations on December 17, 1990. The Commission was charged, among other things, to report:

In February 1991 the Commission gave Sarvodaya three weeks to reply to a detailed questionnaire with over 100 items. Subsequent attacks by government agencies, the government-controlled press, and clandestine sources were virulent and multifaceted. They included attempts at character assassination, charges of participation in opposition political activity, misuse for political purposes of humanitarian funds received from foreign governments and aid agencies, violation of financial regulations, and sale of Sri Lankan children to foreigners. Government funds were withheld from Sarvodaya projects, the government radio refused to report on them, and the Foreign Ministry warned all diplomatic delegations that “Dr. Ariyaratne and the Sarvodaya Movement are utilising resources provided by foreign governments and donor agencies for purposes other than the original objectives of the Sarvodaya Movement.”19 Criminal Investigation Division agents questioned Ariyaratne and others. Unknown persons followed his movements and those of his family. Anonymous death threats increased. On April 29, 1992 Ariyaratne wrote to the Inspector General of Police that he had received four telephone calls the previous evening “from an unidentified caller who threatened to kill me if I did not keep silent against the state sponsored vilifications.”20  The next day Ariyaratne’s six children wrote to President Premadasa to inform him of the brutal death threats they themselves had been asked to convey to their father amidst “shockingly malicious and false coverage in the [government] Lake House press.”21   The children simultaneously appealed to the international community for support:

In response President Premadasa’s secretary assured the children that “I have given instructions to the Inspector General of Police to provide you [daughter Charika, the first signer] and your family with such security as you may require.”23 The international appeal brought expressions of concern and solidarity for Ariyaratne and Sarvodaya from throughout the world. In November 1991 the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), citing press and police harassment of Sarvodaya, called upon the Sri Lankan Government to “re-examine the mandate and operations” of its Presidential Commission.” It noted “suspicion” in the NGO community “that the Sri Lanka Government has little interest in the regulation of NGOs, and its actual interest lies in merely frightening and intimidating them.”24

Ariyaratne did not keep silent. On December 28, 1991 in his presidential speech to the 35th annual meeting of the parent Sarvodaya Shramadana corporation, he defended himself, his family, Sarvodaya, and its service to the poor from an “unprecedented smear campaign in the government-controlled press….Day and night my family and I received many death threats.” He spoke of “innumerable others who have similarly fallen victim to a tide of intolerance and injustice that is now emanating from the power political domain. Perhaps the voice I raise is theirs as well.”25 The speech, delivered at age 60, at a time of crisis, constituted a succinct statement of Sarvodaya’s origins, philosophy, tasks, recognition, repression, defense of the NGO role, moral code, gratitude, and commitment to continue the mission of service with the “understanding, support, and blessings” of all. It is reminiscent of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail.”

Ariyaratne incisively critiqued Sri Lanka’s ills:

To overcome political repression Ariyaratne prescribed a five-stage program of nonviolent direct action: “patience,” “awareness creation,” “seek justice from the courts,” “non-violent direct action within the law by which the power of the people is awakened to reject the unjust laws,” and, finally, if other measures fail, to “join together with all other non-violent and democratic forces to change the power political system.”27   With respect to relations with persons who had harmed Sarvodaya from within or helped to attack it from without, Ariyaratne advised “to bear injustice with patience” and “to educate and uplift the awareness of those who wronged us without bearing enmity towards them.”  He recalled that most of them in the past had “ended up by becoming our friends.”28

The force of personal integrity and the validity of the Sarvodaya Movement, confirmed by international support, overcame the political attack. Strengthened organizationally and in financial management, Ariyaratne and Sarvodaya emerged to continue work toward a peaceful no-poverty society.

TRANSFORMATIONAL DEVELOPMENT FOR PEACE
From the beginning, Sarvodaya has sought to realize holistic conditions for permanent peace. The nonviolent path has been followed through bloody “fields” of military, political, ethnic, cultural, caste, and spiritual conflict. Sarvodaya has persevered despite armed revolution, communal riots and civil war, terrorism, bombings, assassinations, and massacres. It has persisted across broken ceasefires between the government and the LTTE in 1985, 1990, and 1995.

Sri Lanka has been called an “island of victims,” with a traumatized population whose violent extremes are animated by atrocity stories evocative of hatred and revenge.29 Amid conditions of psychic, structural, and physical violence, Sarvodaya has gained respect as a nonviolent force for peace and justice. As Ariyaratne explained in response to the government attacks of the 1990s:

While Sarvodaya’s entire program is conceived as a holistic peace seeking and peace building project, some activities are specifically peace-focused. Shramadana camps engage youth in cooperative labor across lines of traumatized division. Peace marches raise peace consciousness and demonstrate solidarity. Mass peace meditations convene tens and hundreds of thousands of people to send waves of thought to transform their blood-stained island and world.

On March 15, 2002, following the ceasefire agreement between the government and the LTTE on February 22, Ariyaratne led a peace meditation by an estimated 650,000 people in the sacred city of Anuradhpura. The scale was unprecedented in Sri Lankan history. This followed a similar mass meditation by 170,000 people in Colombo in 2000. Meditators at Anuradhpura came from all parts of the country, including some Tamils who had never met Sinhalese. Two days earlier on March 13 a hand grenade had been tossed into the Sarvodaya headquarters compound near Ariyaratne’s house with a note, “traitor.”

Ariyaratne’s opening remarks were followed by profound silence in the immense gathering, exemplifying the power of transforming leadership and followership for peace. He began by noting convergence among ancient spiritual teachings, quantum physics, and modern consciousness research that every atom in the universe is related to every other atom. Therefore the power of combined consciousness could “move mountains.” He continued:

Sarvodaya members are prepared for peace actions. Many have risked their lives in rescue and rehabilitation work in areas of terrorist attacks, bombings, and communal riots. The Sarvodaya Shanti Sena (Peace Brigade) is a specially trained organization for preventive and crisis-coping.service. With roots in Gandhi’s call for a disciplined peace force,32 the Sarvodaya Shanthi Sena was organized following a talk on the concept given by Mrs. Asha Devi Ariyanayagam, wife of a close educational associate of Gandhi, at Ariyaratne’s house in 1962.33 Later, amidst communal violence in 1978, Ariyaratne called for organization of Shanthi Senas to protect life and property in all villages and towns.

The white-uniformed Shanthi Sena now numbers over 100,000 young men and women between the ages of 15 and 30, organized in 9,000 units. Members are pledged to follow nonviolence; seek moderation in life styles; transcend all divisions of “caste, race, nationality, class, colour, religion or such classifications;” and remain independent of party politics. They pledge to “sacrifice my life to maintain national peace and world peace” and to engage in community service activities.34

The Shanthi Sena operates as an autonomous unit with a network and activities paralleling those of the parent Sarvodaya body. Training seeks to promote skills useful for each member and for the community, including skills in nonviolent conflict resolution, first aid, and disaster relief. Among activities are “peace and amity camps” for Sinhalese, Tamil, and Muslim youth; peace marches; establishment of village health centers; and environmental protection projects. The Shanthi Sena was quickly mobilized to respond to the Asian Tsunami and continues to serve recovery as well as to drill for future tsunami evacuations.

