The so-called Golden Age of Islam and then I Revisited it a bit later

Many Muslims claim that there was a Golden Age of Islam roughly 1000 years ago, when most scientific achievements were made and the ground stone was lain for today’s technology and scientific achievements.

In my videos I have already pointed out that it was a Persian/Assyrian/Arab Golden Age as not only Muslims contributed and that these were only developments of existing knowledge.

Yes, there were great people who made great contributions to mankind almost 1000 years ago.

Yes, the level of development was remarkable.

Yes, the researchers following that era based a lot of their work on the findings of those scientists.

Yes, the centre of development and the height of technological advances was Baghdad.

Were 1000s of manuscripts with scientific or analytical contents translated from all sorts of countries, civilisations and languages into Arabic? Yes.

Was any ground-breaking or mind-boggling discovery made? No.

Was any stupendous application developed? No.

That happened later, when people like da Vinci, Galileo, Kepler, Leibniz or Newton started using both their brain cells.

What happened in Baghdad or in Spain was good, solid work establishing facts and providing accurate descriptions of our natural world.

And please don’t expect me to shed tears over the fact that Moors were kicked out of Spain by the Spanish. If the Muslims who conquered and invaded Spain were so clever, why did they have to come to Cordoba to use their brains? And I’d still love to hear from a Muslim exactly which development or scientific breakthrough enabled any Renaissance or industrial revolution. And while we’re in Spain and just to counter another myth: according to necrometrics, the death-toll for the Muslim invasion of Spain as stated in Aletheia, The Rationalist's Manual (1897):  7,000,000 during the Saracen slaughters in Spain. Not that peaceful, I would say, considering there were only 250 or 300 million total on the planet. In reality, we don’t rightly know what happened in Cordoba and what is fabricated. The historian John J. O'Neill, in his book Holy Warriors: Islam and the Demise of Classical Civilisation even goes so far as to say:

“The archaeological non-appearance of the Islamic Golden Age is surely one of the most remarkable discoveries to come to light in the past century.” Nothing in the form of architecture remains as even the mosque in Cordoba was Visigoth and only converted, not constructed. What happened to the claimed wealth and Islamic features and influence? Just a myth? Weird.

He also states: "the Muslim conquest of Spain produced, instead of a Golden Age of science and learning, a bloodbath and an interminable war of attrition." Further, "it was in Spain that the first  crusades began."

Let’s look at some of the claimed contributions during the Arab Golden Age

    * The world's oldest degree-issuing university, Al-Karaouine, was established in Fez in 859 and the first full university, Al Azhar, opened in Cairo in 975.

    * Distillation, filtration, crystallization, evaporation and other chemical processes were introduced by Muslim alchemists.

    * The first pharmacies were established in Baghdad in the 8th century.

    * Spherical trigonometry, analytical geometry, integral calculus and many other advances were made by Muslim mathematicians.

    * Many masterpieces of Islamic architecture were built, including the Alhambra in Granada (Spain), the Great Mosque of Xi'an (China), the Great Mosque at Cordoba (Spain), and the Great Mosque of Samarra (Iraq).

    * The world's first observatories, public hospitals, psychiatric institutions and universities emerged in the medieval Islamic world.

    * The renowned work of Arabic fiction, One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights), took shape between the 10th and 14th centuries.

    * Exquisite works of Islamic art were produced in ceramics, woodworking, painting, calligraphy, carpet making, mosaics and more.

The Crusades in the 12th and 13th centuries, the Mongol invasions in the 13th century and a number of plagues contributed to the weakening of the Islamic world and a gradual ending of the Golden Age.

This sounds modest, factual and realistic.

Did anyone invent anything new? No, not really. I was able to find only 1 invention, that of a type of water pump. 1 invention. Not 1001.

To contrast this, there’s this slick and polished exhibition touring the planet along with a movie, a book and accompanying brochures and educational packages, all claiming to show 1001 inventions, made by Muslims. This is distributed to school children. Along with instructions to teachers on how to make these into fun activities, teaching the kids how stuff works and making them believe all this was invented by Islam and Muslims, following the age old motto of “get them young”. The internet page is also pretty slick and obviously designed by professionals and full of marketing tricks.

So where do all these claims come from? Should this be called 1001 inventions or 1001 nights?
Can I manage to put some facts on the table here?

We are presented with Prince Charles in the form of a photo, implying in the text that he actively supports the exhibition or initiative or whatever you want to call this. In reality, all he has done is write the foreword for one of the editions of the book, saying only that “I am delighted to see the success of the initiative called 1001 Inventions, which presents and celebrates the many scientific, technological and humanitarian developments shared by the Islamic world and the West.” How romantic.

