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1001 Islamic Inventions
pev writes "There's a new traveling exhibition in the UK entitled 1001 inventions. It contains some of the most interesting inventions from the past few thousand years. The common theme, however, is that they all came from the Islamic world and not the west. In some cases [the list is] quite surprising. For the lazy, the Independent newspaper in the UK printed their top 20 from the exhibition."
Mohammed lived a few hundred years after Jesus, so the Islam can never be more than 1.5 thousand years old!
-- Cheers!
"Party happy long time boom boom belt" is in the top 20, right?
Remember we owe the "Algorithm" to a dude who was writing 'programs' 800 years before Ada Loveleace and Alan Turing were about.
. . . when a group of people lets all of their scientific achievements throughout history become overshadowed by religious fundamentalism. Let's hope we don't end up going down the same route here in the States.
(It's even more sad when I have to post anonymously for fear that people who disagree with my post might interpret it to be against their version of Islam and harm myself and my family).
Nothing on the list came from after 1300 CE/AD. What does that tell you?
Rank my idea: http://www.sinceslicedbread.com/node/531
That's hilarious that they had this to say:
Baghdad international airport and a crater on the Moon are named after him.
about the muslim who attempted to build a flying machine.
...spike
Ewwwwww, coconut...
I made it to number 8, then I moved on to newer, more interesting news.
-- Cheers!
This letter that was sent in response to HPs CEO in late September of 2001 would disagree with this, and it has a lot of sources to back it up. Check it out here http://www.ninevehsoft.com/fiorina.htm
Those inventions were created by people, not by Islam. Islam is merely a religion, and hence useless and incapable of anything at except stroking peoples emotions (for good or bad).
Those are human inventions.
Odd that the person who submitted this is surprised that the inventions are from the Islamic world. Anyone who knows anything about the history of the regions whose inventions are included here knows there were a lot of innovations created in the first 500-600 years after the founding of Islam.
The problem is that such inventiveness and scholarly pursuits largely stopped/stagnated as Muslim countries and culture turned inward.
Everything on the top-20 list comes from antiquity. So tell me, what great things did the muslim world invent more recently than, say, 1950 ?
Magic Lamp
(rimshot)
Reviews with a twist! http://www.sardonicbastard.com
To sum this up, even if myth is treated as fact, the Muslim world has accomplished essentially nothing in the last 500 years. I'd regard this as less "surprising" than depressing.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
I don't know why the word "Islamic" is attached to this article.
Just like terrorism isn't "Islamic", these inventions aren't necessarily Islamic either.
The religion of the inventor had nothing to do with these inventions.
http://home.c2i.net/greaker/comenius/9899/indiannu merals/india.html
Numbers is a poor example.
Credit where credit is due.
-- perl -e'print pack"H*","6e656d6f406d38792e6f7267"'
ARABIC, and not ISLAMIC inventions?
Arab/Muslim societies produced some fantastic engineering in their day, much of which is described in the dry but quite informative A History of Engineering in Classical and Medieval Times.
For reasons that I don't understand, the Christian and Muslim worlds seem to have flip-flopped regarding the dominance of religion vs. rational thought somewhere in the past 200-500 years. Of course this is a great over-simplification, but it's worth remembering that there was a time when the Arab world was the center of learning and enlightenment in the non-eastern-Asian world (I phrase it like that b/c I don't want to flamebait the Indians or Chinese).
Simple Unexpected Concrete Credible Emotional Stories
I looked over the sites, and i find something intresting: The complete lack of any modern innovations. This project has completely backfired, instead of trying to promote Islamic society, it has proven the harsh reality that the middle-east is centeries behind the developed world.
The moslems only attacked Persia in 638. It seems to me that at least one of these inventions have nothing to do with Islam.
While it is difficult to spot exactly where the islamic fate starts in history most people seem to assume it starts with the prophet Muhammad.
Who came a good 700 years after Jesus Christ who himself came from a fate even older. If you go back several thousand years the only bible fate around that is still around (as far as I know) are the Jews.
Wich means that most of the inventions claimed here are in fact not made by muslims but either by their predecessors (christians or jews) OR one of the many other fates that used to exist in the world.
