Islam takes Mohammed as the perfection of man. He was the perfect human, and is the model for all law/culture. Therefore, everything is based on what he allegedly wrote (Koran) or said/did (Hadiths). This belief creates a backward looking mindset, and a deep suspicion of innovation and change. You can see the same problem among Christians who subscribe to Biblical literalism, and Sola Scriptura.

Add to that the Muslim conception of God is the He is pure will. God is not bound by logic or rationality in the Muslim view. He acts as He wills when He will. This also imbues a lack of interest in developing thought using logic. There is no Muslim equivalent to the long history of Christian Theology developing new ways of understanding God and Scripture. Their theology centers on interpreting what Mohammed wrote, did and said.

Final edit on the theory. It's ignorance AND bigotry.

That's certainly what snapper's been doing.

Of course -- Snapper's crediting white people "too much." That's essentially what all this reduces to.

a weakened aristocracy who held relatively few special rights over land and peasants, and a tradition of leasing land to farmers which encouraged efficiency gains.

Those things didn't happen by chance; they happened because people refused to let themselves be subject to a strong aristocracy with special rights over them.

Those things didn't happen by chance; they happened because people refused to let themselves be subject to a strong aristocracy with special rights over them.

No, not really. They happened mostly because the royals and central government won a series of struggles with the aristocracy.

None of which were the centers of the Caliphates at their height. And of course, they are all (Anatolia accepted) surrounded by inaccessible geographies. You're making a bad impression, Snap.

Again, you're woefully misinformed.

The Middle East was the prime geographic location until at least the 16th century. It was the crossroads of the world. The center of trade from Asia, Africa and Europe.

Are you really ignorant of the fact that the Meditteranean and Red Sea/Indian were prime trade arteries from 1000 BC until well into the early modern period?

Holy ####, Sam is actually right. Snapper IS a bigoted #######. And ignorant besides. Jesus.

It's ignorant and bigoted to say the Islamic world fell behind the West largely because of its culture? You don't know what bigoted means.

Holy ####, Sam is actually right.

But Sam's attitude makes me wish he was more wrong than he is (both make good points). Bigoted is not the right word for either of them. Sam is much more eager to go out of his way to dismiss the accomplishments of Christians and Europeans than Snapper is to do the same for Muslims.

As is often the case, Matt Clement is the voice of reason and I endorse his statements.

#222 And it's pretty clear that Alhazen for instance wasn't drawing on anybody for much of his work. And several of his students also produced influential, important work.

From Doubts concerning Ptolemy:


Truth is sought for its own sake ... Finding the truth is difficult, and the road to it is rough. For the truths are plunged in obscurity. ... God, however, has not preserved the scientist from error and has not safeguarded science from shortcomings and faults. If this had been the case, scientists would not have disagreed upon any point of science...

Therefore, the seeker after the truth is not one who studies the writings of the ancients and, following his natural disposition, puts his trust in them, but rather the one who suspects his faith in them and questions what he gathers from them, the one who submits to argument and demonstration, and not to the sayings of a human being whose nature is fraught with all kinds of imperfection and deficiency. Thus the duty of the man who investigates the writings of scientists, if learning the truth is his goal, is to make himself an enemy of all that he reads, and, applying his mind to the core and margins of its content, attack it from every side. He should also suspect himself as he performs his critical examination of it, so that he may avoid falling into either prejudice or leniency

And in another word:

From the statements made by the noble Shaykh, it is clear that he believes in Ptolemy's words in everything he says, without relying on a demonstration or calling on a proof, but by pure imitation (taqlid); that is how experts in the prophetic tradition have faith in Prophets, may the blessing of God be upon them. But it is not the way that mathematicians have faith in specialists in the demonstrative sciences.

And

I constantly sought knowledge and truth, and it became my belief that for gaining access to the effulgence and closeness to God, there is no better way than that of searching for truth and knowledge.

Averroes (hugely influential in the European middle ages) wrote (among many other things) about how there was nothing incompatible in seeking the truth for a Muslim (speaking in particular of scientific investigation). Again, very clearly an original thinker.

EDIT: Yeah, nabbed from Wiki. First heard of these guys via James Burke and wiki has a nice summary on both of them.

