The God(less) particle

Jul 11, 2012
 
By Andy Ho

THE scientific world was abuzz last week with the 'God particle'.

Or, at least, that was how the world media hyped it up. Scientists at Europe's US$10 billion (S$12.7 billion) Large Hadron Collider called a press conference to announce their discovery of a subatomic particle called the Higgs boson.

A Nobel laureate in physics decades ago gave it this evocative name, which scientists now hate. But the legions of non-physicists who logged in to follow 'live' the online streaming of their press conference on July 4 must have largely been attracted by this moniker.

Let's be honest about it: few non-physicists would have bothered with a press conference about bosons, fields and 'five sigma', terms that featured liberally in the proceedings.

To be sure, it was a significant finding. And since Big Science requires Big Money, the media coverage will work wonders for its funding in Europe. Legislators will now be suitably intimidated by (their lack of understanding of) the God particle to suggest reducing Collider funding any time soon.

Trouble is, there isn't anything particularly 'godly' about this particle. So what is the Higgs particle?

To explain it requires some backgrounding. The concept of that seeming emptiness we call 'space' actually contains fields invisible to the eye, like electromagnetic fields and gravitational fields. Every point of space said to be empty contains these fields.

Particles are packets of energy which interact with one another and with space (fields). When particles interact with fields, there is exchange of energy, which can be transformed into particles with or without mass.

This exchange of energy occurs through the agency of something called the exchange particle. For example, you may recall from high school science that when electrons orbiting an atomic nucleus drop from a higher orbit to a lower orbit, a photon - which is a massless particle or packet of light energy - is emitted. When a photon collides with and absorbs another, an electron can jump up to a higher orbit. Thus the photon is an exchange particle of the electromagnetic field.

All exchange particles are species of what is called a boson particle. The Higgs particle is one type of such a boson. Scientists came up with a theory that such a particle must exist, in order to explain why some particles like photons have no mass whereas others like protons and electrons which make up matter do have mass.

Using their best model called the standard model, physicists can describe every kind of particle in the cosmos and how large their masses should be, including no mass. But the model cannot explain why mass should exist at all.

To get around this, physicists postulate that there is something called the Higgs field in 'empty' space that produces mass. If particles (like neutrinos) moving through this field can interact with it, the 'drag' gives rise to mass. If particles (like photons) moving through a Higgs field cannot interact with it, then they won't have mass.

Now all you have to do is prove that Higgs fields do exist.

Using the standard model, physicists know the mass that a Higgs boson must have - if it exists. If you detect Higgs bosons of this precise mass, then you would have proven that Higgs fields do exist. This is what the European scientists said on July 4 that they had achieved.

How is the Higgs boson related to the Higgs field? It's somewhat akin to the relationship between the pattern of vibration of a guitar string to the string itself. To find out how tightly strung up the string is, just pluck it, and the sound (waves) emitted will tell you so. Likewise, to know about the Higgs field, collide one proton with another as they did at the Collider and study the waves that result, which are Higgs bosons.

Because such collision data is very complex, errors creep in very easily. To be sure that a particle's mass detected is that of a Higgs boson and not random statistical chance, scientists use a measure called sigma. One sigma means there is a 32 per cent chance that your results are due to happenstance and not the real phenomenon. Two sigmas equal about 5 per cent chance your data is not real. This drops rapidly so that at five sigmas certainty, you are 99.999 per cent sure you have really found what you were looking for, that your results did not occur by random chance. This is what the Collider scientists declared recently, that their data was five sigmas sure to be correct.

So they were almost 100 per cent sure they had found the Higgs boson, which proves that Higgs fields do exist. And this, Dr Lawrence Krauss, a theoretical physicist at Arizona State University says, explains how all mass and matter came into existence out of nothing since space is nothing - though it really contains fields.

In his recent book, A Universe From Nothing (2012), Dr Krauss, like many in the field, explains that the Higgs field permeates all of space and brought into existence, through the Higgs boson, the stars, planets and people. Some may consider it the 'God particle' for explaining how mass formed. But Dr Krauss views it as the 'God-less' particle that would explain the existence of everything without a Creator.

If we live and move in a universe that came out of nothingness, the meaning of life changes radically and all religion is claptrap, Dr Krauss asserts.

Yet proving that Higgs fields exist (because you have proven Higgs bosons do), thus explaining how mass came into being, simply pushes the question back one step. We now must ask: 'Why were there Higgs fields - and particles - there in 'empty' space in the first place?'