It always suprises me when people talk about the rich history of the middle east and attribute it to Islam when in fact islam had next to nothing to do with it. Just check islamic attitudes to the great pyramids.
When an article already makes a basic mistake by attributing achievements to a fate that happened hundreds of years earlier I smell propoganda. Would be like attributing the Great Wall to the Chinese Communist Party.
Same region, same ethnic people but totally different nonetheless.
Basically this whole things sound to me like, thousands of years ago when the world was totally different some guy invented a thing wich was kinda of usefull so now a whole group of religious freaks must be liked despite the fact that everything they say and do is exactly against the believes of that guy thousands of years ago.
No thanks. I just judge muslims by the ones I meet in daily life.
My greatest problem with the muslims in general is that they never seem to have heard of the saying "what is good for the goose is good for the gander" (what goes for you goes for me). Take the recent riots over those danish cartoons. Arab media have spouted hate for decades but that is alright. One rule for the muslims, another for the rest of the world. No thank you.
The only thing I know that in holland a mere 3-4% of the population seems to be in the news 80% of the time. You can turn on the tv without some program about them. Enough already.
Oh, and those who think that hatred against muslims is extreme right. Consider this. What do nazi's hate? Homosexuals, equal rights for women, jews, etc. What do muslims hate?
Those lefties defending muslims bashing gays and supressing womens mystify me. Sometimes the enemy of your enemy is your enemy as well. Just because your against Bush doesn't mean you have to be pro muslim.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
From TFA: By the 9th century, many Muslim scholars took it for granted that the Earth was a sphere. The proof, said astronomer Ibn Hazm, "is that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth". It was 500 years before that realisation dawned on Galileo.
The fact that the Earth was round (contrary to popular belief) was not big news in the 9th century. The ancient Greeks knew very well that the Earth was a sphere, and they too had calculated the circumference with surprising accuracy several centuries B.C. (not to mention before Mohammed). Also Galileo wasn't controversial because he claimed the Earth was round - it was because he claimed that the Earth revolved around the sun, and not vice versa. Sigh.
White people get recognition every day. You're just used to it.
-mkb
"The truth, of course, is that the vast majority of all historical accomplishments were achieved by straight, white, Christian males"
The vast majority of all historical accomplishments? You even use terms like "the truth" and "of course", making it sound ridiculously assumptious.
If I was to believe such a claim, I would require proof. European and American history is Eurocentric, so we know far more about European history than we do of Chinese, Arabian, Japanese, Indian, African or native american history. The Chinese and Japanese have for instance an extremely rich history full of accomplisments, lots of which are not well known by westeners. The same goes for most other civilisations.
Also, just because the white, christian male conquered large parts of the world, does not mean we were culturally superiour. We just happened to better at killing than them.
At #18, the Guardian notes that by the 9th century Muslim astronomers knew the Earth was round and had measured the circumference. The writer conveniently omits to mention that more than a thousand years before, the greek philosopher Eratosthenese has already done that. Certainly Muslim astronomy of the 9th century was far more advanced than European astronomy of the same time, but this article smacks to me of an attempt to say "everything was invented by a Islam". This is strengthed by #14 where they say "the zero was invented in India, but we use arabic numerals". I submit that the shape of the numerals is not very important, while the decimal notation and especially the concept of zero are the major invention here.
For one it is yet another misleading headline, briefly checking in TFA those inventions came later than Mahomet.
... to some religion, especially as these articles do not seem to cover other culture and civilization aspects and influences at all.
However it doesn't make sense to me to associate those inventions from Arabs, Persians, Ottomans,
It's just about a book with fancy colours illustrating inventions from parts of the world where Islam is the main religion now.
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
From their list:
/ eratos1.html
18) By the 9th century, many Muslim scholars took it for granted that the Earth was a sphere. The proof, said astronomer Ibn Hazm, "is that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth". It was 500 years before that realisation dawned on Galileo. The calculations of Muslim astronomers were so accurate that in the 9th century they reckoned the Earth's circumference to be 40,253.4km - less than 200km out. The scholar al-Idrisi took a globe depicting the world to the court of King Roger of Sicily in 1139.