There's also the whole problem of Snapper ignoring other, non-Arabic, Islamic empires that were pretty impressive well beyond the period of the Renaissance.

I'd love to hear his opinions on why the Chinese are also a worthless culture, seeing as they were so easily handled by the "better" European powers.

eta: "It's ignorant and bigoted to say the Islamic world fell behind the West largely because of its culture?"

Yeah, it is. Ignorant and reductive. It's bigoted because you're waving your ignorance around to slander an entire subset of humanity based upon their "culture" - which is pretty hilarious considering the vast differences between Islamic nations across both geography and time.

Vaux: Yeah, I know that Sam's a dick, and he's trolling. Which is why I'm shocked he's right. What Snapper's written IS bigoted, and deeply ignorant of the history of vast swathes of the world.

Final edit on the theory. It's ignorance AND bigotry.

And you mind is so open, your brain has fallen out. I find the defense of a repressive culture by alleged progressives quite humerous.

You really are living up to the worst stereotypes of the left; any criticism of anything non-Western is bigotry, and all cultures must be as good (and likely better) than the West, even if they have worse results on every indicator.

I'm done with you on this.

The British empire won because of its navy, and because it was an island and more or less impregnable until the advent of aerial bombardment.

Well sure it was impregnable, other than to Rome which colonized it and the Vikings which kind of did ....

Wow, Snapper says a lot of things I don't agree with, but I never thought he would stoop to this kind of vile ####. You should be ashamed of yourself.

You really are living up to the worst stereotypes of the left; any criticism of anything non-Western is bigotry, and all cultures must be as good (and likely better) than the West, even if they have worse results on every indicator.

He does leave open the possibilty that non-Western cultures can get off-track, but when that happens it's the West's fault. (Whitey's really, but "the West" is close enough for these purposes.)

I'd love to hear his opinions on why the Chinese are also a worthless culture, seeing as they were so easily handled by the "better" European powers.

The Chinese had the most advanced culture in the world for two thousand years until they suffered from hideous misgovernment largely by non-Chinese rulers, and the Mandarin class. You can see its the gov't system to blame rather than the base culture, because Chinese emigrants were wildly successful economically all over Asia while China itself was a basket case.

There's no question the Chinese culture is capable of keeping up with the West economically. I'm not fond of all its attitudes, e.g. towards women (particularly girl babies) and an excess of collectivism, but it is certainly highly advanced.

and the Vikings which kind of did ....

Well they totally did, unless you count the Normans as French instead of Viking. And from two sides!

Somehow that great English culture didn't help them hang onto the large amounts of modern day France the English crown once held claim to.

But Sam's attitude makes me wish he was more wrong than he is (both make good points). Bigoted is not the right word for either of them. Sam is much more eager to go out of his way to dismiss the accomplishments of Christians and Europeans than Snapper is to do the same for Muslims.

What the ####? I haven't dismissed any accomplishments of anyone. I've merely stated that IF snapper was going to disregard the academic and cultural accomplishments of the Islamic empire, then he MUST ALSO equally disregard those of European Christendom.

I don't disregard either.

Wow, Snapper says a lot of things I don't agree with, but I never thought he would stoop to this kind of vile ####. You should be ashamed of yourself.

I haven't said one thing vile. Bottom line, I've said that Islamic religion and culture has inhibited innovation and growth.

I haven't denigrated the intelligence of Muslims. I haven't said they're bad people. If I said the exact same things about fundamentalist Christianity, nobody would bat an eyelash. If I said it about the Catholic Church, I'd get an Allelujah chorus.

Unless you're coming from the mindset the any criticism of non-Western culture or religion is vile, you're completely off base.

"because Chinese emigrants were wildly successful economically all over Asia"

How do you square this with the massive success of, for example, Indian Americans who are Muslim? Because you certainly seem to conflate Arab with Muslim, and Arabs aren't even the majority of Muslims in the world, much less all Muslims.