Perhaps unique to the Sarvodaya movement is its comprehensive Sarvodaya Peace Action Plan.35 Authored by Dr. Vinya Ariyaratne, executive director, physician son of the founder, it systematically elaborates and extends ideas of a “People’s Peace Plan” presented by A.T. Ariyaratne in 2000. The plan is intended to guide thousands of Sarvodaya workers, volunteers, and all Sri Lanka peace-seekers. The plan contrasts with the global war-fighting strategy of the world’s present dominant military power to dismantle incompatible regimes and establish competitive elections and competitive economic systems.

Sarvodaya’s goal is “TO MAKE WAR UNTHINKABLE” not only in Sri Lanka but throughout the world. Locally it departs from the assumption that the civil war between the government and the LTTE cannot be “won” by either side. It proceeds to outline a “500 Year Peace Plan” with practical steps beginning from the present, through five months, one, five, ten, fifty, and one hundred years to 500 years. Recognizing that at first such a plan may be considered “laughable,” it cautions that present local and global violent conditions are the legacy of at least five centuries and will require long-range commitment to transform them.

The plan presents an analysis of the causes of Sri Lanka’s conflicts. It prescribes transforming actions appropriate for different conditions in five areas of the country. It specifies basic requisites for a ceasefire. It presents steps to progressively transform three overlapping rings of violent causation—political, economic, and cultural—from local to global conditions of peace. Forecasting global futures, it envisages “eternal war,” a “bad peace” (with combatants prepared to resume killing), and a “Sarvodaya peace” where transforming development “removes the root causes for the use of violence to solve problems.”36

ARIYARATNE AND SARVODAYA AS TRANSFORMING LEADERS
A.T. Ariyaratne and the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement offer an example of what James MacGregor Burns has termed “transforming leadership” in which “leaders and followers raise one another to higher levels of motivation and morality.”37 They also provide a case in which “this biggest, boldest kind of leadership confronts the largest, most intractable problem facing humanity in the twenty-first century:  the basic wants of the world’s poor.”38

Interpretations of transforming leadership tend to focus upon the qualities and skills of individual leaders in evoking follower responsiveness. The example of Sarvodaya, however, suggests a tripartite combination of the interdependent qualities of leader, philosophy, and movement. They are all transforming contributors to nonviolent, no-poverty development for Sri Lanka and the world. Ariyaratne is clearly an inspirational transforming leader. The Sarvodaya philosophy articulated by him makes its own transforming contribution. And the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement itself contributes to transforming its participants as well as to transforming Sri Lankan society. All three, reminiscent of buddha, dharma, and sangha, possess potential for evoking transformational no-poverty development throughout the world.

Some salient lessons from Sarvodaya’s experience are the importance of: a courageous and compassionate creative personality; direct transformative actions in shared work camps; a culturally rooted yet universal philosophy of practical developmental sharing to benefit all; readiness to learn across cultures; maintaining independent nonviolent integrity without alienation amid contending violent forces; transnational moral support and assistance; pursuing development as a continuing process of education and learning; articulation of local to global developmental vision; and emphasizing nonviolent respect for life across all endeavors.

Ariyaratne has become Sri Lanka’s most widely respected figure, locally and globally. Sarvodaya members call him “Loku Sir,” meaning elder or leader with an affectionate connotation as for a family member. He addresses others in family terms. Sri Lankans respectfully refer to him as “Dr. Ari.” For foreigners he is simply “Ari.”  He refers to himself simply as a “voluntary community teacher.”  An extensive study of Sarvodaya leaders concluded with a composite judgment of his qualities as “a humble, kind-hearted, compassionate, religious, and honest man.”40

Ariyaratne’s personality blends with the extraordinary people’s movement that he founded. As expressed by biographer Premil Ratnayake, “Ariyaratne and Sarvodaya, though two different physical entities, remain ideologically identical. You cannot talk of one without talking of the other.”41 That is why Ariyaratne and the Sarvodaya Sharmadana Movement merit co-recognition as transforming leaders for a nonviolent, no-poverty, globalizing world.

title: Ethics/Nonkilling/Regional/Sri Lanka


text:
Ethics/Nonkilling/Public Health

Introduction

 * This Course is based mainly on "Nonkilling Public Health", chapter prepared by Sarah DeGue and James A. Mercy (Division of Violence Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control) for Toward a Nonkilling Paradigm (Honolulu: Center for Global Nonkilling, 2009). The Course is part of the Interdisciplinary Program on Nonkilling Studies at the School of Nonkilling Studies. The findings and conclusions in this report are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

A nonkilling society, through the unique lens of the public health approach, is one in which the threat of violent death has been effectively eliminated. Indeed, with violence increasingly recognized as a major public health problem, the prevention of violent death and injury has moved to the forefront of international efforts in this field. As with other serious health threats, the eradication of violence, and thus the creation of nonkilling communities, is the ultimate goal of the public health approach. Violence is a critical threat to the health of individuals and a leading cause of death worldwide. In 1996, the World Health Assembly adopted a resolution recognizing violence as a serious and urgent public health problem. This was followed by the World Health Organization (WHO)’s first World Report on Violence and Health (Krug, Dahlberg, Mercy, Zwi, & Lozano, 2002) documenting the nature and scope of violence globally. This report revealed that, in 2000 alone, more than 1.6 million people worldwide lost their lives to violence (Krug, et al., 2002). Homicide accounted for almost one-third (31.3%) of these deaths, with a global rate of 8.8 people per 100,000. Another 18.6% of violent deaths were war-related, affecting 5.2 people per 100,000. The largest proportion of fatal violence was self-inflicted, with suicide accounting for almost half (49.1%) of these deaths at a rate of 14.5 fatalities per 100,000. These rates vary considerably by region with the highest rates of homicide found in Africa and the Americas, and the highest rates of suicide identified in Europe and the Western Pacific. The risk of violent death also varied significantly by age, and between racial and ethnic groups, rural and urban populations, and rich and poor countries. For example, in the United States (US) in 2006, African-Americans between the ages of 10 and 24 were 5 times more likely to die from homicide than White youths (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2006). Further, in 2000, the rate of violent death was more than twice as high in low- to middle-income countries than in high-income countries. Overall, males accounted for the majority of perpetrators and victims worldwide, including 77% of all homicide victims and 60% of suicide deaths (Krug, et al., 2002).