But as I understand it, the Egyptian Eratosthenes had discovered this same thing 11 centuries earlier:
http://outreach.as.utexas.edu/marykay/assignments
Galileo was responsible for many great discoveries, but I've never seen anyone claim that he discovered the Earth was round. Many argue that a round world was common knowledge in Europe, despite what their maps might make us believe.
I'm very doubtful of the claim that the term "camera obscura" comes from an Arabic word "qamara", since it is a Latin phrase meaning "dark chamber", and the Latin word comes from the Greek "kamara".
Whoops, I overstated this.
... but we're a long way from that right now.
Yes, you did, and even in your latest post, you're still overstating it -- and providing the answer to the question in your original post. The reason that people who aren't straight, white, Christian males feel the need to celebrate the accomplishements of $DEMOGRAPHIC_GROUP is because although straight, white, Christian males have accomplished a hell of a lot, they haven't accomplished as large a proportion of everything as a lot of people (like you) seem to think they have; and those who are not swCm's feel justifiably aggrieved at having their accomplishments downplayed (or, in many cases, having the credit stolen outright.) Really, it's a matter of a pendulum swing; give it some time, and things will settle down. In a perfect world, we'd give everyone credit for their accomplishments without even noting their sexual preference, race, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, age, veteran status, height, weight, hair color, absence or presence of hair, musical tastes, et bloody cetera
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
In the Muslim mythology, Ishmael is the legendary ancestor of all Arabs, like Isaac is the legendary ancestor of... well, of Jacob, who's the legendary ancestor of all Jews. And yes, this conflates religion and ethnicity, but I suppose it wasn't such a problem back in the day.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
As a fellow straight white male, I salute you. It's like reverse racism... rather than putting another race down, it's now appropriate to glorify one's own by celebrating "holidays". It still accomplishes the same purpose... one is viewed as exalted over the other(s). Pride in one's race/orientation/wtf-ever is still racism, no matter how you cut it. Whether you're a limey white or the darkest black, it doesn't matter at all... it's about what you do with the time you're given to live. Geez, everybody, just be "human" and get over yourselves.
Windows isn't the answer... it's the question. NO is the answer!
The fact that the MAJORITY of the Earth's population was centered in that region during the time period the article uses???
I love how one can use data to shape any point they wish to make. Hang the author for submitting flamebait trash.
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
You have not experienced these inventions until you have seen them in the original Klingon.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
It's seventy-two houris, according to the Hadith (kinda like the Islamic Talmud--commentary that they take quite seriously, but it's not The Book). On the other hand, "houri" might mean "white raisin" or "juicy fruit". So it's really a hilarious toss-up.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
but I wonder if I'll live to see the day when it's considered "acceptable" to be proud of straight, male, caucasian heritage. That's not to say I think there's anything to be proud of, but rather that it's interesting how we have all these parades, celebrations, "history" months, and special exhibits for the accomplishments of all the various configurations of gender, race, and religion, except straight, white, Christian male.
Did I wake up in some parallel universe today where there's a stigma attached to being straight or Christian? Last time I looked, there was still stigma attached to homosexuality, and bisexuality is mostly ignored or assumed not to exist. Atheists are often thought of as immoral, and given none of the protections and exceptions that religious people - yes, including Christians - get.
There may be no "parades" and so on, but that's because your types are celebrated, or even forced upon us, all the time anyway. In the UK, even though I went to a state school, we had to celebrate your religion every morning. In most countries, same sex couples are not permitted to have legal recognition for their relationship. Perhaps there'd be less parades if they were allowed to celebrate in the same way that heterosexuals can?
The truth, of course, is that the vast majority of all historical accomplishments were achieved by straight, white, Christian males.
Emphasis on the word historical. The number of Christian scientific developments is far less in the last century.
Having said that - I agree that it's silly to start rating which-group-of-people-did-what (although you yourself fall into this trap with the above paragraph). But for the most part, things like "parades" are not about this anyway, they're about raising awareness against discrimination. I disagree with your claim that it's not acceptable to be proud of straight, male, caucasion or Christian heritage.
while straight white males stand at the sidelines with their mouths shut, lest they be considered racist, sexist, homophobic, or just generally discriminatory.