But Dr Krauss takes for granted the laws of quantum mechanics, which Higgs fields have to obey and do obey for mass and matter to come into existence. He only alludes to these laws of relativistic quantum field theories in passing in the last few pages of his book. He does not ask where those laws that govern what arrangements of quantum fields are possible and which aren't come from.

Did some other property - animate or inanimate - give rise to those laws or to the fact that the universe is made up of particular kinds of fields? So the Higgs boson discovery does not prove creation from nothingness. Nor, of course, does it prove the existence of a Creator, despite the media dubbing it the God particle. What it proves is just that mass comes from Higgs fields, which is a long way from proving whether there is a Creator or not.

andyho@sph.com.sg

[Thanks Dr Ho for explaining the issue so clearly. Although the last defensive bit about the Creator was unnecessary. :-) ]

China and the map of nine dotted lines

Jul 11, 2012

By Wang Gungwu

THERE has been much debate about the Chinese map of the South China Sea with its nine dotted lines denoting an area where China believes it has legitimate claims. How these lines came about has been a subject of much speculation.

What is clear is that the lines marking Chinese interests were drawn after World War II when Nationalist China saw the end of Japanese naval power and watched the Western imperial powers leaving the region or being forced to decolonise. After 1949, the successor state, the People's Republic of China (PRC), retained the map to show its territorial limits.

During the Cold War that followed, moves were made by new states in the region to register territorial claims, but the Chinese map seemed to have aroused little international interest. Far greater matters of how the world was to be divided were at stake.

It was only in the 1970s that the disputes over islands, rocks and waters of the South China Sea attracted wide attention. Reports of oil and other mineral resources provided the trigger. Many international meetings and agreements have been held to sort out the complex legal issues ever since.

China and others turned to historical records to justify their claims. Prior to that, little notice had been paid to what ancient traders, pilgrims and envoys made of their journeys through those waters.

When I wrote my study in 1953-1954 of the early trade of the Nanhai (South Sea), I saw only references in Chinese to how dangerous it was to head towards open seas. The first routes on record show that ships sailed close to the coasts. They noted the landmarks, the safe shelters and, of course, the ports selected for their markets.

No one claimed any kind of territorial or developmental rights in the oceans before modern times. It was not until Europeans brought their rivalries to the region that someone like Hugo Grotius began to develop the idea of the open sea in which legal or political claims drawn from European experiences need not necessarily apply. Instead, rules governing the freedom of navigation began to evolve.

South-east Asian and Indian Ocean shipping had long sailed in the South China Sea. So had Chinese fishermen and then their trading vessels long before the great naval expeditions of Admiral Zheng He. But everyone had been content with setting out and returning safely with the sketchy route guides that they used.

In the 19th century, the world's oceans were mapped and it was assumed that, unless agreed among the powers that constituted what was international authority at the time, the seas were all open. Hence all claims, if any, were irrelevant.

Before World War I, the borders of the South China Sea were the coasts of China, Japanese-held Taiwan, the American Philippines, the British and Dutch empires in the south, the kingdom of Siam, and French Indo-China. No one talked of having sovereign rights over the seas between.

Earlier, the British had used superior naval power to quell all acts of piracy in waters close to the sea lanes. Thereafter, French, Dutch and British colonial officials noted overlapping interests but were content to apply European navigation rules where necessary.

In any case, throughout history, no country had ever controlled the coastal lands of this zone. It was not until 1942-1945, when the Japanese empire controlled the coastal lands of Taiwan and southern China, the Philippines, northern Borneo and the Malay Peninsula and all the islands to its south. At that time, it also indirectly controlled the still nominally French 'Indo-China' and a subservient Thai kingdom.

For more than three years, the South China Sea could be said to be a Japanese lake. The maps certainly show the South China Sea as the watery heart of their vast empire.

Nationalist China noted all this helplessly. It had been in a state of growing hostility with Japan off and on since 1894. During the half century, Japan had moved from Taiwan to dominate the coasts of Fujian and Guangdong, and took the British colony of Hong Kong in 1941. By that time, Japan was in total control of both the East China and South China seas.

The Chinese knew the Japanese well. They had fought off Japanese, Chinese and Portuguese pirates during the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), and the Tokugawa decision to limit maritime adventures had been a great relief. As a result, they relaxed their vigilance along the coast.