Compounding the loss of human life, violence also results in significant economic costs to nations around the world. Violence-related health care, law enforcement and judicial services, lost work days, and reduced productivity cost the global economy billions of US dollars per year (Krug, et al., 2002). For example, suicide deaths cost Canada almost US$ 80 million in 1999 alone, at a rate of more than US$ 849,000 per suicide (Clayton & Barcel, 1999). The costs of interpersonal and collective violence in Latin American countries ranged from 5.1% of the gross domestic product (GDP) in Peru to 24.9% of the GDP during a conflict period in El Salvador during the 1990’s (Buvinic, Morrison, & Shifter, 1999). The estimated cost per homicide is US$ 15,319 in South Africa, US$ 602,000 in Australia, US$ 829,000 in New Zealand, and more than US$ 1.3 million in the U.S. (Corso, Mercy, Simon, Finkelstein, & Miller, 2007; Fanslow, 1997; Phillips, 1998; Walker, 1997; Waters et al., 2004). Some of this variability in cost estimates is due to differences in the methods used, including the types of costs included and the year the estimates were calculated. Violent deaths exact disproportionate costs on society; Victims tend to be younger than those who die from internal causes, thus increasing the years of potential life lost and decreasing a nation’s average life expectancy (Pridemore, 2003). Inclusion of life expectancy as one of only three indicators in the United Nation’s human development index suggests that these premature deaths may have important consequences for the development of nations (Pridemore, 2003; United Nations Development Programme, 2001).

Of course, fatal violence represents only a small fraction of the physical and sexual violence perpetrated across the world. Available national surveys have reported lifetime prevalence rates of 10% to 34.4% for physical assault and 15.3% to 25% for sexual assault (Krug et al., 2002). However, reliable estimates of non-fatal violence and related injuries are more difficult to obtain due to the necessary reliance on self-report surveys for these data. It is likely that these methods underestimate the full scope of the problem, especially under cultural conditions that discourage disclosure. As an extreme example of such conditions, data from Alexandria, Egypt indicate that 47% of female homicide victims were killed by a family member after being raped by someone else (Mercy, Abdel Megid, Salem, & Lofti, 1993). More subtle pressures to maintain silence about victimization affect men, women, and children exposed to violence around the world.

Despite difficulties in estimating the extent of non-fatal violence, attention to the full spectrum of violent behavior and intentional injury is necessary in any conceptualization of violent death prevention. In many instances, violent behaviors that are not intended to kill, such as fighting, deliberate self-injury, or shaking an infant, can result in severe and lethal injuries (Dahlberg & Krug, 2002). Further, victims of homicide or suicide attempts may ultimately survive if prompt and effective treatment for injuries is available. Indeed, recent research suggests that advancements in emergency medicine account, in large part, for the stability of US homicide rates between 1931 and 1999, despite a 700% increase in rates of aggravated assault (Harris, Thomas, Fisher, & Hirsh, 2002). These authors reported that, between 1960 and 1999, mortality rates among assault victims were reduced by nearly 70% in the US, with only 1.67% of aggravated assaults in 1999 ending in death. Interventions that prevent the lethality of violence may significantly reduce the number of violent deaths in a community. However, interventions aimed only at preventing violent deaths or reducing mortality among victims will ultimately be ineffective at creating societies free from violent victimization. For this reason, a core focus and contribution of the public health approach to violent death prevention is an emphasis on primary prevention—that is, preventing violent behavior before it occurs. If effective primary prevention strategies for reducing interpersonal, self-directed, and collective violence can be identified and implemented in combination with complementary secondary and tertiary prevention efforts that aim to reduce the short- and long-term effects of fatal and non-fatal violence, the movement towards a nonkilling society could be importantly advanced.

The Public Health Model and Violence Prevention
The public health approach to violence prevention is unique in several ways. First, as noted above, the public health approach emphasizes primary prevention efforts aimed at preventing violence before it occurs. This stands in contrast to what has been the predominant, more reactive approach to violence, in which the majority of resources are focused on responding to violent offenders with deterrence, investigation, and incarceration efforts (Mercy & Hammond, 1998). The primary prevention efforts of public heath complement criminal justice, mental health, or medical interventions that serve to reduce recidivism or ameliorate the negative consequences of violence. With a focus on identifying risk and protective factors that increase or reduce the risk of violent behavior and developing interventions that address these factors, the public health model starts “upstream” in order to prevent the cascade of circumstances and behaviors that may result in violent injury and death in the future.

Because risk and protective factors associated with violence have been identified by researchers across various fields of scientific inquiry, including psychology, sociology, criminology, law, medicine, and education, an interdisciplinary approach is considered integral to the public health approach. By integrating multiple disciplines through a cross-cutting perspective, the public health model can more effectively address complex, multifactor problems, such as violence. Indeed, not only do the predictors of violence overlap multiple fields, but the various forms of violent behavior often co-occur, have shared risk factors, and are linked to a variety of other health problems. Thus, the use of a cross-cutting approach allows public health to address the complexities inherent in preventing behaviors as multi-faceted and intertwined with other aspects of social and political life as violence. Another unique aspect of the public health model involves commitment to the creation of a rigorous science base to illuminate and identify ways of confronting these complex relationships and systems. The public health model is focused on the development and use of high-quality research to understand and act upon the threat of violence at multiple stages, often concurrently. These include: monitoring trends in perpetration and victimization; identifying risk and protective factors to reveal high-risk populations and targets for prevention efforts; rigorously evaluating the effects of interventions, programs, and policies; and developing methods for disseminating and implementing effective approaches to encourage widespread adoption. Thus, public health provides a multidisciplinary scientific approach with explicit attention to the development of effective prevention strategies (Mercy & Hammond, 1998).

Finally, the field of public health can be differentiated from other disciplines by its attention to improved outcomes population-wide, rather than at the individual level. While the likelihood that an individual will be victimized by or perpetrate fatal violence can be reduced through medical care, incarceration, mental health treatment, or skills-training, for example, the goal of public health is to identify solutions that can reduce the risk for an entire population, as evidenced by lower overall prevalence rates. The potential for achieving change at the broadest level can be increased by moving beyond approaches that address only individual-level factors to incorporate risk and protective factors at multiple levels of influence, from individual risk characteristics to the cultural and social determinants of violent behavior.

