SultanOfSwing

OK, that's cool, I didn't even think about the supernatural aspect of the Christianity of the time.

SultanOfSwing

You probably used them for that reason, but algebra and algorithm are Arabic loan words as well.

kimilseung

Yes it was the words themselves I was referring to. An area I would like to read on more is the the influence on Islamic and Arab culture, (al-Khwarizmi was Persian) of Indian Sanskrit culture. Khwarizmi built on developments of Algebra developed further East. The Middle East gets a lot of the credit for what they developed and/or communicated to the West from India (and I am not knocking that, but India deserves credit too) Arab numerals being the classic example.

SultanOfSwing

I thought that's why you chose them, yeah.

That whole region, especially in and around Iraq, Iran, Pakistan and India is very interesting because it is essentially the cradle of civilization. You could probably spend a lifetime reading about it and not get close to covering everything.

kimilseung

I have found myself to be artifact/experience driven in learning, I have visited Taxila in Pakistan and Dora Europolis in Syria. Sadly while interesting, there just isnt enough remaining to really get my imagination going and get me going with further reading.

SultanOfSwing

That makes sense. It's certainly a part of the world I would love to visit, if I can manage it one day.

DaveLovesDee

https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_9279298

kimilseung

I appreciate your Straw Man contribution, now if you can link coffee to Islam, you will have my full attention!

DaveLovesDee

I Google'd Islam contribution to Western society, and that was one of the first articles that came up. Are you suggesting HuffPost is wrong?

kimilseung

Did you read the article? The article proposes no links between Islam and the five issues (Coffee would be the silliest one to even attempt). So it is not wrong, Linking the article to the search string is also understandable, drawing a conclusion that search results are necessarily solutions to search criteria is probably a wrong conclusion. . The contribution of Cultures were Islam was the predominant religion is not under doubt. Hence why I said it was a straw man. The original post stated that the West owes Islam. But I think we have all moved on past that claim since.

macliam

I've missed a lot of this conversation, but this seems to be the best point to jump in.

Linear progression is rarely the way of the world, I would remind you that I said "we in the west owe much to Islam" ... the west, not the world. Islamic culture gathered and curated and brought these things to the West - and evolved some into forms we recognize. Do you deny that? Whilst Galileo, amongst many others, was persecuted by the Church for daring to think beyond "accepted wisdom", something galvanized desert-dwellers and tribal chiefs to spend vast fortunes in preserving and extending ancient knowledge. Whilst "Christians" destroyed vast swathes of ancient texts and burned libraries in acts of sheer vandalism, these same desert dwellers were inspired to preserve and extend them. I have no interest in the competing religions, but the ensuing philosophies were radically different in this respect.

Indeed Khwarizmi was Persian, and muslim, but his efforts are known because he was was appointed as the head of the library of the Abbasid Caliph's House of Wisdom in Baghdad. A foreigner and ancient enemy, he was appointed by an Arab co-religionist and accepted by his hosts to the extent that his name is Arabised. Would this have happened in Christendom? The "moors" in Spain were mostly tribal people of the Maghreb, vulcanized by Islam (as a force) to feats unknown in their history and, through their connections in the world of Islam, acted as a conduit for these ideas from Baghdad to Cordoba, from East to West.

As a teacher, you would know that knowledge does not exist in a vacuum, so whilst what you say is correct, we rarely drive back through history to give credit to the "spark of light", we do not dismiss the inventor of the internal combustion engine because he built on earlier ideas and seek to give credit to the man who invented the cogwheel. Jacque Fresco may have said "I don't believe in the Great Man theory of science or history. There are no great men, just men standing on the shoulders of other men and what they have done.", but he said it knowing that he was speaking "against the grain" and consigning many of those commonly thought of as "greats" to the dustbin of history.

It is difficult to see where this age of enlightenment foundered, but attacks by crusaders in the East and the reconquista in the West destroyed the early swathe of Islamic culture and caused it to fracture. The dark ages of western Europe met Islamic civilization and destroyed it by brute force and by abetting fractures that always exist within a society. Luckily, not everything was destroyed. Luckily enough was preserved to feed into the dawn of learning in Europe as well - often carried by the Jews who had been viziers for the Moors and were persecuted by the "victors". But the west made certain that this threat would never rise again, the Ottomans took control of the near east and the other lands sank back into tribal ways..... and on to today, where western interference after WW1 leads us to the situation we most now think of as Islam, that Wahhabi fundamentalist interpretation of the faith supported by the Saud dynasty and all its riches.

If you want to ponder history and the movement of ideas and interconnections, go to a little-known tower below the walled town and castle of Marvão in Portugal. It sits just inside the border between Portugal and reconquered Spain. On that tower is a plaque which commemorates 500 years since the passage of jews escaping persecution from Spain into Portugal. The castle of Marvão was a garrison to prevent Spanish troops pursuing them and the tower by the brige over the river Sever was a collection point for the "contribution" that the jews had to pay to enter Portugal..... in fact the tower sits at the edge of a village still called Paragem, which means "Toll".

The date of the plaque is 1992.... 500 years since those events in 1492 - the same year that Columbus supposedly discovered the Americas.

Marvão - Castle on the Hill

Scamp

You want to visit Pakistan and Syria? **** that.

Boiler

Of course we can relate advancements to the systems that encouraged them, no prize for the name of the system the developed the basic technology to do this.

Scamp

Film?
Hollywood?
Camera?
Studio?

Which is it?

mikelincs

I suspect it's from the 'First Man' film, Ryan Gosling as Neil Armstrong