Islam and science: beyond the troubled relationship

74:13

10 Dec 2013

History of Science, Evolution

Ziauddin Sardar

In this lecture at the Royal Society in London, Ziauddin Sardar presents a summary of the historical theories about the relationships of science — it’s “decline” — and Islam.  He suggests that despite many other theories, the one that is not often presented is colonialism’s impact through closing local schools and universities, where indigenous scientists trained.  He argues:  “The decline of science in Muslim societies is the product of the systematic reduction in the meaning of the basic concepts of Islam.  This process not only reduced Islam from a holistic worldview to a one-dimensional faith, but also truncated the creativity of Muslim societies.” (32:50-33:07)  Sardar is critical of several different forms of “fundamentalism”, which he presents as cutting off ijmāʿ (consensus) and ijtihād (the process through which legal reasoning is performed) among Muslims. 

In answering a question toward the end, he states clearly that he is an “evolutionist” and against “creationism”. (1:02:10)

He also fairly pointedly rejects understanding the Qurʾān “as a book of science” or trying to find scientific theories in the Qurʾān, a form of iʿjāz.

The lecture was given on 12 December 2006.  The lecture was sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation.  Sardar was then a visiting professor at the City University of London.  His personal web site is here.  The video includes the question and answer period, which begins at 51:56.

Topics addressed:  Ibn al-Haytham and the Book of Optics, Abdus-Salam, Nobel prize, George Sarton, George Saliba and the Tusi couple, Copernicus, interconnections of Islamic and European sciences, Abduhamid ibn Sabra, colonialism, secularism, humanism, Asharites and Mustazilites, George Makdisi, Muḥammad Abu Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī, Ibn al-Sina, Ibn al-Tufayl, rational study of nature, socioeconomic context of Islamic science, classifications of knowledge, purposes of ijmāʿ and creation of authority in Muslim societies, Islamic fundamentalisms and their association with creationism and Intelligent design, Ibn Tufayl and Ibn Nafis leaning toward evolution, mystical fundamentalism and the forms of knowledge and science that lead from it, the need to reinterpret Islam.

Brought up in the questions:  which Muslim-majority countries can serve as examples, oversimplification and exaggeration in lists of Muslim scientific discoveries, how to engage Muslim youth, 1001 Inventions exhibition, Sufism and science.

Evaluation:

The material on Islam is within the bounds of what Muslims have historically understood as acceptable.

There are some problems with the history of science presented here.  For instance, Sardar suggests that George Saliba said that Tusi’s couple (a drawing of astronomical motion) was exactly reproduced by Copernicus.  Although the drawings, as Saliba points out to show the influence, are very similar, Copernicus placed the Sun, not the Earth, at the center.  (You can see Saliba’s presentation of this material here.)

As noted by one of the questioners at the end, some of the historical material here, perhaps particularly about consensus and “democracy” as it supposedly existed in Muslim societies prior to colonialism, is highly simplified, nearly to the point of misrepresentation.