The Social Ecological Model
One way of conceptualizing the broad spectrum of risk and protective factors influencing violence perpetration is within the framework of the social-ecological model (Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Figure 1). This model organizes risk and protective factors for violence within four overlapping levels of influence affecting the development of human behavior. As shown in Figure 1, factors at the inner levels of the social ecology include those with the most immediate and direct influence on behavior. At the Individual level are biological and personal history characteristics, such as personality traits, attitudes and beliefs, or life experiences that function to increase or decrease risk for violence. At the Relationship level, family members, friends, and peers can also have important effects on an individual’s risk for violence, through parenting behaviors, socialization efforts, or behavior modeling, for example. At the outer levels, the model captures factors that have a broader, and perhaps less direct, influence on the risk levels of individuals and populations. Community level factors include aspects of the physical and social contexts in which relationships occur (e.g., schools, workplaces, neighborhoods) that can influence violent behavior, such as institutional policies, availability of weapons, local law enforcement resources, or employment rates. Factors at the Societal level include those which foster a larger climate or culture in which violence is either promoted or restrained. Such factors might include the presence and enforcement of laws, social or political conflict between social groups, social disorganization or inequality, and social or cultural norms about violence. The arrangement of these levels in concentric circles (see Figure 1) highlights the interactive nature of the relationships between factors across the social ecology, and points to the critical importance, recognized by the public health model, of addressing factors at multiple levels concurrently in order to improve the health and safety of entire populations of people.

Primary Prevention Strategies across the Social Ecology
Violence and killing are multifaceted problems resulting from the complex interaction of biological, psychological, environmental, and social factors. Ultimately, therefore, substantial progress in reducing rates of violence is possible through an array of interventions targeting potent risk and protective factors at each level of the social ecology. These approaches may take many forms and the most promising interventions may be those that address multiple levels simultaneously. Table 1 provides examples of prevention efforts at each level of the social ecology.

The prevention strategies in Table 1 fall into two general categories. The first category includes those approaches that attempt to prevent violence from occurring in the first place. These strategies promote nonkilling by reducing the likelihood that violence will be expressed. These types of strategies include, for example, social development training which has the potential to reduce homicide by providing children and adolescents with skills intended to reduce aggressive or violent behavior that can underlie it (e.g., emotional self-awareness, emotional control, self-esteem, positive social skills, social problem solving, conflict resolution, or team work; Hahn, Fuqua-Whitley, Wellington, et al., 2007). The second type of general strategies includes those which reduce the lethality of violence, without necessarily reducing the expression of violent behaviors. These types of strategies include, for example, efforts to improve trauma care and emergency response for victims of assault, suicide attempt or war. Unless death occurs immediately, the outcome of a violence-related injury depends on its severity and the speed and appropriateness of treatment (Committee on Trauma Research, 1985). The establishment of trauma and emergency response systems designed to more efficiently and effectively treat and manage injured victims is an important factor in reducing the likelihood that an injury will result in death.

The strategies in Table 1 include those with proven effectiveness as well as some that are promising or untested. Home visitation for families at high risk of child maltreatment is among those strategies for which we have strong evidence of effectiveness for the primary prevention of violence. The Nurse-Family Partnership program, for example, which provides home visitation to low-income, first-time mothers from pregnancy through their child’s infancy, is designed to systematically engage mothers and other family members in improving prenatal health-related behaviors (e.g., smoking, alcohol use, health access), providing more responsible and competent care of infants and toddlers, and improving parents’ economic self-sufficiency (Hill, Uris & Bauer, 2007). Results from several randomized controlled trials have shown this program to effectively reduce child maltreatment and injury (Hill, Uris & Bauer, 2007). A 15-year follow-up study of the program found reduced rates of crime and violent behavior among both children and mothers (Olds et al., 1998). This program, therefore, has the potential to prevent child homicides by reducing maltreatment as well as reduce the future potential for children to engage in violent behavior that could lead to killing.

Another set of strategies for which we have interventions and policies with evidence of effectiveness includes approaches that reduce the lethality of violence. For example, efforts to reduce access to lethal means of suicide can reduce the likelihood of lethal suicidal behavior. This strategy was applied to the problem of self-poisoning with pesticides, a primary means of attempting and completing suicide in many developing countries. In Samoa, the introduction of paraquat, an agricultural pesticide, was associated with a 367% increase in suicide rates between 1972 and 1981 (Bowles, 1995). Efforts to control access to paraquat began in 1981 and the suicide rate dropped by over two-thirds by 1988. Thus, although levels of suicidal behavior may have been unchanged, deaths due to suicide declined substantially.

A strategy with potential for reducing the likelihood of collective violence between culturally and/or racially distinct groups in geographical proximity involves the process of creating integrated community associations to encourage interdependence and cooperation between potentially conflicting groups. Hate-motivated violence appears to flourish where racially or ethnically distinct groups cling to negative beliefs and stereotypes about each other (Senechal de la Roche, 1996). A lower frequency of interaction and level of functional interdependence between such groups sustains negative beliefs and stereotypes that contribute to a greater frequency and severity of collective violence (Black, 1998; Senechal de la Roche, 2001). In a study of communal violence between Hindus and Muslims in India, cities with strong associational forms of civic engagement, such as integrated business organizations, trade unions, political parties and professional associations were much less likely to experience ethnic violence than those in which Hindus and Muslims were segregated (Varshney, 2002). Interventions and policies that support the creation and maintenance of formal mechanisms of association between social groups, otherwise at odds with one another, may be useful for preventing collective violence that can contribute to killing.

The evidence base supporting the effectiveness of the strategies for preventing violence or killing listed in Table 1 is stronger for some strategies than others. Research is needed to more fully evaluate the effectiveness of the strategies listed in this Table, as well as other potential options. More complete discussions of the evidence base for violence prevention can be found in a number of key sources (e.g., Doll, Bonzo, Mercy, and Sleet, 2008; Krug et al., 2002; Pinheiro, 2006; Rosenberg et al., 2006). Although the evidence base for specific strategies is still developing, it is clear that the problem of violence and killing represents a serious, though not intractable, threat to the health of individuals and nations. Many countries have begun to utilize the public health approach to track the incidence of violence in their communities, to develop and implement prevention programs, and to engage their citizens and governments in action to reduce the impact of violence. These important efforts show promise that, through the development and widespread adoption of effective, multi-dimensional primary prevention approaches for violence prevention, the vision of a nonkilling society may be realized.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Ethics/Nonkilling/Public Health


text:
Ethics/Nonkilling/Technology

 * This Course is based mainly on "A Utopia Worth Pursuing", chapter prepared by Professor Mihai Nadin (UUniversity of Texas at Dallas) for Toward a Nonkilling Paradigm (Honolulu: Center for Global Nonkilling, 2009). The Course is part of the Interdisciplinary Program on Nonkilling Studies at the School of Nonkilling Studies.

