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Saudi King Abdullah Inaugurates New Saudi University for Science and Technology
breitbart ^ | 9/25/09 | PRNewswire

Posted on 09/25/2009 5:48:21 PM PDT by Nachum

WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz was joined by world leaders and nearly 3,000 guests as he delivered the keynote address to inaugurate the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST).

Other speakers during the ceremony included the KAUST Chairman of the Board of Trustees and Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, His Excellency Ali Al-Naimi, Minister of Higher Education, His Excellency Dr. Khaled Al-Anqari, and the President of KAUST, Professor Choon Fong Shih.

(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abdullah; highereducation; houseofsaud; inaugurates; king; saudi; science; technology

1 posted on 09/25/2009 5:48:21 PM PDT by Nachum
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To: Nachum

“KAUST...we make explosive developments in science”


2 posted on 09/25/2009 5:52:53 PM PDT by max americana (i)
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To: Nachum

Where is this school?


3 posted on 09/25/2009 5:53:49 PM PDT by Islaminaction
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To: Islaminaction

The core campus is located on more than 36 square kilometers along the Red Sea at Thuwal – about 80 kilometers north of Saudi Arabia’s second largest city, Jeddah.

http://www.kaust.edu.sa/


4 posted on 09/25/2009 5:58:31 PM PDT by Right Wing Assault
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To: Islaminaction
It is a library "on the shores of the red sea".

Here is a link from the article....

http://inauguration.kaust.edu.sa/kingsvision/house-of-wisdom.aspx

5 posted on 09/25/2009 5:59:05 PM PDT by Nachum (The complete Obama list at www.nachumlist.com)
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To: Nachum

the electric car is coming


6 posted on 09/25/2009 6:06:02 PM PDT by element92
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To: Nachum

I guess we paid for part of it. We might never wake up in time.


7 posted on 09/25/2009 6:07:39 PM PDT by Islaminaction
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To: Nachum

Interesting...listening to the people (3 of them so far) of Kaust...their own words. Nothing much to be gleaned...just some nauseating background music while they are talking.

They don’t sound very inspired or convincing.

Thanks for posting, Nachum.


8 posted on 09/25/2009 6:27:28 PM PDT by PGalt
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To: PGalt

Will they explore if the Earth is rouind and the contention that it is is not just a western zionist plot, per Dore Gold’s “Hatred’s Kingdom?”


9 posted on 09/25/2009 6:40:32 PM PDT by AmericanVictory (Should we be more like them or they more like we used to be?)
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To: Nachum
They could use some science and technology over there...

No Arab country spends more than 0.2 percent of its gross national product on scientific research, and most of that money goes toward salaries. By contrast, the United States spends more than 10 times that amount.

Fewer than one in 20 Arab university students pursue scientific disciplines.

There are only 18 computers per 1,000 people in the Arab world. The global average is 78 per 1,000.

Only 370 industrial patents were issued to people in Arab countries between 1980 and 2000. In South Korea during that same period, 16,000 industrial patents were issued.

http://lass.calumet.purdue.edu/cca/gmj/sp09/gmj-sp09-rupp.htm

---

Send treats to the troops...
Great because you did it!
www.AnySoldier.com

10 posted on 09/25/2009 7:12:50 PM PDT by JCG
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To: AmericanVictory; JCG

Thanks for the book reference; thanks for the info.


11 posted on 09/25/2009 7:22:20 PM PDT by PGalt
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To: JCG; AmericanVictory; PGalt
Islamic countries do not have much science and technology because the core of science is heresy in Islam.

From What Islamic Science and Philosophy?:

So what does Islamic law say about this science and this philosophy?  According to Reliance of the Traveller: The Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law by Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri (d. 1368), they are unlawful, serious affronts to Islam, a form of apostasy.  Apologists for Islam in the West brag about the "Islamic science" and "Islamic philosophy" that their accomplices in the Islamic world condemn.

Reliance of the Traveller lists the following sorts of "unlawful" knowledge:

(1)   sorcery

(2)   philosophy

(3)   magic

(4)   astrology

(5)   the sciences of the materialists

(6)   and anything that is a means to create doubts

The term "sciences of the materialists" requires explanation.  It does not mean, as one might think, science that is based on the assumption that matter (and energy) is the sole constituent of the universe.  Jews and Christians might agree that such "sciences of the materialists," if not "unlawful," at least present a truncated view of reality, omitting as they do the spiritual realm.  It means, rather, according to the commentary of Reliance of the Traveller, the "conviction of materialists that things in themselves or by their own nature have a causal influence independent of the will of Allah.  To believe this is unbelief that puts one beyond the pale of Islam."

At issue here is not the existence of the spiritual realm, but the condemnation by al-Ghazali in The Incoherence of the Philosophers of "the judgment of the philosophers," first of all Avicenna,

"that the connection that is observed to exist between causes and effects is a necessary relation, and that there is no capability or possibility of bringing the cause into existence without the effect, nor the effect without the cause."                                                              

Causes and effects are inadmissible, according to al-Ghazali, because causes limit the absolute freedom of Allah to bring about whatever events he wills.  Effects are brought about, not by causes, but by the direct will of Allah.

We see then that the condemnation of "the sciences of the materialists" and the condemnation of philosophy are really the same condemnation and that the condemnation of "the sciences of the materialists" is a condemnation of far more than secular science, extending as it does to any analysis of causes and effects, whether materialist or not.  It extends even to any discussion of the nature of any object, whether material or spiritual, because the nature of an object conditions how it affects and is affected by other objects.  So in the end the condemnation of "the sciences of the materialists" is a condemnation of any effort to understand anything.


12 posted on 09/25/2009 7:41:01 PM PDT by PapaBear3625 (Public healthcare looks like it will work as well as public housing did.)
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To: JCG

A few years ago I read an article about Arabs vs everyone else in terms of productivity, innovation, etc.

The author was in a coffee house in some Arab country, around 10 am. He noticed the coffee house was full of young people, who in Korea, the US, Japan, etc. would have been at work for hours actually contributing something to society. No wonder the Arabs don’t produce anything of value.


13 posted on 09/25/2009 9:13:08 PM PDT by radiohead (Buy ammo, get your kids out of government schools, pray for the Republic.)
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To: PapaBear3625

Thanks for the ping/post. BTTT!


14 posted on 09/26/2009 7:08:15 PM PDT by PGalt
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To: PGalt
BTW, I have a copy of "Reliance of the Traveler", I have read the section mentioned in my prior post, and can personally attest to its accuracy.

Islamic theology is incompatible with the core of scientific reasoning, for reasons the author touched upon. This is why the Islamic countries fell further and further behind Europe after the Renaissance.

The Renaissance represented the beginning of a fundamental shift in attitude regarding Authority versus Observation. Post-Renaissance, if scientific observation showed a contradiction with Authority, then Authority lost.

The problem with Islam is that the Quran MUST be considered infallible, otherwise Islam collapses.

15 posted on 09/27/2009 6:43:40 AM PDT by PapaBear3625 (Public healthcare looks like it will work as well as public housing did.)
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To: PapaBear3625

Thanks again, PapaBear3625. BTTT!


16 posted on 09/27/2009 8:27:59 AM PDT by PGalt
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