For that, they were taught a bitter lesson during the 19th century when one naval defeat after another left the country totally vulnerable to foreign attack. By the 20th century, they were determined to regain control of the seas off their coasts.

In that context, Nationalist China saw Japanese naval power as its greatest threat. Thus, when Japan lost the war and all its conquests were returned, Chinese forces crossed the strait to Taiwan and looked both north and south at the seas they now wanted to control.

They had noted that Japanese maps included all of the South China Sea. As the colonial powers departed, the decision to determine a line marking Chinese interests was made.

The Nationalist Chinese felt a new awakening about the vital importance of maritime power. They had been quiescent too long and must now take the initiative. In 1947, the map with the dotted lines covering the South China Sea was drawn.

The PRC inherited the map and did no more about it. Eventually, its historians were asked to justify Chinese claims and several reports were done. Similarly, Vietnamese and others also looked at the historical records. All claimants then turned to international agreements like the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea to which China is also a signatory.

The reasons for the Chinese map of 1947 cannot resolve the complex issues involved, but the background to how the claims originated and why it is so vital to China remains important.

The writer is a University Professor at the National University of Singapore, and chairman of the managing board of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

Could NS be the glue America needs?

by Gillian Tett

Todayonline Jul 09, 2012

This month, American newspapers are full of indignant stories about the country's discontented youth. Little wonder: Now that schools and colleges are out for the summer, millions of graduates are lodged aimlessly in the family home, struggling to find jobs.

Could one solution be a return of the military draft? Until recently, the idea was taboo in polite company, especially liberal circles. America has shied away from conscription since the disasters of the Vietnam war.

But, last week, former United States Army General Stanley McChrystal floated that proposal at the Aspen Ideas Festival. "I think we need a national service," he told the elite crowd. "We need it at the conclusion of high school and university. I don't think young people would fight (the draft) if it was seen to be fair."

Gen McChrystal received a standing ovation. Why? The issue is something that dominated the Aspen debates: Polarisation.

America's elite is increasingly worried about social divides. Never mind that US income inequality is growing; what really worries them is the fear that the US no longer has a common cultural and moral pole to unite around.

As libertarian author Charles Murray explained in Aspen, today's poor, white working class is increasingly socially detached from the rich. And, as political scientist Robert Putnam added, that reflects a decline in "bridging capital" - institutions that unite Americans across the income and social divide.

This is where Gen McChrystal steps in. The reason he wants a military draft is twofold: It could provide more troops and could also offer some of that badly needed bridging capital.

If "everyone over the age of 25 was able to go into a bar and talk about where they served", it would unite Americans, he explained. "I think Israel gets amazing value from that ... in terms of creating a shared experience." And a bit of service might offer some discipline for today's youth, along with a sense of (shared) sacrifice.

Could this idea ever fly? It seems most unlikely right now. The fiscal crunch is placing the military under pressure to cut its reach. And the idea would be controversial on the left.

As someone who has seen the impact of a draft, as a result of having relatives in Switzerland and having lived in the former USSR, I understand Gen McChrystal's point. I am wary of extending army power. I dislike militarised societies. But I also know from friends and relatives how effective military service can be as a social glue and rite of passage.

Being sent far away and forced to coexist with a cross-section of people is life-changing. Other institutions can achieve that effect but military service is uniquely powerful. Just look at veterans for evidence.

The irony in Aspen is that many of the elites applauding Gen McChrystal probably would not expect their own kids to suffer under a draft. As Vietnam shows, the poor end up being most affected.

But the General's ideas still raise a crucial question: If the military is not going to be social glue for the US, is there anything else? That is, perhaps, the great issue that hangs over this year's presidential race and remains dangerously unanswered.

THE FINANCIAL TIMES LIMITED

Award-winning journalist Gillian Tett is the US managing editor and an assistant editor of the Financial Times.

Engineering success through failure

by James Dyson

Todayonline  Jul 09, 2012

Singapore's Minister for Education has called for the country to move beyond rote learning and unlock its creative potential. Simultaneously, Britain's review of its curriculum is looking to Singapore for inspiration.

But while Singapore's excelling education system is to be admired, there are lessons to be learnt from Britain too. Because failure in the classroom is not always a bad thing. In fact, Singapore should be actively encouraging it.

Measuring success in education is not easy. British exam results have risen every year for decades. However, universities and businesses complain of poor basic writing and numeracy skills.