No one is stopping you from celebrating achievments of straight white males. The problem is that you seem to want to also say "...and we're better than all the rest".
The truth, of course, is that the vast majority of all historical accomplishments were achieved by straight, white, Christian males.
You can't overlook the reasons behind this. Being straight, white, Christian, and male has nothing to do with inventions. The reason for this is that "straight" (I'd question the validity of this), white, Christians were the financial/military leaders over the past 200 years. Do you expect a black man to have been able to invent the ligthbulb from his slave quarters? Do you think a Pagan could have gotten funding from a catholic society to do medical research without being burned at stake? Do you think women had the educational opportunities to go forth in a male dominated society and been accepted as credible scientists? Do you think Leonardo DaVinci could have really come out of the closet?The truth is that African-Americans were enslaved and oppressed, Africans themselves were plagued with civil wars and apartheid, the jews were being eradicated in a hollocaust, the Japanese were getting a-bombed, the middle-east was still being bombarded with countless "cruisaides", women were raped, beaten and sent to the kitchen, and the straight, white, aryan, Christian males were sitting on top of their pile of money with guns drawn reaping all the benefits of being the "master race".
Now I know you're not a bigot, I just think you're disreguarding the fact that you are indeed a majority in every way. You might ask why there's black history classes, but no white history classes... because the "history" that you had in school is white history.
If you wanna be proud of anything, be proud of the fact that you are part of a race, sexuality, gender, and religion that has not been publicly ridiculed, tortured, eradicated, and had their ass kicked six ways from sunday for the past x-hundred years.
And not that I think its relevant, but I'm also a straight, white, Christian male.
Capitalism: When it uses the carrot, it's called democracy. When it uses the stick, it's called fascism.
I note a trend: the Arabs, perhaps because of their geographic location at the crossroads of the East and West, are bound to discover many new and exciting ideas and teaching from their neighbors. They were in pretty good company (Greco-Roman thoughts to the West, Indian thoughts to the East) so they are bound to pick up something.
Those inventions were created by people, not by Islam. Islam is merely a religion, and hence useless and incapable of anything at except stroking peoples emotions (for good or bad).
Yet the relative social order and stability brought about by the Baghdad caliphate was sufficient to allow some branches of science advance. That order ended with the Abbasid dynasty in 1200's with the Mongol invasions. Since then much of the middle east has been a backwater. The Sharia no longer serves Muslim civilization well.
an ill wind that blows no good
Close... but a 'petard' was a primitave (Elizabethean) anti-personnel land mine.
Yes, the "muslim world" (again, a useless term in this regard, since it's large and heterogenous; take it to mean the "Arab world", which is still too vague) has fallen from where it once was in terms of intellectual prominence. That's unrelated to either the naure of Islam per-se or to the presence of religious fundamentalists.
Also, nobody's gonna attack you or your family because you post on slashdot. You stupid little bedwetting jackass.
All Arabs are not muslims
I'm pretty sure that at least a few are.
Property is theft.
Won't that cause a compiler error with the mismatched variable types? And you should really use integer division (\) there.
"Error MMCMLXVIII: An un-oracled error as been handed down unto you by the gods. All hail Ceasar!"
Oh, and the answer is wrong. It's VI. Now write it 100, er, C times or I'll cut your balls off.
"And don't forget the ever popular "Method and device for destroying infidel skyscrapers"." As was mentioned earlier: Tom Clancy holds the patent to this invention.
...proud of straight, male, caucasian heritage... and were achieved by straight, white, Christian males
I dispute your casual assumption of causasian and Christian being equivalent.
One of the top 20 was Chess.
First of all, Persian != Islamic. Second, Chess predates Islam.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
Jews did not and do not believe a "son of God" is coming back. Some do believe in a messiah, but that's completely different.
Christians like to read a lot into the Old Testament that isn't there.
"If you wanna be proud of anything, be proud of the fact that you are part of a race, sexuality, gender, and religion that has not been publicly ridiculed, tortured, eradicated, and had their ass kicked six ways from sunday for the past x-hundred years."
Yeah, tell that to the Irish, and the Italians, and the Poles, and the Dutch, and the Scots etc, etc. Being straight, white, Christian, and male is no proof against discrimination. Being straight, "white", agnostic and male myself, I can vouch for the fact that it's not a guarantor of wealth, either.
