Muslims Once Led The World In Science, But Turned Their Backs To It

The Naples [FL] Daily News ^ | December 5, 2004 | Ben Bova

[quidnunc]

The Islamic nations of the world have a population of nearly 1.5 billion, or about one-quarter of the human population of Earth. Yet the gross national product of these nations totals less than half the GNP of Germany.

Poverty is endemic in the Muslim world, despite the fact that most of the world's petroleum deposits and a quarter of our planet's other natural resources lie within these Muslim lands.

The science minister of Pakistan, Atta-ur-Raman, and science adviser Anwar Nasim point out in a recent issue of the British journal Nature that Muslim nations spend only 0.2 percent of their GNP on scientific research, while spending up to seven percent of GNP on their military. They argue that if the nations of Islam put more funding into science, they could create significant economic growth.

Islam once led the world in science.

While Europe wallowed in the poverty and ignorance of the dark ages after the fall of the Roman Empire, the lands of Islam preserved much of the classic learning that was lost in Europe.

-snip-

[FroedrickVonFreepenstein]

Oh, sorry, your wrong its was the Moops, that's the Moops!!

[FBD]

A picture is sometimes worth a thousand words:

[Alberta's Child]

It's worth noting that a lot of the dysfunctional aspects of the Middle East are not just attributable to Islam; they're mainly a function of the age of the region in terms of human settlement. We take a lot of things for granted here in the U.S. -- one of which is the orderly system of government and property ownership. This is really nothing more than an accident of history in one respect . . . the modern settlement of North America occurred so recently that most parts of this continent can still trace their land titles back to the original "owners" several hundred years ago.

The Middle East has no such luxury. Human civilization has existed there for so many centuries that it's almost impossible to determine legitimate land claims; as such, the "legitimate owner" of any piece of land is usually nothing more than the guy with the most/largest guns. No bank in its right mind is ever going to extend a loan on such property, and no "property owner" is ever going to make substantial investments/improvements in a piece of property that may not belong to him for very long. As a result, there is a built-in tendency for chaos and disorder that goes beyond Islam itself.

[dangus]

Yes, it was algebra I was thinking of, and yes, I've read that the Moslems more popularized than invented Al Gebra.

[Conspiracy Guy]

I saw that Friday. The picture alone sums it up.

[FBD]

>"some minor advancements in camel husbandry. Mostly from trial and error, probably."<

BWahahaaaaaaaaa!
whoo-boy...(wiping tears from eyes) - that was a good one!
;^D

[Redbob]

"Islam once led the world in science."

Had to be at least 1,000 years ago.

[etcetera]

Muslim society sounds like the aliens in "Independence Day" - roam the world, conquering, taking, using up what's best of other civilizations, then moving on. But they got stopped...temporarily.

[redgolum]

Christianity had spread to beyond China by the 1400's. The Nestorian Christians were already in India when the Portuguese arrived.

Marco Polo's book showed that there were at least a small number of Christians in Mongolia/China at the time of his travels. The problem is that the various sects didn't get along enough to pass any information along.

[Spirochete]

And what sort of numbers do you use for balancing your checkbook?

(Hint: They're not called Roman numerals.)

Arabs obtained mathematics from India.

[weenie]

Muslim society sounds like the aliens in "Independence Day"

Very true...like the aliens, Islam wants us to die.

[MegaSilver]

Marco Polo's book showed that there were at least a small number of Christians in Mongolia/China at the time of his travels. The problem is that the various sects didn't get along enough to pass any information along.

Yeah... but perhaps if Persia had become a Christian nation (a long-shot, I know, but it's possible), there might have at least been some better diplomacy, even apart from sectarian feuds.

[broadsword]

"From what I understand, Muslims conquered advanced civilizations and absorbed them, giving themselves the appearance of being scientifically adept. However, their religion is so stagnant and unproductive that they achieved little themselves and were easily overtaken by Northern Europe a few centuries later."

Bears repeating. You are absolutely right!

[Parmy]

The bottom line is this, "Who cares?" The Moors were driven out of Spain nearly 500 years ago. A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then.

Since that time Islam, and even before, has not accomplished anything except to intimidate, terrorize and murder to keep itself stagnate, as it is today. To the point that Islam has nothing redeeming going for itself.

[broadsword]

Those "arabic" numerals came from India. The Muslims have given us nothing but slavery, oppression, murder, kidnapping, incinerated churches and bloodthirsty terror.

[dangus]

Sorry, but he anti-denominationalist notion that Jesus came to destory all religion doesn't wash. Religion is the communication of spirituality and theology from one generation to the next, the evangelization of the next generation through the inclusion in spiritual practices. The notion that Jesus did not intend this to take place is silly. Just silly. We learn in the writings of Paul and the disciples that prayer meetings did have a specific form. (We can further read from other historical documents, such as the Didache, much about that form.) We can learn about helpers (Diakonos, or "Deacons"), presidents (Presbyteros, or "priests"), overseers (Episcopos, or "bishops"), envoys (apostles), and even a primate (primus).

What is new in Christianity is that the believer has access to the Holy Spirit, so that he may be in accord with the religion through a spiritual ascent, and not simply subjugation. The Christian is obliged to not merely submit to worldly authority, but to experience conversion so he is in accord with those whom Christ had permitted authority.

[ml/nj]

By the way, Arabs also did a lot of work on ... diophantine eqns

Cute that they named their stuff after a Greek guy.

ML/NJ

[ariamne]

Yet the liberal media constantly trumpets about the bias crimes against MUSLIMS after Van Gogh's assassination in the Netherlands..more proof of the left's collusion with islamofascism..

[weenie]

Islam has nothing redeeming going for itself.

And I'll bet that's one of the reasons they're so p!ssed off with the rest of the world.

Can you imagine what the world would look like if it were completely Muslim?

Desolation!

[dangus]

There is a part of me which isn't sure that the proliferation of disaster movies, such as Independence Day or Deep Impact, prior to 9/11 was not part of some sense that America needed to be steeled for what was about to happen. Watch some of those movies again; they provided needed cues for how to respond as a nation to a calamity.