You really are living up to the worst stereotypes of the left

As a frequent lurker and infrequent poster, I really must come to snapper's defense here. I have learned a lot that I didn't know, simply from a historical perspective, from the last 50 or so posts, which have been an excellent example of why I come to the BTF threads in general and the off topic threads in particular. But what should have been a back an forth between Snapper and others where he simply makes an point and they make a counterpoint, turned into him making an point and their otherwise excellent counterpoint needlessly being punctuated with 'and you're ignorant and bigoted and...'.

Somehow that great English culture didn't help them hang onto the large amounts of modern day France the English crown once held claim to.

France had a population 5 or 6 times that of England, and was far wealthier. They had no chance to match them militarily.

In any case, the innovation I was talking about happened like 300 years later after British culture had moved away from the feudal.

I've merely stated that IF snapper was going to disregard the academic and cultural accomplishments of the Islamic empire, then he MUST ALSO equally disregard those of European Christendom.

"Eurpoean Christendom" ... Thus ignoring 350 years of European intellectual tradition wanting nothing more than to rid Europe of Church influence -- the actual source of modernity having essentially no parallel in Islam.

Europe generated the tradition of dissent from the Church and that and then was when they left Islam and the Arab states in the distant past.

If I said the exacts same things about fundamentalist Christianity, nobody would bat an eyelash.

And this is what's vile. That you conflate ALL of Islam with the most retrograde and fundamentalist visions of Islam. Instead of understanding that Islamic cultures and beliefs are nuanced in pretty much the exact same ways as other religions and cultures, you ignorantly ascribe the beliefs and customs of a portion of them to all of them, regardless of what actually was the case.

ETA: And then you use that argument as your primary explanation as to why most heavily Islamic nations are less advanced than European ones.

If I said it about the Catholic Church

Please do. I'd be fascinated to find out if you could continue typing after your head exploded.

And you mind is so open, your brain has fallen out. I find the defense of a repressive culture by alleged progressives quite humerous.

I haven't defended a repressive culture. I've defended historical accuracy. This is not a defense of al-Queada. It's a defense of history. Pointing out the fact that the House of Wisdom was, in fact, the center of learning in the world for centuries is no more a defense of repressive culture than is pointing out the fact Aquinas was a brilliant thinker (that I often disagree with) is a defense of repressive Catholicism.

He does leave open the possibilty that non-Western cultures can get off-track, but when that happens it's the West's fault. (Whitey's really, but "the West" is close enough for these purposes.)

Where on earth does this even come from?! Show me anything close to this in the text of this thread.

How do you square this with the massive success of, for example, Indian Americans who are Muslim? Because you certainly seem to conflate Arab with Muslim, and Arabs aren't even the majority of Muslims in the world, much less all Muslims.

I do not doubt the individual intelligence, and diligence of Muslims (or any other ethnic group). Take smart people, and put them in a well functioning system and culture, and they will suceed. Those same people have not had massive success in Pakistan or Bangladesh, living in a Muslim culture.

It doesn't match the Chinese experience b/c the Chinese suceeded in locales that were even more backward than China. The Chinese weren't moving to more advanced nations and suceeding individually, they were moving to less advanced countries and suceeding much more than the local (to the extent they attracked hatred and even Genocide in Indonesia).

Thus ignoring 350 years of European intellectual tradition wanting nothing more than to rid Europe of Church influence -- the actual source of modernity having essentially no parallel in Islam

Please read @238 very carefully?

I haven't defended a repressive culture. I've defended historical accuracy. This is not a defense of al-Queada. It's a defense of history. Pointing out the fact that the House of Wisdom was, in fact, the center of learning in the world for centuries is no more a defense of repressive culture than is pointing out the fact Aquinas was a brilliant thinker (that I often disagree with) is a defense of repressive Catholicism.

I never said they weren't the center of learning in the world for centuries. I said they lost that distinction over the last milennia because Islamic culture was hostile to innovation and change to an extent that Western/Christian culture wasn't.

I do not doubt the individual intelligence, and diligence of Muslims (or any other ethnic group). Take smart people, and put them in a well functioning system and culture, and they will suceed. Those same people have not had massive success in Pakistan or Bangladesh, living in a Muslim culture.

Indian and Indonesia *are* Muslim cultures.

France had a population 5 or 6 times that of England, and was far wealthier. They had no chance to match them militarily.