As others have commented, this list should probably be described as Arabic inventions, and not Islamic.
Also, I notice that the tone of the Slashdot story and the comments in this article is rather antagonistic and condescending. I am reminded of Chris Rock's standup routine, when he talks about how white people viewed Colin Powell's possible run for presidency:
"Whenever Colin Powell is on the news, white people give him the same compliments: 'How do you feel about Colin Powell?', 'He speaks so well! He's so well spoken. I mean he really speaks so well!' Like that's a compliment, shit. 'He speaks so well' is not a compliment, okay? 'He speaks so well' is some shit you say about retarded people that can talk. What do you mean he speaks so well? He's a fucking educated man, how the fuck you expect him to sound, you dirty motherfucker? 'He speaks so well.' What are you talking about? What voice were you expecting to come out of his mouth? 'Imma drop me a bomb today', 'Imma be Pwez o dent!'."
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie
The principles of simplicity, elegance, and order are aesthetic, not religious. The appreciation of beauty is not in any way dependent on belief in God. In fact, the primary rationale for atheism is Occam's Razor. God has never been proven to be required to explain anything, and therefore the assumption that he exists is unnecessarily complex and inelegant.
The belief that the world is illusory or unimportant is actually a common religious belief, probably the one that sceintific atheists despise the most. If you follow the arguments of religious conservatives these days, they are based on epistemological relativism. Fundamentalists have co-opted postmodernism to exploit its slippery evasions of logic and evidence. This is why Evolution is "just a theory" to them--there is no truth, only opinion. There is no reality. The inconsistency of such arguments, coming from the mouths of absolutists, is mind-boggling, but then, they don't hold reason in very high regard.
And the primary argument of supernaturalists (theists) is that God can change or suspend the laws of physics at will. So the laws of physics apply... except when they don't. Given this assumption, science becomes impossible. This is what the current war between science and religion is about--political religion is intent on eradicating the naturalistic world view, and science in the process.
Everything you said in your post was completely wrong.
What do term limits have to do with voting someone out? I agree, term limits are a good thing and unfortunately the only thing that will get rid of Bush (since he has been able to fix the last two elections), but they have nothing to do with voting. That's why they work so well; they require no effort on the part of the lazy, uninformed electorate.
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
Try again, there are plenty of documented evidence that the people in Jerusalem were treated horribly (as were the others who were captured early on during the periods of expansion). At a minimum Jews, Christians and anyone else who lived in Muslim lands were second class citizines (just as Jews were in Europe). There were many incidents, because one was a oppressor, one was oppressed.
The reason that people who aren't straight, white, Christian males feel the need to celebrate the accomplishements of $DEMOGRAPHIC_GROUP is because although straight, white, Christian males have accomplished a hell of a lot, they haven't accomplished as large a proportion of everything as a lot of people (like you) seem to think they have; and those who are not swCm's feel justifiably aggrieved at having their accomplishments downplayed (or, in many cases, having the credit stolen outright.)
It's really far more general than that. Collectivists (including racists), lacking in individual accomplishments of their own, like to cite accomplishments of people from their race/religion/country as if this somehow ennobles them personally. Whether it's David Duke bragging about the Wright brothers, or Jesse Jackson bragging about the great University of ancient Timbuktu, it's the same bullshit of trying to attribute prestige to a group, rather than the individual.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
" Children in Turkey were vaccinated with cowpox to fight the deadly smallpox at least 50 years before the West discovered it."
This is just plain WRONG! The practice of deliberately infecting people with SMALLPOX (not cowpox) from a mild case to make them immune (variolation) was a process developed sometime around the 10th century in China and/or India. It involved taking pus from the pox of someone suffering from smallpox, or the scabs from the pox, and inoculating healthy people with it. Usually a mild case of smallpox developed, giving lifelong immunity afterwards. The first written account of variolation describes a Buddhist nun practicing around 1022 to 1063 AD. She would grind up scabs taken from a person infected with smallpox into a powder, and then blow it into the nostrils of a non-immune person. Another method, more common, involves rubbing the pus from the pox into a scratch in the skin of the non-immune person.