Killing is a matter of agency. As the saying goes, “Guns don’t kill—people do.” Directly, as in targeting and triggering the deadly weapon; or indirectly, as in building machines that kill, or writing programs to drive some machine, be it a computer or a guillotine, that will perform the operation. Or in constructing killer robots to which the task can be delegated. Dispensing poison, in so many forms—from the famous arsenic to the insidious poisons of religious, ideological, political, moral, or scientific fanaticism. Brute force—which includes messy decapitations as well as dropping an atomic bomb. Careless driving is another way of killing. Irresponsible acts—waste disposal by production facilities and industrial farming methods—kill. So do sloppy medical interventions, and legal tricks that let killers go free. Some methods of killing are slow, and some faster than predicted by the persons who calculate the costs of pollution, or professional misconduct. And more often than we like to think, we can kill by not acting at all. Accepting killing as part of life, as an unavoidable by-product of existing. Albeit, nonkilling technology, which should be an answer to the ever broader forms of killing practiced in our days, would have to cover the huge territory of human actions, whether these are well intentioned—industrialization, for example, or genetic engineering—or criminal—e.g., wars of all kind.

Creating life is still a matter of a realization in a limited space of possibilities—from sexual encounters to artificial insemination—and the associated probabilities. Killing conjures an infinity of means. The metaphors encapsulate the agency factor: the look that kills (“We look, they die,” was a description used many years ago by some MIT researchers developing intelligent weapons for their sponsors); the thoughts, the mindlessness, indifference. We die so many times in our lives as we experience deceit, betrayal, injustice, humiliation, hunger, thirst, illness. No limit to these possibilities, just as there is no limit to stupidity. Nonkilling technology will have to address not only literal killing, but also metaphorical killing. Generations were killed—in the metaphorical sense mentioned—by acts stemming from intolerance, discrimination, insensitivity, or political ideology, although they continued to exist physically, to eat, to make love, to reproduce, to be miserable.

The reason for placing the issue of nonkilling technologies in the broadest possible framework of life proper, as well as metaphorical, is simple: Is it really possible to erase the act of killing—other human beings, plants, animals—from our existence? Can humankind invent something—whatever—that will prevent killing? The trigger is squeezed, the bullet flies, but no one is killed because this “nonkilling” something was deployed. Is this at all possible? Behind the atomic bomb, there is physics. None of those amazing minds that contributed to our better comprehension of matter (radioactivity, in particular) were themselves killers. Even those who ended up working on the mass-killing technology that brought an end to the murderous World War II did not do so animated by what is called “the killer instinct.” The desire to stop the barbaric extermination of civilians and to avoid having the world taken over by insane dictators, supported by fanatics converted to the agency of death, motivated the scientists in carrying out their assignment. After the destruction was documented, many of those scientists dedicated their efforts to preventing the future lethal use of the energy they unleashed. Killing in order to stop killing. The more, the faster, the cleaner, the better. Or maybe not! Is this what nonkilling technology is supposed to be? Some magnificent invention that will prevent human beings from killing human beings?

To address killing is to address its specific rationality, as irrational as the act of killing appears to us. The same applies to nonkilling science and technology. In our world of quantified economic considerations, to address killing means to address the return associated with the act. It can be money, diamonds, power, recognition, satisfaction. In the animal realm, killing is associated with survival. Within humanity, killing followed the path from survival to affluence—and at each step reflected the motivations of life itself. The first tools made life easier. But all of them, embodying the physics of the lever and of the wheel, also made life more susceptible to death: a hammer kills more efficiently than the fist. Let’s face it: the process we call human progress is actually that of increased efficiency taking place in human self-constitution: We are what we do. The human quest for efficiency has resulted not only in more successful hunts and better crops, improved shelter, labor-saving devices, and self-improvement, but also in more efficient means for killing. Omitting implements for hunting and defense, the quest for efficiency drew on positive motivations. Fertilizers increase crop yields, but their ingredients can be used for making bombs. Remember Oklahoma? Nuclear reactors are efficient means of generating the energy on which human life and well-being depend. But on the same order of magnitude, they are turned into means of killing and destroying. The amazing technology that embodies our ability to automate mathematics—computers in their myriad manifestations and functions—made possible levels of prosperity that most people could not have imagined. Even the innocuous cell phone, through which lives can be saved, can be an agent of killing when used to remotely trigger explosions, or when it distracts someone driving a vehicle. In Africa and Asia, the cell phone engages many citizens in the local economy, keeping them from starvation. But it also made some conflicts bloodier than ever, as instruments of coordination and remote control of destructive explosives.

To understand the broader picture of what we call technology—including that dedicated to killing and murder—let’s take a short detour. To repeat: We are what we do. We are poets when we write poetry, mothers when we give birth and nurse an infant, scientists when we pursue knowledge. And killers when murder  is carried through. Or: well-intended individuals or groups when we pursue nonkilling technology. To prevent killing. This definition cuts through the whole history of humankind. The only change is in the circumstances under which we make ourselves. Myth and ritual—in which killing played a central role—responded to natural rhythms, and incorporated these in the life cycle. Killing was part of it, as life unfolded from birth to death. Nonkilling technology would have meant not the abolition of stones or knives, but of all the reasons for killing in the first place. Once human self-constitution extended beyond nature, creating its own realm, observance of natural rhythms took new forms. These new forms were more able to support levels of efficiency appropriate to the new condition achieved in the experience of farming. It was no longer the case that survival—sometimes at the expense of someone else’s life—equaled finding and appropriating means of subsistence in nature.

In our days, efficiency facilitates prosperity—beyond any previous expectation—but also misery. We are more productive, and more destructive. Should nonkilling technology reduce our productive capabilities? Killing is an expression of who we are and how successful we want to be. The millions of people killed in previous wars—the wars of the Industrial Age—went through the glory and despair of confrontation. Airplanes hitting the Twin Towers in Manhattan, or the use of “intelligent bombs” in the wars still going on, have a direct impact. But in each situation, we are what we do—active military, scientists conceiving weapons of mass destruction, engineers perfecting killing machines. Or activists against killing, scientists working on nonkilling technology. What is new in humankind’s condition is the slow but inescapable change to a psychopathic condition: no self-reflection, no sense of wrong, no sense of guilt. Killing like sneezing or making casual love, or watching some sports event. Should nonkilling technology address the progressive psychopathic condition of individuals living more and more for themselves, and less and less for society? Maybe the place to start in the attempt to conceive nonkilling technology is in making awareness of the consequences of killing possible. Even more: necessary. Among many other factors, the game obsession—not Tetris but Killer (as one game is even called)—needs to be mentioned. Games, whether we want to admit it or not, are part of the technology of death; addictive playing, as it is practiced, entails the numbing of hearts and brains. Wars became television events watched during dinner, or in the context of a Hookup(nothing consequential, not even sex). Death and games, TV and killing are not in causal relation; better yet, the relation is very subtle. The targets we see on high definition screens are no longer real for the viewer. The means of annihilation are themselves driven by virtual actors—someone in Nevada controlling a drone in Waziristan—performers in a large-scale game where the distinction between life and death is suspended. Or so some think.

