Oh, it's true. Islamic culture was the pinnacle of advancement circa 1400s. The problem is that it remained mired in the 15th century due to it's 7th century outlook on the world. And it is what grinds them so much now as they see how far they've fallen behind the infidels. The fundamentalists belive that is Allah's punishment for them straying away from the 'true' faith, hence their ebrace of radical theology. Our prosperity, culture and civilization is an affront to their view of themselves.
And yet having a great civilization in the past can help give incentive to strive for a great civilization in the future. China (chiefly the PRC) and India look at their powerful pasts, and then--somewhat smugly--toward the future.
Slammite society reached its zenith somewhere around 1200. Then, the guy in charge of the most major power in the slammite world burned the beards off of four of Chengis Khan's ambassadors and sent them back to Chengis Khan that way to show Chengis Khan how bad he was. It's been a downhill trip ever since then.
Read Bernard Lewis's book "What Went Wrong".
Explains it very well.
Coincidently, in the 1400s, China under the Ming Dynasty stopped their seafaring to foreign places shortly after a few excursions to Arabian areas.
The "civilized" culture was possibly revolted by backward Islamics, and then decided to lay low and back away from the Troglodytes.
That seems like a reasonable thing for me to believe, rather than that the Arabs were mathematical pioneers.
They weren't. A few years (decades) later, after the Chinese abandonment of exploration by sea, Columbus "discovered" America.
The Arabs do not like that math, nor do the Chinese.
short answer envy