freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 6:39pm:


alright then, lets run with that then. So everything the caliph does is representative of islam right? What would you say then about a caliph that builds great libraries and learning centres and encourages scholars from all over the world to come and study there? When caliphs do that sort of thing (which we know they did), then what else is that if not islam promoting science? You checkmate yourself with your own ridiculous argument.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 6:39pm:


Quote:


well my interpretation of that story is that he boasted that he could do it, and the caliph took him up on that. Seems pretty obvious to me, but I'm not going to labour this point - because quite frankly its not worth it. You can argue that the caliph - acting in his role as islam's representative stifler of science (even though he had already built a great centre of learning in Cairo some years earlier), went after a prominent scientist - for no other reason that he wanted to suppress science. Thats fine - the absurdity of that idea just speaks for itself. But even if in some bizarro universe it somehow did make sense as an example of islam stifling science - it is still only one example, one tiny anecdote against an entire history of caliph's promoting science and building great centres of learning.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 6:39pm:


Cordoba and Baghdad were the centres of the intellectual world. They housed the largest libraries and bodies of literature the world had ever seen. Scholars came from all over the world to study - and in fact were encouraged to come by the caliphs. Is this what you call superficially fertile learning environment? I couldn't imagine what you would consider to be a non-superficial learning environment.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 6:39pm:


Sure I have - islam came along and said "we hate science so much that we'll build the greatest learning centres the world has ever seen, and attract all the great thinkers from all over the world to come to study there". And the really ingenious part about this is, these centres were merely superficial learning centres. Great cities built of cardboard facades, presumably. Probably the libraries were filled with books that just had fancy covers, but had blank pages inside.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 6:39pm:


Funny thing - I went and checked. From that list of 18, only 4 are mentioned as having anything to do with translating. thats 4 out of 18. My maths might not be that great, but I'm pretty sure thats not a majority - would you agree? Also all of those four made discoveries and advancements on their own. Do you ever get sick of  just making schit up? I certainly do.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 8:22pm:


What I am having so much trouble with is how this equate to stifling science. You still seem to be blissfully unaware of the contradiction. If what you say is true, then this is a case of the islamic world attempting to make advances in science, but failing. If only you could think logically you might realise that the idea of a civilization that was so hell bent on stifling science actually going out and creating these learning centres - not just any old learning centres, but the greatest the world had ever seen - is just nonsensical.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 8:22pm:

I have already explained myself here. Its not my fault if you are forgetful or refuse to listen. But here is the relevant point again - just for you:

Quote:

I'm not going to apologise for not ranking them, and I've explained enough times why I don't believe that is constructive. But please don't sit there and claim I have never pointed out any worthy contenders for the being amongst the greatest scientists.

freediver wrote on Mar 26^th, 2013 at 8:22pm:


lol - nice try. I can assure you I have only ever produced one list - grudgingly. Honestly, where do you come up with this schit?

Tell you what instead of spending your whole time making up stories about what I say and what "some muslims" say, why don't you for once do something constructive to this discussion. Would you be able to offer an opinion on this paper written by a scientist, in a medical journal? I posted it earlier, but you ignored it then. It kind of trashes everything you've been saying about islam in the golden age. Hopefully you can offer a convincing counter argument and demonstrate why this paper has it so terribly wrong:

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1315909/

or what about the article from the economist - again posted previously without any response:

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http://www.economist.com/news/international/21570677-after-centuries-stagnation-science-making-comeback-islamic-world-road

Same with most of Isaac Newton’s work, FD. Just more accurate measurements of concepts already understood.

You can say this for almost the entire canon of science.

Karnal wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 8:40am:


No you can't. This is a common misconception about the nature of scientific revolution. For example, because of the way it is taught, many people think that relativity is just a more accurate version of newtonian mechanics. Or slightly different equations that only matter at high speed. It is not. It discards the old concepts of mass, space, time etc and replaces them with new ones. Kuhn covers this concept in great detail in his book on the nature of scientific revolution.