By the 1700's, variolation was common practice in China, India, and Turkey, where it was carried to England by a diplomat's wife. In the late 1700's European physicians used this and other methods of variolation, but reported "devastating" results in some cases. Overall, 2% to 3% of people who were variolated died of smallpox, but this practice decreased the total number of smallpox fatalities by 10-fold. However, a variolated patient could transmit genuine smallpox and could even start an epidemic!
Jenner, on the other hand, was the first to use cowpox (vaccinia virus) instead of live smallpox ... hence the name of "vaccination".
Islam only refined them, popularized them, and maintained the knowledge.
Or let's look at the invention of the Zero, which is actually an Indian invention (as in India), and is documented in their ancient texts.
We in the West pay more attention to where we got it from, not from where it originated. Possibly because we are too lazy to actually do the research required.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
What is it about Islam that inspired these inventions, assuming they are all "Islamic" inventions.
Is the nuclear bomb a Christian invention? The automobile? What gives? Why call something "Islamic" if Islam had nothing to do with it. You might call these inventions non-provacative to Islam, or compatible with Islam, but that's about it. They were not invented because of Islam, they were likely invented despite Islam, just like all the Western advances were achieved while dragging the Catholic and Protestant Christian churches kicking and screaming into the future.
Edith Keeler Must Die
Or don't you respect people's choice in the matter?
Look at his name? It sounds kind of arabic so my guess is he could be a muslim.
I am not a muslim but I do hear them talk about allah being with mohammed with x, and then with noah with y, just as he was with adam.
Its part of their belief structure to incorporate islam as the extension of judiasm after it became corrupt(muslim belief).To a muslim its the truth and mohammed came to be set the true faith again.
http://saveie6.com/
Eratosthenes discovered this (include the circumference to about the same error) in the 3rd century BC using the same method.
Time for a little honesty! An Atheist's Guide to Mohammedanism http://www.atheists.org/Islam/mohammedanism.html
Wait, the Islamic conquests of Europe pretty much ended with the Battle of Tours in 732. What sort of "response" takes three hundred and fifty years or more to happen? Are you suggesting that the French knights suddenly felt bad for the subjugated Middle Eastern tribes?
Look, I know it fits nicely into the modern "savage Arabs bad!" viewpoint, but you're going to have to back up your "the Crusades were the Arabs' fault!" with something more than "jihad" as an answer.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Reg: They've bled us white, the bastards. They've taken everything we had, and not just from us, from our fathers, and from our fathers' fathers.
Stan: And from our fathers' fathers' fathers.
Reg: Yeah.
Stan: And from our fathers' fathers' fathers' fathers.
Reg: Yeah. All right, Stan. Don't labour the point. And what have they ever given us in return? (he pauses smugly)
Xerxes: Coffee.
Reg: What?
Xerxes: Coffee.
Reg: Oh. Yeah, yeah. They did give us that. Uh, that's true. Yeah.
Masked commando #1: And the camera.
Stan: Oh, yeah, the camera, Reg. Remember what photography used to be like?
Reg: Yeah. All right. I'll grant you coffee and the camera are two things that the Muslims have done.
Matthias: And algebra.
Reg: Well, yes, obviously algebra. I mean, algebra goes without saying, doesn't it? But apart from coffee, the camera, and algebra...
Masked commando #2: Chess.
Xerxes: Surgical instruments.
Masked commando #3: Windmill.
General audience: Ohh...
Reg: Yeah, yeah. All right. Fair enough.
Masked commando #1: And the fountain pen!
General audience: Oh, yes! True!
Francis: Yeah. Yeah, that's something we'd really miss if the Muslims left, Reg.
Masked commando #4: The three course meal!
Reg: All right, but apart from coffee, the camera, chess, surgical instruments, the windmill, the fountain pen, and the three course meal, what have the Muslims ever done for us?
i\hbar\dot{\psi}=\hat{H}\psi
It is amazing how many of these "inventions" are of following form - "Even though such-and-such was probably invented in India or China, it was the muslims who [wrote it down/polished it/revealed it to the west].