The media laments. Teachers grumble. Politicians blame each other. The latest well-meaning attempt to overhaul the education system has included calls for Singapore-style education and a return to rote learning.

In contrast, Singapore is the model student: Second for maths, fourth for science and fifth for reading, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development international league tables.

But A grades are not always the best indicators. Thomas Edison, one of history's great inventors, believed in Fs - that is, F for Failure.


INVENTION MATTERS

We make progress by making mistakes. While inventing the bagless vacuum cleaner, I failed 5,126 times. But prototype 5,127 was a success.

Singapore will only unleash its potential through teaching the value of failure. In a world where intellectual property is often far more valuable than the tangible, it is invention that counts.

According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation, Singapore filed 4,000 patents worldwide in 2011 - impressively up more than 30 per cent on 2010.

Compared with the US, which stacked up 415,000, there is plenty of catching up to be done (population sizes excused, of course).

Singapore's Minister for Education, Mr Heng Swee Keat, last month called for an education system that was "less about content knowledge" and "more about how to process information". Promising words.

Learning "rote" is too often distilled down to memorising useless facts or ticking boxes. Processing information is problem solving. And to paraphrase Samuel Beckett, problem solving is to 'Try. Fail. Try again. Fail again. Fail better'.

New ideas are not found by doing the same as everyone else. They are found by learning from your mistakes. If you are told that there is one right way to do something, you are unlikely to go looking for another.


ENCOURAGED TO PERSEVERE

The message in British and Singaporean schools needs to be that embracing failure is a lifelong commitment.

Britain has made strides in recent years. Design and Technology lessons challenge students to apply the theory they learn in science and maths to real problems.

They will not succeed straight away, but they are encouraged to persevere. And when they hold a physical solution in their hands, a passion for invention is ignited.

This is true in business, too.

In our company, we occasionally set our engineers a challenge unbound by the day job (if there is such a thing at Dyson). They have fired rockets, created battery powered go-karts and navigated obstacle courses.

The most sophisticated challenge yet, a ball-based mechatronics challenge, will shortly see teams from our sites in Singapore, Britain and Malaysia go head to head.

Victory is not the point. They will learn and, more importantly, be inspired to create new exciting technology.

Singapore is ready to do the same. Its superb academic scorecard makes the world jealous. Now is the time to make the world envious of its ideas and inventions. And ironically, that begins with learning the importance of failure.


Sir James Dyson is an inventor and the founder of Dyson. He is a frequent commentator on education andinnovation issues in the British press.The technology company spendsS$2 million a week on R&D at theirUK, Singapore and Malaysia facilities.

What's so bad about charisma?

Jul 7, 2012
 
politics 360

Trouble happens when followers cede independence
 
By Jeremy Au Yong

THERE was an interesting study on charisma conducted in 1998, just after Steve Jobs returned to Apple but before he built his reputation as a messianic chief executive.

Then, researchers asked 150 students to allocate $10,000 across three possible investments: a mutual fund, money market certificates or Apple shares.

The students were given similar sets of financial information with one big difference. Half the students were shown a video of Jobs making a presentation at a trade show with his trademark flair, while the rest were not.

Researchers wanted to see if the simple addition of Jobs' charisma would have any impact on the investment decisions. The results shed some light on the impact charisma can have.

The arrest of Kong Hee and four other leaders of the City Harvest Church last week for alleged financial wrongdoings has once again drawn scrutiny to the notion of charismatic leadership.

Without commenting on his innocence or guilt - that is now a matter before the courts - his case does reignite debate over the potential dangers of charismatic leaders.

It is a conversation Singapore society has had before. After the cases involving former National Kidney Foundation (NKF) chief T.T. Durai or former Ren Ci head Ming Yi, some concluded that there was a need to be warier of the charismatic among us, because charisma is like a super power that is deadly in the wrong hands.

But if people are aware of the risk, why do they leave themselves vulnerable? Why do they not learn their lesson? And what exactly is it about charisma that seems to disable even the best defences?

Like any super power, there is nothing intrinsically bad about charisma. The ability to attract people and inspire them to follow you is actually very valuable.

For every Jim Jones, the charismatic leader responsible for the mass suicide of over 900 people, there is a Steve Jobs or a Richard Branson.

In fact, an argument could be made that charismatic leaders actually saved many companies because they pushed through change that was needed.