The rest of the page is only self-praise and marketing. We are informed that the book is “richly illustrated”, something I last saw in Harun Yahya’s hilarious "Atlas of Creation". We are also told that it is now an “award-winning international science and cultural heritage brand” – whatever that may mean. Probably nothing, but it has all the right keywords. Meaningless, yet effective. They claim they are the “global leader in popularising awareness of the thousand year 'Golden Age' of Muslim Civilisation” and then say that “men and women of different faiths and cultures built on knowledge from ancient civilisations”. So what happened to the Muslim civilisation? Not so Muslim anymore?

Also found on the page is the announcement that the exhibition will open in Washington. They tell you that it is in the National Geographic Museum, where it is and what the entrance fees are. More than a picture with some smiling faces I would be interested in the exhibitions themselves, instead of being lured into something without any knowledge what the contents is.

They also advertise a book, which was published earlier this year and apparently contains the foreword of Prince Charles. They even provide an ISBN number to facilitate ordering. But this number does not lead to Amazon or any retailer. It does not exist.

Does the approach via the author, a Salim TS Al-Hassani, provide any hints? Well, he’s an Honorary Professorial Fellow at the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Manchester. His background is Mechanical Engineering, so he should know about water pumps and stuff. Initially, I thought I had drawn another blank as the first 10 or 20 pages only provided links back to the 1001Inventions webpage, but later, I finally found it. And much cheaper than the 25 GBP normally charged when purchased from 1001inventions themselves. On top of failing to provide a usable ISBN number they also fail to provide some help in distinguishing this book from a similar one and what the differences are. The one is about the legacy of Muslims and a different one covers their heritage.

Inside the book I took so long to locate, we find page after page of illustrations and photos. Information is repeated over and over and I learn that the Golden Age lasted from exactly 632 CE to 1796 CE.

How is the beginning of the Golden Age of scientific development marked? Easy: the death of Muhammad. How does that relate to a scientific development or achievement? Nobody knows. It probably sounded like a good idea to someone. Does it mean that only when the messenger Muhammad died that there was finally some progress?

The last entry seems to be the opening of a hospital in 1154, so I will never know what event marked the end of the Golden Age in 1796. But it explains why they claim the Golden Age lasted 1000 years and I manage to come up with only half that: 500 years.

At the end of the book there are pages and pages of names – but no list of the 1001 inventions.

Before I go and take a look at some of the claims and show how the marketing trick works, I want to find out how this endeavour, which must be immensely cost-intensive, is funded. Initially, in 2006, it was paid for by the UK government.

Originally funded by the British government and launched in the United Kingdom in 2006, 1001 Inventions was created by the Foundation for Science, Technology and Civilisation (FSTC). FSTC is a British-based non-profit, international network of the world’s leading academics with expertise in the history of science and technology. Both 1001 Inventions and FSTC are non-religious, apolitical organizations and have received support from various arms of the British government, the Wellcome Trust and the British Science Association.

The launching institution was and still is the FSTC, the Foundation for Science, Technology and Civilisation. Its aim is to “increase knowledge on Muslim heritage” as it is totally and completely non-religious and apolitical. They also want to promote Muslim heritage. Totally non-religious, of course. It is probably sheer coincidence that the President of FSTC and the author of the book mentioned earlier are both called - Prof. Salim TS Al-Hassani. They can’t make up their minds, but the Deputy Chair or chairman, also a professor, a Mohamed El-Gomati, obtained his single BSc in 2 areas, maths and physics. It is unclear whether he actually made his Masters. But this does not mean that generally the academic titles are the result of diploma mills and worthless, just that I personally have my reservations.

It is written on the FSTC page that “Professor El-Gomati is a prolific scientist who publishes extensively” and they provide a link to his latest 30 publications. Alas, these are dated all the way back to 2000 and many are just proceedings or talks. Not as prolific or active as I would have expected. What I suspect is closer to the truth is the following statement, that he’s a “religious advisor to a number of UK Universities and charities and speaks on the contribution of Muslims in Science, Technology and Civilisation”. That fits in much better with what the aims are.

Back to the funding:

“The global tour of the 1001 Inventions exhibition is sponsored by ALJ Community Initiatives, which is the Corporate Social Responsibility arm of the ALJ Group - a Toyota automobiles distributor in 13 different countries.”

I could not find out who pays for the materials, exhibits, documentation and the pricey marketing in form of a movie including actor Ben Kingsley.