In view of the broad understanding of killing presented here and how people are becoming more efficient at killing, and less sensitive to it, the question to be posed is: How inevitable is killing? Because even to entertain the utopian notion of a world free of killing will not result in turning back time. The past cannot be undone. If time were reversible, there would be no victims of killing. The answer has to lie in some other place: the return on killing. In other words, why do people kill each other? The How, embodied in technology, is in effect a translation of the fundamental Why? Sure, “What is the return on nonkilling technology?” is also an unavoidable question. Is it only humanism? (Many people don’t even know what this is.) Sense of guilt? (Psychopaths do not have it.) A new scientific or technological challenge? A new way to get rich fast? To become famous? To feel good? If someone justifies killing by fearing for one’s life, the equation states: My life is more important to me than the life of the person I killed. The return is a sense of self, on which basis all those who kill implicitly affirm their own importance. Can we advance towards a society in which every life is equally important? Nonkilling technology would have to result in this condition of the human being.

I killed because the person wanted to rob me. The equation is: What belongs to me, of trivial or great value, is more important than the life of the would-be robber. Can we advance towards a society in which ownership is not more important than life? Nonkilling technology might have to address ownership as well.

I killed because they killed those dear to me, my friends, my fellow countrymen, my fellow-religionists, my gang pals, my fellow-travelers. In other words, some people are more valuable than others in virtue of some association or relation. Can we advance towards a society in which differences among us are less important than what we have in common? Or better yet: a context in which we can tolerate them instead of trying to make us all the same?

I killed because that was the only way to get rid of someone who deserved to be killed. Such a person could be a serial killer, a psychopath, a fanatic, in the guise of president, king, commander, political leader, or theocrat. Killing in such situations affirms that we can prevent murder, and other extremely damaging acts, through murder. In other words, some killings are better, more justified, than others. Can we advance towards a society which realizes that killing = killing (i.e., killing equals killing), no matter how we justify it? Yet again, nonkilling technology will have to effectively override any justification for murder. Even for those obsessed with power at any price.

Humans bear the burden of a long history of killing. Within this history lies the distinction between murder—a premeditated act—and killing—which can sometimes be unintentional. It carries with it understandings that made sense in different pragmatic contexts: The ones you don’t kill will kill you. Or, another layer: If someone took someone else’s life, and the act is fully documented, society can impose the death penalty. Or: killing someone out of love—yes, love is called up as a motive for killing—out of desperation, or in a situation of diminished self-control. But we do not live in the past. And since each and every person is subject to change, the condition of killing is changing. Struck by lightening was sometimes interpreted as an act of divine punishment. Today it is an extreme event—brought about by actions not fully explainable in science, or inescapable for reasons other than religious. The nonkilling technology is called a lightening rod. Decapitation in virtue of being different, and standing for different values, goes back to an understanding of homogeneity associated with a sense of self-righteousness that resulted in the herd mentality. Hitler’s advanced technology and methodology for killing is not fundamentally different from that of contemporary terrorism.

“Made a killing”—a way of describing how huge profits are made—carries with it an experience that during a period of crisis (such as the current recession) has become very clear to those involved. Profit as the engine of capitalism explains competition in all there is good to it, but also in all that is damaging to it. Killing cannot be disassociated from profit, as death cannot be understood independently of life. Technology that serves killing is never justified by what it accomplishes, but rather by what it promises in terms of profit. Unfortunately, as we, as a society, become less concerned about the human consequences, we enter a stage of psychopathic actions within which the pain of others no longer affects us. The psychopath is a machine—victory of technology over the living.

The Utopia of a nonkilling society of course implies many forms of human interaction that return a better value than killing, and celebrate human creativity, not profit-making. Envy, alienation, disease, intolerance, inequity, inability to accept differences can be murderous. The inability to cope with change—our own included, i.e., the change from adulthood to senescence is probably harder to take than the change from childhood to adolescence—is also associated with the extreme act of taking someone else’s life. Is mercy killing less killing? Anything and everything can kill. Technologies developed for the sole purpose of killing are only more obviously dedicated to the act—not necessarily better, and never more justified. Nonkilling technology is probably a reflection upon our own understanding of what is called (demagogically) “the sanctity of life.”

In the final analysis, to kill means to consider your own life worth more than someone else’s. If and when circumstances leading to this deadly inference are erased, life and death will make our expertise in killing superfluous.

title: Ethics/Nonkilling/Technology


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Talk:Electronic Circuits

OK I am going to assume this is the Equivalent course to my school's EE311 course. Which was a guide to transistor circuits. If I am wrong feel free to do any moves required. The Isiah 15:48, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

title: Talk:Electronic Circuits


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Electronic Circuits/Transistor Active Mode conditions

Typically we want to have a transistor to operate in what is called active mode. Active mode is when the Base-Emitter junction is forward biased and the Base-Collector Junction is Reverse biased. For the npn this means that the Base has a higher potential than the Emitter and a lower potential than the collector. Now, confusion happens because even though this seems like a simple rule Ve < Vb < Vc there are two ways of looking at it. One way states that only that equation must be obeyed in order to get forward-mode the other way throws a new condition on it. The new condition states that: Not only does Vb have to be higher then Ve it must be higher by a certain amount, the same holds true for Vc. Vc must be higher then Vb by a certain amount. This amount is Vbe(on) and Vce)on) respectively.

Way 1
If Ve < Vb < Vc holds true then the npn transistor is in active mode

Way 2
If Ve + Vbe(on) < Vb  and  Vb  + Vce (on) < Vc the transistor is in active mode

discussion
This comes from the fact that a diode doesn't function correctly below about .7 volts. Typical values for Vbe(on) and Vce (on) are around .4 - .5 volts. You have to decide when to use which model. Typically you use way 2 when there is no feedback present.

Model Discussion
This model illustrates Way 2. It is a very very simple way to model the transistor but is useful for determining modes. What you will find in this course is a hierarchy of transistor models. With simple models only good for certain applications. In this case This model will allow you to determine what mode the npn transistor is in.


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Electronic Circuits/Transistor Active Mode Equations

If a npn transistor is known to be in active mode the following equations will always hold true for it:

 * ic = Is*exp(Vbe/Vt)
 * ic = B*ib
 * ic = ie - ib
 * B = ic/ib
 * a = B/(B+1)
 * ie = ic + ib
 * ie = Is*exp(Vbe/Vt) + ib
 * ie = B*ib + ib
 * ie = ib(B + 1)
 * Vbe = vb - Ve
 * Vce = Vc - Ve

Terms

 * B, Beta is a manufacturing constant
 * Vt, is the thermanl voltage typically around 25mV, but one shouldnt assume so unless you have to
 * Vbe, is typically around .7v, but one shouldnt assume so unless you have to.