The problem with charisma does not lie with just the charismatic leader. Rather, the trouble tends to stem from how charisma changes the way the followers relate to the leader and the organisation.

Political scientist Marty Linsky once wrote that effective leadership meant 'disappointing followers at a rate they can absorb'.

He reasoned that a leader who disappointed his followers too much would be turfed out while one who did not disappoint at all was not leading anyone anywhere.

The idea implies a sort of social contract between a leader and a follower. In the absence of charisma, this contract has to include a shared sense of mission. The follower goes along with the leader because he believes the leader is taking him where he wants to go.

If the leader then starts to head off in a different direction, that social contract is violated and the leader may find he has lost his followers.

This arrangement, however, can be eroded by the presence of a a magnetic personality. A very charismatic leader does not have the same social contract. He does not need to be on the same page as his followers.

In this situation, people follow not because of some aligned sense of purpose. They are there because they are drawn to this outgoing, dynamic, passionate person.

One clear sign that an organisation has come under the spell of a charismatic leader is a sharp distinction between the way he is viewed inside and outside the organisation.

Many outside the NKF seethed when Mr Durai's lavish lifestyle came to light, so much so that the building was vandalised.

Yet, when he resigned shortly after, NKF staff members gave him a grand, emotional send-off. At the end of his farewell speech, they gave him a standing ovation.

'I've seen him work. It's his passion. He works seven days a week, by choice, for a larger cause,' a manager was reported as saying that day.

All this despite the court proceeding just days earlier showing that Mr Durai had, among other things, travelled on first class flights and had a gold-plated tap installed in his office toilet.

The results of the Steve Jobs survey give an insight into how powerful the effect can be. The group that watched a 20-minute video of Jobs invested on average three times more in Apple shares than the group that did not.

They all had the same facts, but the sheer force of personality coloured their perceptions of those facts.

The charismatic leader can thus disempower his followers. They do things not because they have reasoned that it is the right thing to do but because they have ceded a lot of independence to the person asking them to do it.

Suddenly, there is no amount of disappointment they cannot absorb.

And often, not enough attention is paid to this supporting cast. When we look back on the NKF now, we tell the story of how Mr Durai compromised the organisation. But the story is not complete without including the role of his close associates.

Even if we argue that he put them there, he could not have achieved that manoeuvre without others watching it and choosing to look the other way.

To understand that is to see that no amount of new safeguards against a leader will ever be sufficient if the followers are weak. The bars of the cell may be thick but they are useless if the inmates hold all the keys.

And it is in the very nature of charisma to create weak followers.

Thus, in trying to protect organisations from abuse, what is needed may not just be more regulations or more procedures.

Instead, it is about making sure we never turn a blind eye to our own reasoning just because a flashy leader passionately and articulately tells us to.

jeremyau@sph.com.sg

It's raining names

Jul 7, 2012
 
LETTER FROM KYOTO
 
By Janice Tay

FIND me a clothes line, hang me up to dry - or I shall throw myself into a tumble dryer.

The rainy season is here. The Japanese call it tsuyu but I call it The Great Damp. Even when the weather's fine, the air is thick with moisture that seeps into you, into clothes, into bedding, and into the top of my fridge, which has taken up mould farming.

On the days that it storms hard enough to wash angels out of the sky, I stay indoors and read. More often than not, a book about the rain and its many names ends up in front of me.

There are the names that tell you when, how long and how hard. Hijigasa ame - elbow umbrella rain - the one that comes so suddenly you have to shelter yourself with your sleeve while you run for shelter.

Hito shibori - one wring - not long but heavy, as if someone has wrung a rain cloud dry.

A close cousin, ippatsu ame - one blast rain - stops almost as soon as it starts.

Then there are the rains named for their shape, named because they look like thread, zeros, cat fur or the shafts in a bamboo forest.

Every now and again, there is kai u - strange rain. Fish, frogs, tadpoles and worms have all apparently splattered down from the heavens, the victims, according to one theory, of whirlwinds or tornadoes that sucked them up into the air.

A more everyday oddity: The rain that comes even when the sun shines. Fox rain is one name for this, probably from folktales of foxes taking on human form to deceive. Another name: rainbow pee.

There are also the names that remind you that it's never just water spilling from the sky; there's always someone at the other end who will be dampened, drenched or delighted. And that someone need not be human.