Besides the FSTC, which wants to trigger a social change by exploring the cultural roots of science, I found groups such as the Muslim Heritage and the Muslim Heritage Awareness Group and the Curriculum Enrichment For the Future as well as various names, which are dropped to make it look as though institutions such as Wellcome Trust and the British Science Association are part of the initiative. Who, at the end of the day, the investors are is not revealed. There is no business plan and no strategy paper. There are indirect indicators, where a Saudi Ambassador presents a book financed in the UAE.

The list of references and further resources is endless and probably lists every book with Muslim and science in the title. It even lists Arabic atheists, something I was surprised to see and I admit I feel respect for the organisers that they don’t sweep these people under the rug, which normally happens. But then, Jim Khalili only talks about science in general and even says the pinhole camera was invented by Ibn al-Haytham or Alhazen as he was also known. That’s how good this propaganda machinery works. Associate advancements and research into optics to a person and attribute a minor but well-known invention to that person and people will believe it. Repeat often and everybody accepts it as a fact.

And this is how the marketing trick works: find an established and proven fact which establishes a person as being reputable. Link an invention to that person as a sort of quick win. Now you don’t have to go into details any longer and can make unobtrusive claims without anyone questioning them. If you read the texts provided by 1001 inventions, you will find that they suddenly use a lot of “it is thought that” ”it is likely that” “ what probably can be” “linked with” “may have happened” etc etc

After a while you will see sentences saying that in those days people “unlike many today, had expressed their religious commitment and faith through deeds useful to society”, thereby eroding the principle of non-religiosity and inserting religious dogma into the educational material. Sentences such as this one, link “aspects of our modern lives that are linked with inventions by Muslims or were inspired by Islam”. How is that objective in any way? This is just another way of introducing religion into the classroom via the back-door under the guise of education and non-religious, objective information. While in reality it is cheapest propaganda.

Disclaimer

So we have claims which are not really formulated. The website just plants teasers of things that WILL be shown, without ever showing them. We are fed “sound bites” and empty phrases such as “inventors created marvels” or “scientific breakthrough”, while never establishing a real origin of an invention and its modern descendant.

Example: the great Ibn al-Haytham, the polymath, who lived from 965 to 1040CE, contributed a great deal in physics, mathematics, mainly optics and all the way to the scientific method. He based his work on existing knowledge provided by the Greeks, Indians, Chinese and the Egyptians and researched further, disproving e.g. the ancient Greek idea that light comes out of the eye, bounces off objects, and comes back to the eye.

But are all applications and products involving light and glass now based on al-Haytham’s research? No, of course not. And he did not determine the speed of light either, as is claimed by some Muslims. A question that comes to mind here: shouldn’t a professor or even 2 professors know the difference between an invention and a discovery?

Did he really invent the pinhole camera? No, that's silly. He provided different advancements, especially when solving problems, where he had to expand on existing mathematics in order to solve and demonstrate a particular problem, explaining and demonstrating the principles.

The pinhole camera,  or camera obscura, has been around for well over  2000 years. Mozi, a Chinese philosopher referred to this device as a "locked treasure room." Aristotle, Euclid, Theon, Anthemius, etc etc all knew about, described and experimented with pinhole cameras, so there is no need to have it re-invented by al-Haytham.

This approach of taking a well-known principle or object and then artificially linking it emotionally with a particular Muslim is the way this entire scheme works. It deceives naïve and trusting people and those who are easily impressed. Children.

It is only when a claim is researched that the flaws come through and the highly polished surface suddenly cracks wide open and the truth comes through. Like the coffee claim.

coffee was first brewed in Yemen around the 9th century, brought to Cairo by a group of students

Can any of this be verified? Not really. There are so many legends and claims due to the popularity of the drink, the favourite hot beverage everywhere. We THINK the first bush was identified as coffee in Ethiopia. We had coffee bushes in the garden – but in East Africa.

So where it was discovered and by whom is impossible to ascertain, but we know that the neighbours from Yemen were the first to trade the beans and this gradually started off the craving for drinks containing caffeine. The same goes for claims surrounding perfumes or fabrics. No, the zero was not “invented” by Muslims but has existed for something like 5000 years and was actively used (ie not as placeholder) by the Indians until it was “rediscovered” by Italian mathematician Fibonacci and has proven to be quite useful. No, we don’t really use Arabic numerals but a mixture of different influences. Anyone who actually knows Arabic numerals will appreciate this.