Conculsions
Given Beta and one current nearly any piece of relevant information can be found.


text: File:Simple diode model of a npn.jpeg

title: File:Simple diode model of a npn.jpeg


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Electronic Circuits/Introduction to the simple diode npn model

A NPN transistor is composed of a N-type -P-type - N-type material. WE can view it this way. This model is very very simplistic. It is useful for determining the mode the transistor is in and help to visualize what else is going on. Please use caution. Transistor analysis is the art of knowing where and when what type of models should be used.

Equations
With this model the following equations can be derived 1) Think of a transistor as a non-linear resistor, with diodes, between the base and the collector whose value in Ohms is changed by the value of the current flowing into the base. Study the graphs that are supplied by the manufacturer and you can derive, within limits, approximate equations from those graphs.

Terminology
The diode between the base and collector is often called the BC junction, the one between the base and emitter junction is often called the BE junction.

Circuit Diagram and Circuit Symbol
The Circuit Diagram and Circuit Symbol of an npn diode is shown in the figure and also the flow of current through the diode is also calculated through the mentioned equation.

 Iundefined IB+IC

Important note
There are actually two versions of this model. The first model views the diodes as merely switchs that allow current to pass when the anode is at a higher potential then the cathode. The other model requires that the anode be not only at a higher voltage but that it has to be higher by a certain amount. This amount for the EBJ diode is called Vbe(on) the amount for the CBJ diode is Vbc (on). Typical values for these terms are around .3 volts for the Vbe (on) and .4 volts for the Vbc (on).

Forward vs. Reverse
If the junction diode is conducting, then it is said to be in forward mode. If the junction diode is not conducting, the it is said to be in reverse mode.

Derivations
So for our simplified model
 * EBJ is forward if and only if Vb > Ve. i.e. the voltage at the base is higher then the voltage at the emitter.
 * CBJ is forward if and only if Vb > Vc. i.e. the voltage at the base is higher then the voltage at the collector.
 * otherwise the diode is reverse.

For our model with Vbe (on) and V bc (on)
 * EBJ is forward if and only if Vb > Ve + Vbe(on). i.e. the voltage at the base is higher then the voltage at the emitter by the value of Vbe(on).
 * CBJ is forward if and only if Vb > Vc + Vbc(on). i.e. the voltage at the base is higher then the voltage at the collector by the value of Vbc(on).
 * otherwise the diode is reverse.


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Electronic Circuits/The BJT Modes

Depending on the different bias conditions on the emitter-base Junction(EBJ) and the collector-base junction(CBJ), the following modes of operation of BJT are obtained:

It is important to note that these rules apply for the PNP transistor as well. We don't care how the diode gets forward biased, merely that it is forward biased.

title: Electronic Circuits/The BJT Modes


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User talk:KinnaraNing

Always Wanted To Schedule
Topic- I've always wanted to draw my own anime style.

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4: try to find some random anime pictures online

Week 5: sketch some characters from my favorite anime

Wee6: look up more pictures

Week 7: continue drawing

Week 8: sketching more pictures from online or from books

Week 9: continue sketching

Week 10: drawing more manga characters

Week 11: present my drawings to the class

title: User talk:KinnaraNing


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Classical guitar technique/EADGBE

A solid knowledge of the fretboard is essential to playing classical style guitar. The fretboard is set up starting with the lowest to the highest strings in this fashion;

Key of Cmajor up to the 5th fret. (No sharps or flats).

| E A  D  G  B  E | Open Position |--|         | F           C  F | 1st fret |--|         |    B  E  A       | 2nd fret |--|         | G  C  F     D  G | 3rd fret |--|          |          B       | 4th fret |--|         |A   D  G  C  E  A | 5th fret |--|

This pattern continues all the way up the fretboard. Sharps (#) are produced by going UP 1/2 step (1 fret), and flats(b) are are produced in like manner going down 1/2 step (1 fret).

title: Classical guitar technique/EADGBE


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Apple TV Hacks

Disclaimer
Apple TV hacks have been available since days of Apple TVs release. Apple is not currently preventing users from installing Apple TV hacks, but users are warned that applying hacks will void the product's warranty.

Software Hacks in the Beginning
Apple TVs operating system was described by Walt Mossberg as "a modified version of the Mac operating system". Hackers began creating Front Row extensions by gaining SSH and FTP access to the device.

Initially, software hacking required physical changes to the Apple TV hardware; the bottom rubber panel was removed (which is near impossible to do perfectly) and the hard drive connected to a computer. This leaves the rubber not fully connected and a sticky residue on the bottom metal. It is an aesthetic barrier to modification.

Because of problems associated with swaping the Apple TV hard drive, AppleTVHacks.net and FatWallet.com offered a US$1,000 reward for an external USB drive hack to utilize the USB "service port". Mid-2007, the USB hack was released.

The New Method: Patchstick
The community-created "Patchstick" project enables Apple TV owners to add software modifications using the USB hack. Users can download a Patchstick image to a USB drive and reboot the Apple TV from the drive. Software is then automatically transferred from the USB drive to the Apple TV device. A commercial version of the Patchstick was released mid-2008, the aTV Flash software. This software allows playback of common media files and includes a web browser, RSS reader and ability to download metadata from the IMDB. In a similar way to the open-source Patchstick method, the aTV Flash requires no physical modifications to the Apple TV. aTV Flash also enables the Loop pointer from Hillcrest Labs to be used for navigating Apple TV menus, and controlling video playback.

Creating the open-source Patchstick was a manual effort until the Mac atvusb-creator application was released in late 2008 on Google Code. atvusb-creator is noted as the "easiest way" to create the Patchstick and loads a USB drive with dropbear ssh, bin tools including compression and FTP utilities, and two plugins (SoftwareMenu and XBMC Media Center/Boxee Installer/Launcher).

Replacing Front Row: Boxee
Boxee is an open-source "media center application based on XBMC with a social networking spin" and includes its own plugins for Internet media services such as Flickr, Last.fm, Shoutcast, Joost, Comedy Central, MTV, and Hulu. Boxee also includes user-defined RSS audio, video, torrent and text feeds. Boxee installs a Netflix plugin, but Apple TV doesn't have enough processing power to run Microsoft's Silverlight, which Netflix depends on.

Boxee How Tos

 * Install Boxee or XBMC on an Apple TV
 * Hack Your Apple TV With Boxee
 * Max Out Apple TV's Potential With Boxee
 * Cut the Cable For Good with Boxee and Apple TV

Apple TV Updates
The Apple TV software updates typically remove any software hacks that are installed. Major hacks are updated on a regular basis and the Apple TV device can easily be re-hacked. The most common method used to "re-hack" is by using the Patchstick to reload hacks after an Apple TV software update. Although major hacks have been updated, most Front Row plugins have not been updated to work with Apple TV 2.x. AwkwardTV reports 10 plugins out of 32 have been certified to be compatible with the "Take Two" update.

Software How Tos

 * access the device remotely through SSH,
 * get Apple TV's version of Front Row running on other Apple computers,
 * install regular versions of Mac OS X v10.4
 * install regular versions of Linux
 * add support for other codecs
 * create Front Row plugins.

