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Scientist Who Sparked 'A Revolution in Chemistry' Dies at 70 (washingtonpost.com)
Ahmed Zewail pioneered a technique for using lasers to monitor chemical reactions, which the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said sparked "a revolution in chemistry and adjacent sciences." Slashdot reader Provocateur writes, "The Washington Post has the story...citing his prizewinning research in femtochemistry..."
Slashdot covered Zewail's Nobel prize in 1999, as well as his 2001 claim to have resolved Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. "Mathematics, mechanics, and chemistry were among the fields that gave me a special satisfaction..." he says in the Post's article, adding "for reasons unknown (to me), my mind kept asking 'how' and 'why.' "
Slashdot covered Zewail's Nobel prize in 1999, as well as his 2001 claim to have resolved Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. "Mathematics, mechanics, and chemistry were among the fields that gave me a special satisfaction..." he says in the Post's article, adding "for reasons unknown (to me), my mind kept asking 'how' and 'why.' "
Well, he was one of three muslim science nobel prize winners in history (the other two being Abdus Salam and Aziz Sancar). And there are 1.5 billion muslims. By contrast, jewish scientists have won over 100 nobel prizes, and there are only 15 million jews. I guess this means that a muslim is about 5,000 times less likely to become a renowned scientist than a jew is. So while muslim scientists aren't oxymorons, they're an exceedingly rare occurrence.
Dr. Zewail worked for years to raise money and generate political interest in creating a science-based university and research campus near Cairo...
“A part of the world that pioneered science and mathematics during Europe’s dark ages is now lost in a dark age of illiteracy and knowledge deficiency,” he wrote, adding that he wished the $1.5 billion in annual support that the United States gives to Egypt would accent “scientific and industrial cooperation” instead of going overwhelmingly toward the purchase of military equipment.
He managed to rise above the political problems in that region to try and make the world a better place.
Its nice when you don't have to live in 3rd world conditions.
Millions of muslims live in countries with per capita GDPs that would place them in the 1st world. Instead of using their wealth to educate, they use it to pay for imports and to keep women uneducated and economically isolated. Even Ahmed Zewail, a rare example of an exemplary muslim scientist, did almost all of his important work will living in America.
There is some effort to change things, such as King Saud University, a first rate research university where women are treated like human beings, but that is a rare exception, and is generating a lot of conservative push-back.
Oxymoron.
Muslims once invented chemistry, astronomy, and mathematics. Then Saudi Arabia gained influence of the faith and ownership of the holy cities.
Sweden, Finland, and Switzerland were the third world as well. It turns out that third world conditions can be quite nice!
Ezekiel 23:20
Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, Brunei, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia have all per-capita GDP significantly higher than some of the poor EU countries like Poland or Slovakia, all while having a population of about 45 million people.
Ezekiel 23:20
I bet you did not know that algebra is an Arabic word.
Have you done any research into History at all? I'm not one to defend terrorism, however the modern concept of the scientific method from Islam. Say what you will about Muslims but it is not correct to say that they do not have a strong scientific pedigree.
....and what OP is saying is that the wealth in those countries is very concentrated so GDP is a poor benchmark.
Argh. The laws of science be a harsh mistress.
I had the honor and privilege of meeting Dr. Zewail and attending a private lecture while at university. His daughter was my upper division biochemistry professor and he was kind enough to drop in and give us a lecture while he was visiting. He was a brilliant thinker not just in the world of femto-spectroscopy, but overall. He was approachable and witty. He will be missed as a father, a fellow human and for his contributions to the scientific world.
Argh. The laws of science be a harsh mistress.
....and what OP is saying is that the wealth in those countries is very concentrated so GDP is a poor benchmark.
Except their wealth is not particulary concentrated. For instance, Qatar, the wealthiest Arab country, has a Gini coefficient about the same as America.
...and so is alcohol, but people were drinking it even in prehistoric times before there was any Arabic, or even Arabs themselves. So, your point is?
Ezekiel 23:20
Actually, not only have I been reading on history of science since I was eight or nine but I also had a mandatory one-semester course on history of science later in college. Whether or not scientific method is fully attributable to the so-called "Islamic Golden Age" is debatable. They certainly didn't use it universally, and likewise, the notion had to develop into what we use today. ("Modern" is kind of a weasel word anyway; especially in history, you have to be careful with it given how it's commonly used for post-1500 kind of stuff). Likewise, "strong scientific pedigree of Muslims" is also a problematic claim given how it's religion is not something you inherit with a pedigree. The largest Muslim country is Indonesia while the period you're probably referring to involved Near and Middle Eastern Arabs and Persians (in fact, often even non-Muslim Jews). How does accepting a religion give you a "scientific pedigree" just because a completely different nation in the past that had some scientists also happened to follow that faith?
Ezekiel 23:20
What period are you referring to? Post-World War II?
Ezekiel 23:20
Low-hanging fruit has already been picked. Now we're facing the hard stuff.
Ezekiel 23:20