The truth is, until Vasco De Gama discovered the sea route to India, Arabs were the conduit for all communication and trade between the West and India. Hence, many inventions and goods that are actually Indian are often misnamed as Arabic. The so-called "Arabic numeric system" is an excellent example.
One would think, after all these years, there would be more clarity on this issue.
All your favorite sites in one place!
I have read a lot of history about the Islamic empire that stretched from India to Iberia. This is largely an extension of my desire to understand Spanish history.
To say that Islam created these wonders is to ignore what was actually happening in the society that was the Islamic empire. The empire was tolerant of all religions and beliefs, including people "not of the book," which would include persons that were not Jews and Christians. This empire preached tolerance and benefitted from having non-believers because the government taxed non-believers more (which may have influenced the less-firm in their beliefs to convert).
The end result was a polycultural society that valued innovation, high art and wonderful architecture. And I would argue that it's not the dominant religion that was responsible but the society.
If you look at the last century, you'll see lots of Nobel Prize winners in the sciences coming from America (that would be The Great Satan to many Islamic societies -- especially Iran). Could it be that a polycultural society with vast natural resources is what helps in the creation of these innovations?
I look at these monocultural and intolerant societies as non-creators of advancements. For examples, one merely needs to look at Afghanistan under the Taliban, Iran and China under the Cultural Revolution.
I agree that it is important to look to history and appreciate those innovations and inventions that came before but to suggest that a religion created these is to ignore what really happened.
I should note that, when Iberia turned monocultural and intolerent under the Kings of Castile and Aragon, they created and innovated such wonderous examples as the Spanish Inquisition, the expulsion and forced conversion (and further persecution) of Jews and the encomienda system of tributory labor that was used to enslave and destroy Native American nations and civilizations. [sarcasm]It's a shame these innovations happened so long ago; they surely would have been awarded Nobel prizes for them.[/sarcasm]
I do not wish to detract from the religion that is Islam. I know a great number of practicing muslims and they are good people with whom I have very good friendships. I believe that people should get along with their neighbors and appreciate them more by striving to understand them. But the article seems to gloss over the fact that the culture probably begat the advancements rather than the religion.
Gods don't kill people, people with gods kill people.
"...the Japanese were getting A-bombed..."? Huh? What? The Japanese were engaging in a rascist orgy of murder, destruction and enslavement throughout the far east and south pacific. The white guys (whom the Japanese had attacked) simply stopped them (and then propped up the government, funded the regrowth of their industry, secured their borders and basically gave them the tools necessary to become the economic power that Japan is today)... and the a-bomb, which saved the lives of a lot of those savior white guys, was instrumental in that. Don't ignore all the bad things that the white guys have done but don't apply your B.S. filter to the good things either. The a-bomb was a bullet to the head of a racist international, rapist-murderer.
Oh, and if you still think the a-bomb was a bad thing, ask some elderly Chinese or Koreans (i.e. people who actually lived through what the Japanese did) what they think about it. Might find they wish the white guys had had a few dozen more a-bombs to drop.
I noticed that the article indicated that some surgical tools (notably for eye surgery) were invented in the time of Islam. But this probably isn't true because Galen, a doctor in the Roman Empire had created such a tool and used it in eye surgery.
There's going to be a ton of errors with this exhibit because it neglects to remember that there were strong, prosperous, and clever civilizations of the Middle East before Arab domination. Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Persian Empire all laid the groundwork for learning and inventing. Additionally, the whole Middle East was a crossroads for that allowed knowledge, technology, and goods to flow to it.
An enormous fluff piece on the centuries-old accomplishments of a religion now better known for its murderers than anything else, and you take it as evidence of anti-Muslim sentiment? Can I score some of what you're smoking?
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
"By Christians' definitions, Jesus _cannot_ be the Jewish messiah."
That's a pretty controversial statement to make without support. Perhaps I just don't follow your logic, since the previous sentence seems to mistakenly use "Christian" twice in stead of "Jewish" (in one of those places, though I'm not sure which one).
I would appreciate it if you would clarify this.
Also (and please forgive me for any misconception, as I have already stated that I don't understand what you were trying to say), what is your operating Christian definition that excludes Jesus from being the Jewish Messiah?
