Interesting essay at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/30/science/social/30ISLA.html?ex=1005467004&e
i=1&en=ea
670939cf6cdf4a
"How Islam Won, and Lost, the Lead in Science"
October 30, 2001
By DENNIS OVERBYE
Brief sample:
Among other sociological and economic factors, like the
lack of a middle class, Dr. Hoodbhoy attributes the malaise
of Muslim science to an increasing emphasis over the last
millennium on rote learning based on the Koran.
"The notion that all knowledge is in the Great Text is a
great disincentive to learning," he said. "It's destructive
if we want to create a thinking person, someone who can
analyze, question and create." Dr. Bruno Guideroni, a
Muslim who is an astrophysicist at the National Center for
Scientific Research in Paris, said, "The fundamentalists
criticize science simply because it is Western."
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