In any case, the innovation I was talking about happened like 300 years later after British culture had moved away from the feudal.

My point was far more towards the inability of culture to explain as much as you claim it can. You're obviously able to recognize that, but tend to ignore the damage to Middle Eastern culture that, for example, the Mongol's did.

I never said they weren't the center of learning in the world for centuries. I said they lost that distinction over the last milennia because Islamic culture was hostile to innovation and change to an extent that Western/Christian culture wasn't.

And your bigotry is highlighted in that unsubstantiated, blindside after 'because.'

Please do. I'd be fascinated to find out if you could continue typing after your head exploded.

The Catholic Church certainly has hindered innovation and growth in the last 1000 years. But not nearly to the extent that Islam has.

And your bigotry is highlighted in that unsubstantiated, blindside after 'because.'

How does an analysis equal bigotry? My analysis is either true or not true. There's nothing bigoted about the supposition that some cultures are better at forstering innovation and growth than others.

That's only bigotry in the mind of someone with an agenda.

Show me anything close to this in the text of this thread.

It's embedded in practically everything you and modern leftists write. The fact that you don't write, "I'm biased against the West and overlook practically all faults of the non-West or denominate them Whitey's fault" doesn't change that, just as the fact that Snapper doesn't write "I'm ignorant and bigoted," doesn't stop you from seeing ignorance and bigotry in some of his writings.

Indian and Indonesia *are* Muslim cultures.

Right. And the same exact people are not as successful there as when they come to the US.

I assume, Snapper, that you agree with Mitt Romney that the reason Palestine is poorer than Israel is also culture.

It's embedded in practically everything you and modern leftists write.

So you don't have any actual examples and are just throwing ######## at the wall. Thanks for admitting as much.

And this is what's vile. That you conflate ALL of Islam with the most retrograde and fundamentalist visions of Islam. Instead of understanding that Islamic cultures and beliefs are nuanced in pretty much the exact same ways as other religions and cultures, you ignorantly ascribe the beliefs and customs of a portion of them to all of them, regardless of what actually was the case.

ETA: And then you use that argument as your primary explanation as to why most heavily Islamic nations are less advanced than European ones.

Of course there's nuance, we're talking in generalities since the period encompasses 1000 years and hundreds of states.

My base proposition is simply that Islamic culture (on average) has been less favorable to innovation and growth than Western Culture (on average) in the last 600-800 years.

That doesn't mean it has to stay that way. It doesn't mean that Islamic culture doesn' have other advantages, and someone might not validly prefer it.

Right. And the same exact people are not as successful there as when they come to the US.

Yes, Snapper, immigrating from poor areas to rich areas increases success. This has nothing to do with 'culture.'

I assume, Snapper, that you agree with Mitt Romney that the reason Palestine is poorer than Israel is also culture.

No. That's just silly.

It might be poorer partially b/c of that, but we can't tell given all the constraints placed on the Palestinians.

But, I'd say the reason Saudi Arabia is poorer than Isreal is mostly culture.

t's embedded in practically everything you and modern leftists write.

That's one way to be able to make your case. "I don't care that you never said it! You clearly meant it!" I mean, at least the argument against Snapper actually quotes what he's written.

here's nothing bigoted about the supposition that some cultures are better at forstering innovation and growth than others.

You never replied to my comment explaining why your statements are bigoted. I'm assuming that you're just going to ignore comment 271, because it's pretty much a perfect distillation of why you're painting with too broad a brush while at the same time being extraordinarily reductive in your analysis. EDIT: Well, clearly you just got to 271.

Yes, Snapper, immigrating from poor areas to rich areas increases success. This has nothing to do with 'culture.'

The poor areas are poor for a reason.

So you don't have any actual examples and are just throwing ######## at the wall. Thanks for admitting as much.

More engaging in the time-honored tradition of reading, analyzing, and synthesizing the work of another. You know, criticism.

You never replied to my comment explaining why your statements are bigoted.

see [286] I can't type that fast.

Goodnight all.

More engaging in the time-honored tradition of reading, analyzing, and synthesizing the work of another. You know, criticism.

If that's what you're attempting, I'd suggest you stick to ditch digging.