For a more relevant example, a more accurate measure of a year or the circumference of the earth is not the same thing as going from an earth centric to a heliocentric model of the planets. One is a complete rejection of the existing paradigm. The other pushes the envelope slightly further on the existing paradigm. Most, if not all the scientists on the top 100 list are credited with creating completely new paradigms of thought that challenged the most basic concepts about the universe.

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 1:50pm:


except Mr Gibberish - you did spend quite a lot of time on that point.

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 1:50pm:


Right! It was an isolated case. That wasn't so hard was it? Yet why did you spend so much time labouring this point? Why emphasise the point about him being the first person on the list and how it was improbable that he was the only one? Why else if not to argue that he was likely representative of the way islam stifles science?

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 1:50pm:


So these are the "unconscious" type of stifling? How does that work? How does one unconsciously arrest someone? Sleep walking was he? You make less and less sense every post. Also, you might want to consider the possibility that like Mr Gibberish, these were also isolated incidents - probably the most prudent course given the lack of any actual evidence.

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 5:54pm:


err ok.
1. My argument was never to prove that no islamic scientists weren't mad (or whatever) - but that many islamic scientists made significant contributions to modern science.
2. Mr Gibberish - notwithstanding his whacky antics - is widely regarded by western scholars as making a significant contribution to the advancement of chemistry.
3. He is but one scientist among many - and the only one that we know did the type of crazy antics ascribed to him (ie not 'typical'). So at best he is a poor example to use to demonstrate islam's apparent tendency to "stifle" science. You even acknowledge that he is not typical - yet inexplicably appeart to maintain that he can still be used to demonstrate that he is a good example to use. Go figure 

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 5:54pm:


no it didn't help - because thats exactly what you did. There were 18 scientists to dwell on in that list, yet all you wanted to talk about was Mr Gibberish and Al Haytham. I'm assuming you refuse to talk about the other 16 (despite me constantly bringing them up) because you couldn't find any dirt on them. What do you think that is called if not "picking and choosing"?

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 5:54pm:


uh yeah - a real cracker of an example which you agree was a rare case.

What do you think makes more sense FD - just from my list of scientists - is it logical to conclude that islam stifles science based on the fact that of the 18 in the list, 1 apparently tried to hide his findings from the world and 1 was put under house arrest? Or do you think its more logical to conclude that islam promotes science based on the fact that 16 out of 18 scientists in that list suffered no known ill treatment or intimidation from their superiors (with the possible exception of Al-Kindi - we'll make it 15 out of 18 then), were able to - indeed encouraged to go about their work, and suffered no known bouts of paranoia or other mental breakdown that made them want to hide their works from the world?

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 5:54pm:


What is islam if not a collection of muslims? You are stumbling - badly. Don't forget you spent half this thread trying to convince me that by imprisoning Al Haytham, the caliph - you know an individual "certain muslim" - was acting entirely in the name of islam. Remember? I tried to dispute that, but you were insistent: the caliph embodied islam, as mandated by the prophet himself.

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 5:54pm:


LOL - are you actually being serious? Promoting greed is exactly what capitalists go around doing. "Greed is good" was the famous line by Gordon Gecko. And that is certainly not a mere shocking line from fiction - it is gospel for any die-in-the-wool capitalist. In fact its an ideology that is built into the system. Capitalists are un-apologetically shameless about this. It makes me sick actually. Have you ever talked to a capitalist? This is exactly their philosophy - so bad example (again).

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 5:54pm:


I did better than that - I gave you three. Hilarious that you keep missing this.

freediver wrote on Mar 27^th, 2013 at 1:37pm:


True. I’m interested in Kuhn. Do you think the introduction of algebra to Western Europe in the 15th century constituted a paradigm shift?

If I’m not mistaken, it changed the nature of credit in the Italian city states, and eventually led to an entirely new financial system.