Islam, science and deference

This site reminds us of something overlooked in this week’s debate about the “Enlightenment” – that Islam, in its early years, was wholly consistent with scientific progress. It gave us men such as Al-Razi,discoverer of sulphuric acid and ethanol, Al-Khwarizmi, inventor of algebra, Ibn Firnas, inventor of the glider, astronomer Ibn Al-Shatir, and Al-Haytham, a pioneer in optics.

Which raises the question: what exactly is it about the western “Enlightenment” that is alleged to have produced the goods of scientific and technical progress?

It’s not any unique conception of rationality, still less a secular one. It's not just the early history of Islam which shows that scientific progress is compatible with religion. Newton, remember, was a religious crank. And the man who gave his name to what we consider the epitome of rational thinking – Bayesianism – was a priest.

I suspect the key to progress, which the Enlightenment promoted but did not create, is a rejection of deference, a desire to find things out for oneself rather than take them on trust.

The problem, though, is that deference is still with us, even in science, as Steve Fuller points out. In politics and in business, the norm is to defer to “leaders”, and chief executives – a process reinforced by the MSM, which inculcates the dogma that senior figures and experts have something worth saying.

There are, of course, good reasons for us to defer to leaders and experts; it makes life easy and often they do know what they’re talking about. But this is not always consistent with progress. As a wise man said:

How can anyone think philosophically while committed to those old wives' tales, founded on contradictions, obdurate ignorance, and dogmatism? 

That’s Al-Razi.

Comments

[dearieme]

A cautious writer might first have checked whether this flourishing might not have taken place at times, and in places, where the repressive power of Islam was light. Just a guess.

[chris]

It was light,which is my point. The simple dichotomy that Islam=repression=backwardness vs West=liberty=rationalism=progress is just that - simple.

[embutler]

the people in the european enlightment did well in the relaxation of the curch's fatal grip... since muslims were stifled ,the islamic grip must have tightened

[Mark]

Mohammed set out to convert Arabs to an extension of Judeo Christian religion. He sort of succeeded but, the pagan Arabs have won out in the end. Like a hagfish, they have eaten away at the core of Islam until Islam no longer exists. Arab idolatry is back. This time the Koran is the idol.

[Robert Schwartz]

The great questions in the history of science are china and the Islamic world. In the Song dynasty, China was the leading scientific and industrial nation of the world. After the Mongol invasion, they never recovered that position.

The Muslim world was very productive in scientific fields until the 15th century. After that a very deep romantic conservatism seemed to take over. The turks adopted western cannons in the 15th century to conquer Constantinople, but in the 16th when the turks conquered Egypt, its mameluk army would not use explosive weapons and was easily vanquished. The turks, OTOH, would not allow printing presses in their empire until the 18th century, and then only for the use of Jews and Christians.

If I had to hazard a thesis on why Europe got ahead in the 15th century and stayed that way, I would suggest political chaos. Heretics like Descartes could move to another country. China and the Muslim world became more imperial and more bureaucratized.

[dearieme]

Within Science, complaints begin to be heard that such-and-such isn't mainstream while so-and-so is outside the consensus. Or even that some interpretations of data are insensitive or cause offence.

[Paul]

a link about a related topic;
http://truckandbarter.com/mt/archives/2004/08/quotes_for_refl.html