Posted on 01/11/2002 8:52:14 AM PST by ml/nj
Is that the Royal "We"?
If you don't know or care why people care, then it's a mystery to me why you bother to read and comment on this thread.
The short answer is that it's a clue as to what they might be doing tomorrow.
ML/NJ
Thanks for the link.
I know you said you didn't have time to look, but I just did. There is some stuff to follow up on there but most of the "innovations" seem to be translating information from the original into Arabic, rather than destroying it. For example:
At the House of Knowledge founded in Baghdad by the Abbasid caliph Mamun, scientists translated many texts from Sanskrit, Pahlavi or Old Persian, Greek and Syriac into Arabic, notably the great Sanskrit astronomical tables and Ptolemy's astronomical treatise, the Almagest. Muslim astronomers accepted the geometrical structure of the universe expounded by Ptolemy, in which the earth rests motionless near the center of a series of eight spheres, which encompass it, but then faced the problem of reconciling the theoretical model with Aristotelian physics and physical realities derived from observation.The bad news is that I surfed around a bit and found this from the description of the life of Muhammad:
Muhammad, surrounded by his followers, lived in Medina for ten years, slowly winning over converts. Muhammad made repeated attempts to attract the Jews to his cause, for example, he directed that believers worship like the Jews in the direction of Jerusalem. Ultimately these attempts failed, and henceforth Muslims prayed in the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca. Muhammad's native town, which had long been a center of paganism, thereby became the center of the true religion, the focal point of the believers' daily prayer, and eventually the object of their annual pilgrimage.This is so cleansed that it doesn't even agree with the Islamic sources: Nothing about slaughtering the Jews who didn't want to be converted; He needed to be "provoked" to attack. To my mind this balderdash renders the enitre site as unreliable.Raiding and warfare were the primary economic activities of the new community in Medina, and the rich caravans organized by the Quraysh of Mecca were particularly attractive targets. In 628, Muhammad finally negotiated a truce with the Meccans and in the following year returned as a pilgrim to the city's holy sites. The murder of one of his followers provoked him to attack the city, which soon surrendered. Muhammad acted generously to the Meccans, demanding only that the pagan idols around the Kaaba be destroyed. Muhammad's prestige grew after the surrender of the Meccans. Embassies from all over Arabia came to Medina to submit to him. Muhammad's extraordinary life and career were cut short by his sudden death on June 8, 632, aged about sixty, less than a decade since he had set off from Mecca with his small band of followers.
ML/NJ
Adapted from the Hindus by the way!
ML/NJ
"Arabic numbers" are of Hindu origin.
Exactly right. Any "accomplishments" are largely the result of exploiting the existing dhimmi Christians, Jews, Zorastrians, etc. These were the foundation. Particularly in the Ottoman Empire, the backbone of the empire were the Greek and Armenian Christians.
I'm not sure Islam has anything to do with it, but some of the world's preeminent neurosurgeons were born, reared, and educated (at least in part) in Muslim countries, e.g., M. Gazi Yasargil, who is from Turkey.
Yasargil pioneered most of the advanced microsurgical techniques in use to today for resecting brain tumors and treating aneurysms.
Perhaps, but this did not occur to any significant amount till after 1400. By that time, a lot of Greek learning had made its way into Western Europe thru Spain and other Moslem conduits. I contend that this earlier Greek learning was far more influential in the history (even the formation) of Western civilization than some humanistic polishing acquired during the Renaissance.
Without the Greek modes of thought transmitted by the Moslems, it is unlikely there would have been a High Middle Ages or a Renaissance.
Again, I believe that Moslems are being given far too much credit for the transmission of Greek thought.
To say that cultural exchange between Constantinople and the West "did not occur to any significant amount till after 1400" erases the Fourth Crusade and the Latin Empire of Constantinople from the pages of history.
In 1203-1204, the Doge of Venice persuaded the Fourth Crusaders to attack Venice's maritime rival, Constantinople, as payment for Venetian sea transport of the Crusaders. Constantinople was conquered by the Fourth Crusaders in 1204.
From 1204 to 1261, the Catholic West ruled Constantinople as the Latin Empire of Constantinople.
The greatest conduit of Greek thought and Greek treasures into the Europe of the Middle Ages was the Most Serene Republic of Venice and not the Arab world. The Latin conquest of Constantinople in 1204 wasn't nice and it wasn't pretty but it did give the West, principally Venice, a 57 year long rule over the direct descendant of the Eastern Roman Empire.
BUMP
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