In spring, there is yuei u - flower pleaser - just as there is mugi kurai: barley devourer. In summer, there is baba odoshi - granny scare - a sudden downpour in the afternoon that sends someone who has left beans or other things out to dry into a panic.

Regardless of season, there is yarazu no ame. It falls hard when a guest or lover is about to leave, and holds them back a little longer.

The rain here comes so close, it pours inside the body. Ji u - ear rain - a ringing in the ears. Kokoro no ame - heart rain - something that covers a heart, and will not let light in.

But the most common rain names are those that show the season. Kan ake no ame - frost end rain - falls around the first day of spring though the rains of this period are still cold, sometimes mixed with snow or ice.

Much warmer is banbutsu jou - all creation - which revives all those that winter left for dead. And when life returns, so does colour. Kurenai no ame - crimson rain - is the rain spanning the weeks when flowers of every shade of red - azaleas, rhododendrons, peach - bloom.

The summer entrant aoba ame - green leaf rain - follows, coating leaves so they look even shinier.

Splitting summer in two is the rainy season, tsuyu. Mukaezuyu - welcoming tsuyu - may go out to meet it. It appears before the season begins in earnest, raining on and off for a few days.

There are times when the rains don't come as expected. Farmers dread the empty tsuyu; its other name: withered tsuyu.

Also feared is abarezuyu - rampaging tsuyu. A deluge that roars down from day to night, it swells rivers until they burst.

A stretch of fine days around the middle of July may lead you to think that the rainy season is over. But sometimes kaerizuyu - returning tsuyu - nips back and keeps the weather wet for another two or three days.

With autumn, the rains grow cold and hawks go south. The rain that comes when they leave: taka watari - hawks crossing.

After they go, the days grow only colder, bringing at times amayuki - rain mixed with snow. Another winter visitor: kazahana, wind flowers. Early in the season, under a clear sky, the wind sometimes snatches up snow and drizzle, tossing them about before letting them fall.

But the days of wind flowers are still far off. It is tsuyu now, The Great Damp, and today promises to be wet again - more time, perhaps, to stay in and read about rains so that when they come, I may greet them by their proper name.

When churches are charities

Jul 7, 2012

Religious organisations which operate as charities have special features, hence a different approach may be needed in terms of regulation

By Willie Cheng

THE City Harvest Church court case has resurrected the periodic question: Why should a church, or for that matter, a religious institution, be accorded charity status?

The naysayer's reasoning goes like this: Charity is about helping society's poor and needy. Sure, churches can be charitable and give some money to those in need, but so do many other organisations which are not charities. Religion, after all, is fundamentally about God and spiritual matters.

A proper discourse on this subject however requires an appreciation of how the definitions of charity and church have evolved over the centuries.

Charity and church defined

SINGAPORE and about 60 other countries trace their legal heritage to England. Specifically, the legal definition of charity harks back to the Statute of Charitable Uses 1601 of Elizabethan England and its subsequent refinements in common law.

Chief among the common law cases was Income Tax Special Purpose Commissioners v Pemsel (1891) where four categories of charitable uses were defined:

•     the relief of poverty;
•     the advancement of education;
•     the advancement of religion;
•     other purposes beneficial to the community not falling under any of the preceding heads.

Over the years and across the world, the fourth category has been used to cover an increasing variety of causes such as vulnerable groups (the disabled, elderly, etc), animal welfare, environment, the arts and heritage. Singapore, for example, specifically added sports as a charitable cause in 2005.

One reason for including the advancement of religion as a charitable cause in early England was that much of the charitable work of providing for the poor and needy was being done by the church. Religion, in those days, meant the Church of England.

However, over the centuries, the religious scene has changed significantly. For starters, there has been a proliferation of and diversity in churches.

In the first few centuries after Jesus Christ died, Christianity was consolidated and became widespread with the establishment of the Roman Catholic Church. Starting in the 16th century, a movement by certain priests to reform the Catholic Church led to the formation of several Protestant denominations such as the Lutherans, Presbyterians, Anglicans and Methodists. In time, these denominations sprouted further subdivisions and sects, alongside untold numbers of independent 'non-denominational' churches. Larger ones with weekly attendances of 2,000 or more, such as City Harvest Church, are called 'megachurches'.

These churches may differ in opinion regarding theology and/or liturgical practice. But they mostly subscribe to Jesus Christ as the saviour and the Bible as God's word (even if they may interpret its contents differently).

