NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22318, 16 January 1936, Page 8

NOTES AND COMMENTS

DISHARMONY The question whether a quarrel with his wife has a bad effect upon a man's work was raised by Mr. Alan Colman, of Norwich, -when speaking at a luncheon of the Industrial Co-partner-ship Association in London. " I often wonder," he said, "whether people who are still suffering under the strain of domestic disputes are the best people to entrust with automatic machines when they arrive at their work." Mr. Colman added that the importance of maintaining domestic harmony was realised by his firm. They arranged that their assistant secretary should bo "an approachable sort of fellow," whom any worker could consult on his domestio troubles. FILMS IN SCHOOLS Although many education authorities have given their verbal blessing to "visual education," barely one in 50 schools in Britain uses the educational film in the classroom, notes the Times Educational Supplement. It is over a year since the British Film Institute was established to promote the use of school films, and following the discussions at the summer conference at Oxford the Education Committee of the London County Council made provision for showing films in schools, and similar arrangements have been made by a few other progressive authorities. But there is still no general adoption of this method of teaching. The causes of delay include not only the recent economy policy of the board and local authorities, but also the alleged high cost of equipment, while many doubt if there is a sufficient supply of suitable films. War has been waged intermittently over the respective claims of sound and silent films. The confusion and uncertainty thus created have resulted in a policy of "wait and see." Meanwhile a number of pioneer authorities have been experimenting, and the sum of their experience shows that many of the early difficulties no longer exist. OIL FROM COAL

The British coal trade no longer holds the world in fee, and on its own territory it has to meet the competition of oil, notes the London Observer. Until it has transformed itself into an oilproducer its conditions and outlook cannot be other than arduous and depressing. Among all the national problems immediately confronting Britain there is none of equal moment. It has a vital hearing both on defence and on prosperity. The Army, Navy and Air Force are all dependent on imported oil. The manifest hazards of that situation would be removed if a fluid fuel derived from our own soil were everywhere at their disposal. Such a supply would change to our advantage the whole balance of foreign trade. Internally, it would enhance the value of every ton drawn from the mines, and overcome tho difficulty of squeezing a living wage out of it, while, as a byproduct," we should have a complete dismissal of tho smoke nuisance and a brightening of the general landscape of industry. On the completion of this purpose the whole force of national thought and knowledge, administration and resource, ought to he centred. Our prospects of safety, wealth and well-being all hinge upon it. From many of our present handicaps and embarrassments there is no other direct deliverance.

A HUNDRED YEARS HENCE Problems of a hundred years hence were envisaged by Captain G. D. Griffith in addressing tho' London Head Teachers' Association. If tho predictions of economists were fulfilled, ho said, the main economic problems of to-day would have been solved. The point might soon be reached when needs were satisfied in tho sense that we preferred to devote our further energies to non-economic purposes. We should then devote our main energies to living and not to providing the means for living. With the economic problem solved there were others which would have a profound effect on the business of education. In the future, with a falling population and smaller number of births, a scientific rather than a sentimental point of view would prevail and the quality of tho human species would no doubt receive as much attention eugenically as was now devoted to the quality of flocks and herds, pet dogs, and cago birds. The educator would not then be overwhelmed with tho responsibility of ensuring that his charges should earn a living, but would so develop the wholo personality that when his pupils left his charge they would be able to use their leisure intelligently. With smaller classes and a different orientation with regard to tho subjects taught, tho maintenance of discipline by old-fashioned methods of mass suppression would no longer bo required. r lho diflicult and tioublcsome children would be subjects for the psychologist and tho psychiatrist.

A TRIUMPHANT DEMOCRAT Speaking at the celebrations in Dunfermline, Scotland, of the centenary of Andrew Carnegie's liirth, Dr. John H. Finley, editor of the New York Times, said no divination or human calculation could have predicted that one born in a placo so rich in Royal dust as Dunfermline would bccomo tho foremost protagonist of triumphant democracy in the world, and, entciing America as an immigrant boy, would rise to be its richest citizen. All Scotland could boast, not only that she gavo a burial place to Robert the Bruce in Dunfermline's Westminster Abbey, but also a living place to Andrew Carnegie in the weaver s cottage a few rods away. As a young man Carnegie had pledged himself to devote his surplus wealth to benevolent purposes. When that pledge to himself was enlarged into a gospel of wealth for others as well as himself, it was widely wondered, and cynically by some, whether he would really live up to his proposal. Tho world now knew that he did. He avoided what lie called tho disgrace of dying a rich man. He was a triumphant democrat, with an international mind having an orbit of concern for tho cosmos, but with Dunfermline and Pittsburg as its two foci, and with a love for all things beautiful. In Andrew Carnegie Scotland, and incidentally Britain, shared with America one of the most romantic and heroic of lives in the history of the human race.