I don't disregard either.

I know you don't, and my statement was hasty and emotionally driven. I apologize for it.

The problems that I had with your responses were the following:

as the Christian barbarians stormed back into the Iberian peninsula during the Reconquista.

The Reconquista was a long process, but much or most of it took place after the period when the Europeans could be considered barbarians. Their culture probably wasn't as advanced scientifically as the Islamic culture by the 1100s through the 1300s, it's true, but it had certainly advanced beyond the barbarian stage. Your use of the term struck me as siding historically with the Islamic side and against the Christian side, and going out of your way to express that position..

The notable difference being that Aquinas was cribbing Aristotle via the Muslim translations.

This also struck me as elevating the Muslim accomplishment above the Christian accomplishment. ("Aquinas couldn't have read Aristotle without help from the Muslims.") It was rhetorically effective, but it read as an attack on Aquinas.

Have you done calculus recently? Astronomy?

This was in response to the question of whether Islamic culture had, during the period between 1750 and 2001, re-attained the heights to which it had risen in medieval times. The Islamic contribution to math and science occurred during the middle ages. While later developments wouldn't have been possible without it, it wasn't a new Islamic empire that made those developments, it was largely Westerners; the fact that humanity's understanding of the universe is built up over time doesn't mean that those who made earlier advances get credit for later ones.

In any case, my reaction was unfair, and I again apologize, but I thought I should explain what set me off.

I will also say that Snapper is not a bigot either, and that there is too much of a hair-trigger response of "bigotry!" when someone dares criticize a non-Western culture. The fact is that for all sorts of reasons, some circumstantial and fortuitous, and others almost certainly cultural--how could there have been no cultural reasons?--the West has dominated the past several centuries in terms of economics and political power. Those of us lucky enough to have been born in the West (which I don't like capitalizing, by the way, but I do to follow convention) shouldn't need to feel that we can't celebrate the accomplishments of our forebears. I myself consider all my human forebears to have been on potentially equal intellectual footing, as I'm sure Snapper also does (and as he has further shown in his posts since I wrote this one).

The poor areas are poor for a reason.

And that reason is what, exactly? God didn't fill them with resources?

Islam takes Mohammed as the perfection of man. He was the perfect human, and is the model for all law/culture. Therefore, everything is based on what he allegedly wrote (Koran) or said/did (Hadiths). This belief creates a backward looking mindset, and a deep suspicion of innovation and change. You can see the same problem among Christians who subscribe to Biblical literalism, and Sola Scriptura.

Nitpick: he didn't write the Quran, he allegedly recited what God told him and others wrote down what he said, which was later codified under Uthman.

But anyway, where's the evidence for your claim? Islamic society even one hundred years after Muhammad hardly resembled the society Muhammad lived in. As Muslim armies conquered, they adopted many of the customs of the defeated peoples, retained the administrative class in power, etc. That doesn't suggest a culture/religion inherently afraid of innovation or even change. As has already been pointed out, Islamic philosophers studied and expounded on Greek and Indian philosophy and mathematics.

Add to that the Muslim conception of God is the He is pure will. God is not bound by logic or rationality in the Muslim view. He acts as He wills when He will. This also imbues a lack of interest in developing thought using logic. There is no Muslim equivalent to the long history of Christian Theology developing new ways of understanding God and Scripture. Their theology centers on interpreting what Mohammed wrote, did and said.

Well Shi'i Muslims would place just as much importance on Ali and the subsequent Imams (of course depending on which branch they follow, and IIRC only Ismailis have an active Imam), but I'd also say many Sufi orders practice an Islam far different from what you're suggesting. Furthermore, influential Islamic scholars like al-Razi and al-Farabi (both lived in the 9th and 10th centuries) placed logic or reason above revelation, and influenced subsequent generations of Islamic scholars as well. Al-Biruni, is probably the most famous/important I can think of right now, and he certainly valued logic to find the truth.

What you're describing sounds more like Wahhabism to me, rather than being applicable to Islamic culture as a whole.

My base proposition is simply that Islamic culture (on average) has been less favorable to innovation and growth than Western Culture (on average) in the last 600-800 years.

