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-

[Publius6961]

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.

Islam is a religion
A political system
A system of central governance putting fascism to shame.
A means of controlling the tiniest aspect of every individual's life.

It is not surprising, then, that upon conquering each new dynamic inventive and competent culture, the black curtain descended on innovation, innovative thinking, inventiveness and intelletual excellence.
Why do you suppose that art in islam never progressed beyond two-dimensional cartoons?

They were adept at copying and preserving the work of others.

They were never innovators, otherwise. To this day!
As a self-aware muslim said recently, muslims use the enemy's tchnology to blow them up (cell phones), but are utterly unable themselves to make the tiniest screw that holds the cell phone together!

[FBD]

>"This resentment is misplaced, as it should be directed inward."<

Not true.
Consider the following:

Almost all of Frances 1,200 mosques are funded by foreign governments. Of the country's 230 imams, none is French.

Imams are often chosen by foreign governments for loyalty to their ideological priorities...one imam in Roubaix met mayor Martine Aubrey on the edge of the Muslim neighborhood where he preaches, declaring it Islamic territory into which Aubry (predicted to be an early favorite to win Frances Presidential elections in 2007)-had "no authority to venture"

source: Robert Spencer; Onward Muslim Soldiers" page 82.

---

From the Netherlands:
http://hq.protestwarrior.com/?page=/featured/International/Dutch/dutchpw.php

P.W. Holland

From René, chapter leader:

- "At this point our country is facing a period of terror. After the murder of Theo van Gogh in Amsterdam by a radical Muslim, the Netherlands is falling in to a period of hate-crimes. Churches are being burned, bombs are being placed near schools and politicians and opinion makers are being threatened to death. This morning three officers were wounded by a hand grenade during a raid on a home in The Hague in which possible terrorist were hiding. At this point they are still there and are keeping the home occupied. The are probably armed.

After years of preaching of multiculturalism and tolerance by the liberal elites, we are now facing the consequences of not paying attention to the growing influence of the Islam in the Netherlands. I doubt that the situation will ever return to normal. It's reached the point that we fight or we will lose our country...."

[FBD]

lol...yes you did!

regards

[redgolum]

That and when the Turks and Mongols crashed into the Middle Eastern world, they destroyed just about everything left after the Crusades.

[PeterFinn]

The >>ARAB<< nations led the world in art, music, science, astronomy, and seafaring until their descent into the darkness and madness that is Islam.

After that all they accomplished was conquest, destruction, and tyranny until the West arose to defeat them...as it seems we must do yet again.

But first we must defeat the Liberal enemy who dwells amongst us and who would gleefully deliver our civilization into the hands of the pig-humpers.

[FBD]

whoops... I misunderstood your comment.

Agreed; resentment should be directed inwards, at the dictators, mullahs, etc.

But they are full of blind hatred. I don't see how that is going to be overcome, anytime soon.

Regards

[hosepipe]

[ 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. ]

Not true...
Alaska has more oil, natural gas, coal, and most other minerals and other resources than any other single piece of land on earth.. ALL locked up by democrats in federally OWNED land.. The federal government should OWN NO land.. States should be the owners of ALL the land within their borders. The federal government owning ANYTHING "including land" except for Washington D.C., is UnConstitutional.. and flys in the face of "a Republic".. makeing this country a defacto democracy.. which breeds socialism like ALL democracys do..

And muslims invented NOTHING.. they stole ALL the inventions and advances (said to emanate from Islam) from conquered territorys.. from Egypt, Persia, India, and areas around Turkey.. which used to be christian all of them(except for India).

[Conspiracy Guy]

LOL. I'm saving words for old age when I'll have more time to use them.

[HoustonCurmudgeon]

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.

I am no expert in this area but if I remember correctly, the Roman Empire fell a couple of hundred years before Islam came along and while much of the middle east was Christian or pagan.

[dangus]

When the Black Prophet (cf. Revelations) swept across Christendom, he inherited the wealth of knowledge of the Sumerians, the Egyptians, the Israelites, the Greeks, the Persians, and those of Asia Minor. These cultures were the sources of the West's fascination with Science. Christianity further proposed that scientific knowledge was a form of wonderment at God's creation, and therefore was a blessed pursuit.

The appreciation for science survived the onslaught and was incorporated, at first, into the Tradition (Tradition being one of the five pillars of Islam). Today, the only pillar in fundamentalist Islam is the Koran. One could argue that the extinction of Tradition, and with it the appreciation for the gifts of the cultures which were assimilated into Islam, is a necessary result of the flawed creation of Islam. Or perhaps one could insist its loss is a perversion of Islam. But one thing is clear: Islam was never responsible for the great learning which took place within its territories.

I am greatly alarmed at anti-scientific forces within Christendom today. It's amazing that Protestant movements which still to this day use the Catholic church's skepticism of the PERSON of Gallileo as an ad-hominem attack against Catholicism have repeated the very same errors to far greater degrees in the areas as divergent as cosmology and evolution.

[edchambers]

Can anyone think of one thing positive to come from that part of the world since the arabic numeral system?Even that I believe predates Islam does it not?

[Delbert]

I don't think the Arab people have made a single advancement since the birth of islam. <---Oh Infidel, How easily you have forgotten. We have taught you how to saw off the heads of handcuffed hostages and how to blow yourselves up with innocent women and children. May Muhammad (piss be upon him) forgive you and grant you your 72 rasins.

[jordan8]

Yet the gross national product of these nations totals less than half the GNP of Germany.

A sedative for those dumb enough to believe in that "Clash of Civilizations" nonsense.

[weenie]

...resentment should be directed inwards, at the dictators, mullahs, etc.

But they are full of blind hatred. I don't see how that is going to be overcome, anytime soon.

Criticism of Islam is blasphemy, punishable by death. By extension, there is no criticism of the culture and there is no critical introspection by an Islamic person.

It is a religion without any mechanism for self-correction and is frustrated to the point of intense hatred. And of course that hatred can only be focused outwardly, projecting blame on others...

To paraphrase Churchill, it is a "rabid dog" that will grow until it threatens everyone on the planet...the only solution:

It must be killed.

[Publius6961]

Arabs were NOT always muslims you know. They had QUITE a few thousands of years when they weren't involved in the death cult of islamics. The numbers came about PRE_mohamed.

I will need to dig into my library to verify it, but I very very very very much doubt that.

Before islam, they were literally a tiny step removed from the stone age.

[Fiddlstix]

Absolutely. The zero and algebra came from Hindus and knowledge of medicine came from Jews. A lot of what we know about ancient Greek literature was transmitted through Arabic.

Bingo!

[dangus]

>>"While Europe wallowed in the poverty and ignorance of the dark ages after the fall of the Roman Empire,<<

No knowledgeable Catholic would ever say that!

>> the lands of Islam preserved much of the classic learning that was lost in Europe." <<

Northern and Western Europe, the only lands preserved from Islamic domination, were the scarecely settled frontierlands of the Roman empire. It was the land conquered only in the time of Julius and afterward. It had never known the decent government of the Roman Republic, only the brutal savagery of the dementocracies (my own word!) of the decadent stages of Rome.

It wasn't lost, it was never there. The glory of the ancient world lies beneath the rubble of Islam.

[dangus]

Actually, even the Islamic regions of the Northern and Western Indian subcontinent had once been Christian, and still show many signs of Christian syncretism.

[dangus]

Calculus, I think. After that, I think the greatest achievements were some minor advancements in camel husbandry. Mostly from trial and error, probably.

[Publius6961]

The glories of Babylon?

Pre-islam.