The claim that involves a human flying in a glider is just as far-fetched and is based only on wishful thinking. We have claims of people attaching themselves to kites and balloons, we have powered flights made 2400 years ago. All with a "maybe" or "possibly" attached to it. Or the “Some Say” introduction.

Al-Hassani from 1001inventions does not provide any kind of conditional form. He seriously claims that “Abbas ibn Firnas, the first man to fly, who launched his flying machine over the Spanish city of Cordoba more than 1,000 years before the Wright brothers took to the sky.” He doesn’t mention that Firnas was supposedly 65 years old, glued some feathers to his body and jumped, almost killing himself on the process. This is sourced by the historian Lynn Townsend White to an account in the 17^th century. Hardly credible. Hearsay and a fable. But this does not stop a man, calling himself professor, misleading people by making it look as though there is evidence to support this claim and as though putting a beard and a turban on a model hang-glider pilot makes it true. And to top it all off he calls it a replica. Of what? His imagination?

The other itemised claims are also mostly hearsay and maybes.  I mean, things like water clocks have been around for 1000s of years, so there’s no biggie there. Why make it look so? Just to be clear on this: I am NOT talking about whether or not someone built a hospital or university with some unique feature I showed at the beginning. That’s laudable and great. I am talking about the rubbish claims: first camera, first pump, first glider, first surgery, first astronomical whatever, somehow missing the formulation of the theory of evolution.

What bothers me the most is that this company, trying to establish itself as a brand which is recognised and perceived as reliable is not caught out from the word go. It seems that anything starting with an A will be claimed by some Islamic institution.

What bothers me so much about this is that anyone can take any claim made by these people and verify it – or falsify it in the cases that I looked at.

But why are people so gullible and uncritical? Every adult and especially parents of young children should know by now about viruses being sent by e-mail looking perfectly credible. Everybody should know that a letter telling you of a huge amount of cash just waiting to be picked up by you is a scam. Anything that sounds too good to be true probably is. This also goes for scientific claims or claims made to sound scientific using pseudo-science. Are we too lax in checking scientists because we are too lazy? Or afraid that we might look inferior? Don’t we care what our children are taught? Don’t we first check?

Scientists are just humans. And fallible. So why don’t people check just a little bit?

We all know the hype which surrounded Zakir Naik and Harun Yahya and how foolish they look today because they lied and fed people false information which was unearthed via the internet and people with critical thinking skills.

Will the same be true of 1001 inventions when people start looking behind the sparkling façade and realise that none of the claims can be verified the way they were made? These are not facts. They are elements or nuggets of truth which are drawn out and blown up out of all proportions. Yes, the research during one or other Golden Age contributed towards later discoveries – but then, doesn’t all research do this? Why not simply stick to the truth?

Muslim and non-Muslim scholars from different countries brought about inventions and also improved or re-introduced old inventions like the Elephant clock which embraced many cultures as a scientific dedication of respect and understanding. The seven meters high clock uses Greek water raising technology, an Indian elephant, an Egyptian phoenix, Arabian figures, Persian carpet, and Chinese dragons, to celebrate the diversity of the world.

That is what it boils down to: just a mix of people doing their thing, each contributing in their own capacity and ability. There’s no need to make any group of people whether it be based on race, gender, ethnicity or belief, look better or worse than they are.

Thank you for your time.

Oh and please go and check out the other 998 claims they make – and prove they are fallacious claims. Just deception, misrepresentation, lies and/or trickery.

What started off as a short rant, somehow went longer and longer the deeper I went. A company is now taking the claim of a "Muslim" or "Islamic Golden Age" to extremes.

This company is launching a broad attack on children and unsuspecting adults in the form of propaganda using deception, marketing and lies. It seems to pay a lot better outputting deception and making dishonest, misleading claims than working as a professor or researching as a scientist.

Recipients of this propaganda and visitors of the exhibitions don’t check anything and are generally being caught for suckers. This includes President Obama the same way as his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the British Prime Minister or HRH Prince Charles.

While I openly acknowledge the huge advances Arab researchers made during their Golden Age I strongly condemn the claims there were any significant developments or inventions made during that era. Muslims did NOT invent a camera, algebra or an aeroplane. They advanced optics, mathematics or physics, but did not revolutionise anything. This propaganda, which reminds me of the lies used during the Communist era, does nothing to further the acceptance of Islam and its dogma. It shows to what extremes Muslims will go, only to score a few sympathy points with non-Muslims.

I urge everyone to apply a basic set of rational thinking and scepticism when listening to the claims and please check for yourself, whether they really apply and represent any kind of major advancement.