This is far less troublesome than your previous statements, but it still requires "culture" to do so much heavy lifting that you essentially have to make culture mean "the entire geographic, historic, and cultural background" of a region, whereas it usually means something else. And it really falls apart when you make the argument that during the Islamic Golden Age prior to the 14th century owed it's successes to things other than what you purport to be "Islamic culture" when by most definitions of culture the Arab Islamic culture at that time fostered a tremendous amount of innovation and art while it's neighbor in Europe muddled through several centuries where it was most certainly not doing a very good job of the same. And given your argument that Islamic culture has most always been a hindrance upon development, it reveals your argument as ignorant of the flourishings of other Muslim nations in later centuries that were as or more advanced than the contemporaneous European culture since at least somewhere before the Renaissance and as early as when the Crusades were still happening.

Assuming you don't want this site to just be a liberal circle jerk, I would think that you would want the conversation to include more snappers and less Kehoskies to improve the intellectual level of the discourse. The way you just treated snapper, I don't see why he (or anyone like him) sticks around.

And my other comments about culture, such as the French v. English, or the Chinese, or Israeli v. Palestinian, are all aimed at pointing out how short the simple explanation of "culture" falls when actually figuring out how we got to today.

The Reconquista was a long process, but much or most of it took place after the period when the Europeans could be considered barbarians. Their culture probably wasn't as advanced scientifically as the Islamic culture by the 1100s through the 1300s, it's true, but it had certainly advanced beyond the barbarian stage. Your use of the term struck me as siding historically with the Islamic side and against the Christian side, and going out of your way to express that position..

That's fair, and for the sake of honesty, I *do* side with Grenada and the learning centers of al-Andalusa historically, against the reactionary forces of militant Catholicism which was driving the Reconquista in the Iberian peninsula. I do this for the same reasons I side with the Greens over the mullahs in Iran, and the secular rationalists over the Tea Party reactionaries in today's US political arena. I side with learning and culture over reactionary religious fundamentalism by default. In the example given, culture and learning were represented best by the waning Muslim caliphate and opposed by the religious zeal of "Christendom." I don't think it's an academic fallacy to side with rationality where at all possible.

This also struck me as elevating the Muslim accomplishment above the Christian accomplishment. ("Aquinas couldn't have read Aristotle without help from the Muslims.") It was rhetorically effective, but it read as an attack on Aquinas.

This comment was two-fold. First, it was a direct rebuttal of the "we can write off the entire Golden Age of Islam because they were just cheating off of previous work and had no original thinkers" line of argument Snapper was running with. My point in that regard was to remind him that the long slog of history is constant recycling and rebuilding of previous work, and that European "culture" was hardly built from scratch in that regard. In the second part of that fold, I intentionally called out Aquinas because 1) I think Aquinas is poorly cribbed notes on Aristotle and 2) it was a direct body blow to Snapper due to the Catholic connection.

This was in response to the question of whether Islamic culture had, during the period between 1750 and 2001, re-attained the heights to which it had risen in medieval times. The Islamic contribution to math and science occurred during the middle ages. While later developments wouldn't have been possible without it, it wasn't a new Islamic empire that made those developments, it was largely Westerners; the fact that humanity's understanding of the universe is built up over time doesn't mean that those who made earlier advances get credit for later ones.

That's fair, but again, I think if we're going to go with the "Islam is in decline and 1000s of years removed from it's pinnacle, and only loosely associated historically with modernity" then we must also apply that same critique to European Christendom. This conversation started with regard to the "Middle Ages." As such, my comments have been concerned with the comparison of the European history of that time, the Islamic history of that time, and tangentially the European awakening of the Renaissance. Of late, the conversation has turned to western civilization post-Christendom, and is claiming that there is something uniquely, culturally "European" or "Christian" or "Western" about modernity in the post-Enlightenment Age. I find that argument to be tenuous at best, and would argue that the advancements of the post-Enlightenment era have less to do with the fact that we're "culturally Christian" or whatever, and more to do that the German Enlightenment destroyed Christendom and Islam in a way that Islam has yet to accept.

In any case, my reaction was unfair, and I again apologize, but I thought I should explain what set me off.

No worries. The pits get bloody sometimes.