Posted on 08/08/2013 9:43:35 PM PDT by Kip Russell
Richard Dawkins has been forced to defend controversial comments he made online after saying the last time Muslims contributed something worthwhile was during the Middle Ages.
Prof Dawkins, the bestselling author of The God Delusion, wrote on Twitter that all the world's Muslims had won fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. He went on to argue that although Muslims were responsible for many achievements during the Dark Ages, including alchemy and algebra, their contribution since then was questionable.
His comments sparked outrage from many high-profile writers and journalists including author Caitlin Moran and Channel 4 News Economics Editor Faisal Islam.
Moran tweeted: "it's time someone turned Richard Dawkins off and then on again. Something's gone weird." Writing on Twitter on Thursday, Prof Dawkins said: "All the world's Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. They did great things in the Middle Ages, though."
While in response to another Twitter user who wrote that Muslims were responsible for alchemy and algebra, he replied: "Indeed, where would we be without alchemy? Dark Age achievements undoubted. But since then?"
He later tried to justify his comments by saying he talked about the number of Muslim prize winners because we often hear "boasts about their total numbers".
He wrote: "Why mention Muslim Nobels rather than any other group? Because we so often hear boasts about (a) their total numbers and (b) their science."
He added: "A statement of simple fact is not bigotry".
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
“What positive effect has Islam had on the world? I can think only of negatives.”
As someone noted after 9/11: People flying machines their culture could never create into building their culture could never build (or something along those lines). All of the real work done in the oil kingdoms are done by Western brains and imported labor from poorer countries.
Re: the King David Hotel. As I heard it, they did call in a warning some time prior to the detonation, but the ever-superior British officers pooh-poohed the very concept of such an attack.
It's important to make a distinction between Muslims and Arabs. There were no Muslims before Muhammad, who was born in 570 AD. Most all of algebra basics preceded that that date. Algebra is credited to Babylonians nearly two millennia before Muhammad. A Muslim started using the word "algebra" to describe this branch of mathematics, but not the mathematics itself. As for alchemy and other types of superstition, who cares. Dawkins is certainly accurate with this statement. With political correctness, though, accuracy is not a virtue.
You comment proves the point. You had to dredge up an event 70 years ago to find a case of questionable Jewish activity. And even that was justified in that the Kind David Hotel was British military headquarters. Deir Yasin is a myth. How many Islamic terror attacks resulting in deaths have been perpetrated since 9/11 2001? Over 21,000. Jews versus Moslems. No contest. Don’t let your dislike of Jews blind you to the real history of Islam. http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/
How can you offer proof of a negative? It is incumbent upon the Muzzies to prove that they did do something constructive. So far all I hear is the sound of silence on their part but I will offer up one for their side: They gave us Obama! Oh, wait....
Alchemy was a contribution?
Wow. What a list. And there is a hidden message here that should be noted:
Something happened in the mid-90s. After a long string of Nobel Prizes earned by the Jewish population the well suddenly went dry.
I offer up two possibilities:
1. The Jews just suddenly stopped doing quality work.
2. The Nobel Prize committees finally learned that politics trumps science, economics, peace ...
Bump
I would be inclined to agree with you, except that Islam blurs the line between faith and politics, and as such -- whenever it achieves political control -- always imposes a totalitarian system as horrific is Naziism, communism and all the other tyrannical "isms" that have caused so much death, poverty, misery and oppression.
It is when Muslims cross the line from faith to politics that they become the enemy, the "good Germans" notwithstanding.
They have really advanced Explosive Vest Technology. And they have given cowardly murderer a modern twist.
I like what they’ve done with language too. For example... Taking a noble word like “martyr” - and turning it into something else entirely.
“A statement of simple fact is not bigotry”.
True, but hard to enforce.
Nonsense. He can't be forced to defend (or retract) anything. He may simply leave his comments to stand independently, and let other people do what they want.
Arabs can copy other peoples’ works and make clones of existing technology, but they do not (and never have) created NEW technology.
Just as the left needs to go back to the Crusades to discuss Christian “brutality,” they need to go back to the same time period to discuss Muslim “accomplishments.”
What an athiest scumbag! richard’s just jealous because muslims have more nobel prizes than he’ll ever get in his life, and they invented calculus when all he did was create some bogus “theory” (if i can even call it that) about animals changing. He doesn’t ever know what he’s talking about!
Where the heck has he been living? They are called "hate-facts", and they are a certain indicator of bigoty.
Right?
The phenomenon of the “good German” is like Spanish flu, which didn’t start in Spain and wasn’t limited to Spain.
We’re all susceptible to some degree.
Watch the atheist liberal talking heads defend islam from atheist Dawkins! Ain't it grand?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.