Hardware How Tos
Hardware modifications allow users to expand Apple TVs capabilities. Customers can:

 * upgrade the hard drive on their Apple TVs, although a repair company such as Weaknees, MacService, and iResQ can install hard drive upgrades with data transfer. The company offers upgrades to 80GB, 120GB, 160GB, and 250GB hard drives.
 * output color through composite video   This hardware-based hack, which requires inexpensive hardware to trick the built-in operating system, enables users with non-HDTV TV sets, for which the Apple TV was originally designed, to connect Apple TVs to them.

title: Apple TV Hacks


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User:Williamborg

Not much here. Look for me on w:User:Williamborg.

"De store seire er aldri vunnet i det første slag." Johan Falkberget

"La perfection est atteinte, non pas lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à ajouter, mais lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à retirer." Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1900 - 1944)

"One man may hit the mark, another blunder; but heed not these distinctions. Only from the alliance of the one, working with and through the other, are great things born." Antoine de Saint-Exupery

"Zurück geht kein Weg", sagte er ernst und freundlich, "man muß immer vorwärtsgehen, wenn man die Welt ergründen will." Herman Hesse 'Märchen'

"Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education." Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy (as quoted in 'The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell')

“Here is Edward Bear coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way. . . if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it!” A.A. Milne Winnie-the-pooh

"Dimidium facti qui coepit habet: sapere aude" ("He who has begun is half done: dare to know!"). Epistle II of Horace's Epistularum liber primus, line 40

title: User:Williamborg


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Vancouver Flower Clock Project/Narrowleaf Hawkweed

Back to Vancouver Flower Clock Project

This is a Vancouver Flower Clock Project Journal Page for Species Hieracium umbellatum, Common Names: Narrowleaf Hawkweed, Northern Hawkweed.

General Info

 * Bloom Season

 * Habitat

Notebook
Share a poem, story, memory or anecdote about this plant.

Log a Bloom Observation
To log a bloom observation, sign your name by typing "~". Please indicate if the time and date of observation are different from the time of signing. Be as detailed as possible in your description of the observation. Were the blooms open or closed? How long did you watch? Where were they situated? What were the weather conditions? Were there any surrounding plants, insects? What was your response?. Take a photograph, video or scan an image and upload it using Special:Upload.


text:
User talk:Gerlynramos

Your editing experiment
Thank you for experimenting with Wikiversity. Your test was recorded, and it has been reverted or removed. Please use the sandbox for further testing. You may wish to learn more about what Wikiversity is to help you contribute. If you haven't done it yet, consider registering if you are keen on our project. ---- (profile | chit chat | email) 09:35, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

title: User talk:Gerlynramos


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User talk:Mmagnuson

 Hello Mmagnuson, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. After you leave a comment on a talk page, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone follow the threads of the discussion. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To get started, you may

 * Take a guided tour and learn to edit.
 * Visit a (kind of) random project.
 * Browse Wikiversity, or visit a portal corresponding to your educational level: pre-school, primary, secondary, tertiary, non-formal education.
 * Find out about research activities on Wikiversity.

 * Read an introduction for teachers and find out how to write an educational resource for Wikiversity.
 * Give feedback about your initial observations
 * Discuss Wikiversity issues or ask questions at the colloquium.
 * Chat with other Wikiversitans on #wikiversity-en.

And don't forget to explore Wikiversity with the links to your left. Be bold to contribute and to experiment with the sandbox or your userpage, and see you around Wikiversity! --mikeu talk 15:01, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

title: User talk:Mmagnuson


text:
User:Dragonzflyte

Hmm.... well I was bored do I created a page end of story but I don't know what to put on it. I like celtic myths and fey for the most part but I also like myths and stories in general.I'm thinking of writing a book, any suggestions? BTW Michael Bryant's a jerk for calling my dogs pit bulls since they aren't and besides why the heck did he have to choose a type of dog no one knows about and add it to his stupid list? I mean chiwawas bite more often then staffies! There wasn't a single case of an attack in Ontario before he banned them. But nooo everyone believes the media So Unfair! >.< TT_TT NOTE: I'm too lazy to figure out how to "organize" the page today and don't want to anyways but sorry for the mess if anyone actually visits.

title: User:Dragonzflyte


text:
User talk:Dragonzflyte

 Hello Dragonzflyte, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. After you leave a comment on a talk page, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone follow the threads of the discussion. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To get started, you may

 * Take a guided tour and learn to edit.
 * Visit a (kind of) random project.
 * Browse Wikiversity, or visit a portal corresponding to your educational level: pre-school, primary, secondary, tertiary, non-formal education.
 * Find out about research activities on Wikiversity.

 * Read an introduction for teachers and find out how to write an educational resource for Wikiversity.
 * Give feedback about your initial observations
 * Discuss Wikiversity issues or ask questions at the colloquium.
 * Chat with other Wikiversitans on #wikiversity-en.

And don't forget to explore Wikiversity with the links to your left. Be bold to contribute and to experiment with the sandbox or your userpage, and see you around Wikiversity! --mikeu talk 15:31, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

How do I edit the page? >.< I forgot to say I'm very interested in Science, Physics and french (even if I'm failing french)

title: User talk:Dragonzflyte


text:
Dutch Language/The verb "to be" in Dutch

Learning Dutch - Lesson 2: The verb "to be" in Dutch

Lesson overview

 * You will learn the verb "to be" in several tenses.

Present Simple
Ik ben = I am Jij bent = You are Hij/zij/het is = He/she/it is Wij zijn = We are Jullie zijn/u bent = You are Zij zijn = They are Gij zijt = Thou art

Past Simple
Ik was = I was Jij was = You were Hij/zij/het was = He/she/it was Wij waren = We were Jullie waren/u was = You were Zij waren = They were

Present Perfect
Ik ben geweest = I have been Jij bent geweest = You have been Hij/zij/het is geweest = He/she/it has been Wij zijn geweest = We have been Jullie zijn geweest/u bent geweest = You have been Zij zijn geweest = They have been

Past Perfect
Ik was geweest = I had been Jij was geweest = You have been Hij/zij/het was geweest = He/she/it has been Wij waren geweest = We had been Jullie waren geweest/u was geweest = You had been Zij waren geweest = They had been

Notes: Just learn the present and past simple by heart. With the perfect's just put "geweest" after the simple form.

Handy sentences with to be
Ik ben groot = I am tall Ik ben klein = I am short Ik ben ... jaar oud = I am ... years old Ik was jong = I was young Ik ben oud = I am old Ik was jong, maar nu ben ik oud = I was young, but I am old now.

Notes: Learn "to be" by heart, and you will quite easily make Dutch sentences. We will soon cover more advanced "to be" grammar.