I say this because I am a Christian, and I believe that Jesus was, is, and will be the Jewish Messiah. It's just that he was rejected by his brothers the first time around (much like Joseph, Moses, and David), and so he was sent to the gentiles (much like Joseph, Moses, and David) for a time, but (much like Joseph, Moses, and David) will return to his people Israel and be their deliverer. The fact that this has not yet happened does not (especially in the eyes of Christians) make him any less the Jewish Messiah.
So, if you would, please clarify your statements in the light of this.
...because "hacker" sounds way sexier than "code drone."
Muslims were a great influence on math and science, thousands of years ago, but name for me ONE SINGLE INVENTION OF ANY SIGNIFICANCE to come out of a muslim country in the past 200 years. There isn't one.
These 1001 inventions are ALL from the glory days of Islam, and therein lies the problem. The Muslim religion has KILLED all crativity. They got left behind at the industrial age and THIS IS THE VERY REASON THEY ARE BITTER TODAY.
They got so full of their success that they became complacent, and the world passed them by. When they woke up to this fact, in the early 20th century, it was too late. People whom they used to "rule" over had surpassed them in every fashion because they chose to live in such a closed society within their Ottoman Empire.
When they realized that they were falling behind, they decided to force anyone (male) with any potential into one of two fields - medicine and engineering. They would send them abroad to attend the finest schools and then bring them back to try and bring any knowledge back into their folds. Think about it: Osama Bin Laden is an Engineer; Ayman al-Zawahiri is a doctor. Neither chose their profession, they were just recognized as having a few brains in their head and given one of two choices.
However, none of this changed the fact that the religion of Islam rejects modernity in every form, so this new influx of knowledge did nothing to stem the tide, the downward spiral of their entire culture. So they did a little introspection to try and figure out why they were failing as a culture. They decided that they needed to return to their 7th century roots, which is exactly the wrong approach.
Muslims are embarassed by the fact that they are so pathetic, and for good reason. The only answer for them is to embrace modernity. Until then, they can drive on the roads we've designed, sell the oil that we pumped for them, live in the buildings that we showed them how to build, using tractors and construction equipment purhcased from us. They'll continue to drive around in thieir German/European/Italian/American cars. They can continue treating their patients in their hospitals using medical textbooks written by the hated Christians and Jews, using techniques learned in Medical colleges that they attended outside their countries. And they can continue to resent us for this until they decide to wake up to modernity.
Good security is based upon reality and common sense. Common sense is a function of having common knowledge.
I am inclined to believe the above statement is contradictory. From my observations, being human seems to require inflating your self-worth and belittling others. Humans have always separated and stratified over distinctions of marginal or dubious value. Yet the depth to which they clung to these distinctions made Paul so radical when he wrote "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians 3:28) This idea is still radical today, as parent attests to. Cultural "progress" and civilization "advances" haven't rooted out human nature. Paul proposed that under Christ this could be achieved, which made the message of Christianity highly attractive to everyone who wasn't a Powerful Wealthy Senatorial Male (PWSM) in Greco-Roman times.
... these were all invented before 1001 A.D. Go figure.
it was a lot harder to get into trouble with Communist Party doctrine as a pure mathematician than as a physicist (who might wind up using "Jewish physics" like relativity or quantum mechanics)
You are mixing up Communists and Nazis. Nazis banned relativity and quantum mechanics as "Jewish physics". By contrast, Soviet leaders (despite being antisemitic) recognized that Jewish physicists and physics were absolutely vital for building nukes and missiles.
The real reason Soviet physics started to fall behind the West was that
a. an enormous number of talented European Jewish physicists had fled to America in the 1930's, while nobody wanted to flee to Stalin's welcoming arms;
b. for some time in the 1940s-1950s, computer science was considered to be anti-Soviet, which meant that Soviet computer technology (vital for physics!) remained a decade or so behind the West all the way to the end of the Cold War;
c. too large a percentage of Soviet physicists were put to work in the military industrial complex, and many of their discoveries were classified. By contrast, in the post-WW2 West, most physicists tended to do unclassified work in the universities.
What's the word to describe this? Not irony.. but?
Any fool can criticise, condemn, and complain, and most fools do. - Benjamin Franklin