Some critics consider independent churches shallow in theology while being deep in secular models of entertainment-based worship and marketing. For example, critics take issue with the doctrine of the 'prosperity gospel' some of these churches around the world subscribe to. The prosperity gospel teaches that financial blessings are the will of God and more donations to the church result in increased material prosperity to the individual. It is a philosophy which some theologians argue has no sound Biblical basis.

Another key distinction among the various forms of churches lies in their structures and leadership.

The Catholic Church and the mainstream Protestant denominations have fairly well-established organisational structures and processes for the formation and conduct of the clergy. For example, a Catholic priest is ordained only after an intensive period of scrutiny and formation of eight or more years, upon which he takes a vow of chastity, obedience and, sometimes, poverty. He is expected to live less than modestly. In Singapore, Catholic priests are given a stipend of $500 per month, with their board and lodging provided by the church.

On the other hand, most of the non-mainstream churches are essentially independent congregations, some loosely affiliated to each other, but mostly with their own rules and practices. Many of these churches do not have the same kind of rigorous institutionalised approach to selecting and developing leaders. Indeed, leaders often emerge by virtue of their charisma and ability to win followers. It is the congregations, rather than institutional rules, which determine leaders and lifestyle expectations of the leaders.

Should such charismatic leaders have flawed characters, they can do untold damage. In extreme cases, such organisations are classified as cults. Cults are banned in Singapore, but not in some countries. Yet, by granting charity status to such cults or near-cults as some countries do, regulators confer on them tax benefits and, more significantly, legitimacy.

Keep religious groups out of charities?

GIVEN the historical broadening of the definition of charity, it would be, in my opinion, wrong to narrowly target religion for exclusion as a charitable cause.

Yes, (most) religions are about God and the afterlife, but they are also fundamentally about goodwill and bringing out the goodness in man. Which is to say: they are about the community good.

If religion is excluded - say, we revert to the layman's notion of charity as helping the poor and needy - we need to also exclude sports, the arts, heritage, animals, education and health care. We would, in fact, exclude the whole gamut of other causes of 'community good' that have grown over time.

At the same time, we also need to recognise that there are churches and there are churches. What then do we do about the errant religious organisations that may not be extreme enough to be classified as cults (and thus be banned) but, in all other respects, qualify to be charities? The default answer is: Treat it as any other errant social service charity or sports charity.

In other words, have a clear set of rules and regulations for how charities are to be governed and managed. And if there is a breach by any of the charities or its personnel, throw the book at them.

Special features of religious groups

HOWEVER, the application of such rules and regulations to religious charities is not so straightforward. There are three related and distinctive features of religious organisations that regulators have to grapple with.

The first is the basis of donations. An inviolable principle in the charity sector is 'donor intent'. This means respecting the basis for which a donation is given. In the case of religious institutions, most believers give with a blanket fiat for their leaders to do with the donation as is deemed fit rather than for specific or even general charitable purposes.

The second is evangelisation. The missions of most religious organisations include evangelisation, not just of the converted, but of the broader community. Evangelisation sits uncomfortably with regulators in the more secular countries. Yet, it can be argued that evangelisation is no different from, say, the advocacy of other charities, such as the healthy lifestyles (to avoid certain diseases) promoted by health-care charities like the Singapore Heart Foundation and Sata CommHealth.

The third is the leadership of these organisations. The governance and management of religious institutions tend to be bound together, rather than be separated, as is considered best practices by secular bodies. Religious leaders also have a sway over their followers which can sometimes be seen by regulators and outside parties as bordering on the irrational.

The interplay of these three factors has challenged regulators when they seek to implement a single sector-wide approach to regulating charities.

In Singapore, the same set of regulations is applied to all charities, regardless of sub-sectors (for example, the religious, social service and arts sub-sectors).

There is, however, differentiated treatment in the Charity Code of Governance based on the size of the charities: the bigger the charities, the more controls and scrutiny are needed.

As highlighted above, there are unique aspects of religious charities, as there could be for charities in other sub-sectors.

It might be timely to review these sub-sectorial differences for a more targeted and meaningful approach to charity governance and regulation.

The writer, a former partner at management and technology consulting firm Accenture, is author of Doing Good Well. He sits on the boards of several commercial and non-profit organisations, including Singapore Press Holdings, Singapore Institute of Directors, and Catholic and secular charities.