Scientific Contribution by Muslims Throughout Ages
Islamaphobia
Jamshed Akhtar(jamshe...@yahoo.com)
From the book:The Ultimate Revelations
http://www.islamawareness.net/
Fascination with the heavens, coupled with the need to determine the timings of prayers and
direction of Qibla in diverse locales, resulted in the tremendous development of Astronomy
from the very beginning. The progress took place along three interlinked pathways - development
of infrastructure; collection of data; and interpretation of data in conjunction with original
theoretical models. First path entailed construction of royal and private observatories - at
Baghdad, Damascus, Maragha, and Samarqand etc…[1]...and designing of several new instruments
by highly creative innovators of the era, to felicitate observations. In this regard, a very
important invention was Astrolab designed by Jandab an eighth century scientist.
Al-Battani, Ali Bin Isa and others developed and perfected it to such an extent that it became
an instrument of observation and a kind of computing device for calculating complicated
trigonometric functions and for determining astronomical parameters/functions. Through it,
they could tell the date and hour from the position of certain stars. Movable sights on the
instrument were aligned with the star and relevant numbers and signs were read off from windows
in the instrument or from its circumference.
Al-Khujandi constructed another very useful device, called Sudus al-Fakhri. It is now known as
Sextant. Farghani, another inventor developed and improved the Sun dial known to Greeks and
Babylonians. All these devices were revolutionary inventions of their time and with the help of
these instruments, astronomers collected data. They carried several observations to determine
Obliquity ‘i’[2] and the eccentricity ‘e’[3], compiled tables of all kinds.
Thus by ninth century, a team working under Yahya Mansoor, the director of Al-Mamun
Observatory, had made a number of astronomical observations and another team which had been
given the task of determining the value of one terrestrial degree, managed to measure the
radius of the earth from this observation, with only a 2.5% error. By eleventh century,
Al-Bairooni using a different method reduced this error to 0.25%. Boozjani: [1011 AD] proved
that sun had attraction; this attraction affected moon’s orbit and that it did not exceed 1º
15’.[4] Al-Battani, one of the great mathematicians and astronomers of the world, discovered
the correct angle of inclination of earth; proved the ‘Trepidation of Equinoxes’ as being a
wrong concept; proved that the orbit of the earth is not circular but elliptical; prepared
Astronomical tables known as ‘Zij Al-Battani’ that were of immense value to Astronomers of the
9th and 10th centuries. The list of eminent astronomers of this era and their works is simply
too long to narrate here.
After thoroughly studying the Greek theoretical model of the planetary motion and its
modification given by Ptolemy, astronomers like Al-Bitruji, Al-Tusi and Qutubuddin Shirazi etc.
propounded their own models, while some others like Ibn Al- Shatir suggested further
modifications in the Ptolemic model. In fact, Copernicus in his famous book has used what is
known today as Al-Tusi’s device for producing linear motion as a resultant of two circular
motions. The famous historian W. Hartner has proved even the fact that the geometrical figure
of this device as produced by Copernicus, is exactly identical even to the extent of the
lettering employed by Al-Tusi in his Arabic astronomical treatise. And it was this device that
played a very important role in the development of an alternative non-Ptolemic model of
planetary motion[5].
The greatest contribution of these scholars is in mathematics.[6] They founded Algebra; made
Trigonometry an independent branch of mathematics; and achieved tremendous advances in other
fields like Geometry and spherical geometry etc. In this case too the impetus for the
development was provided by the Message[7]. Al-Khwarizmi[8] the founder of Algebra, was the
first mathematician to work on the details of ‘Arithmetic and Algebra of inheritance’ besides
the systematisation of the theory of quadratic equations. His treatise entitled ‘Hisab Al-jabr
wal muqabala’, enjoyed tremendous popularity in the medieval West for centuries. Tabit ibn
Qurrah of ninth century, who had translated the works of Euclid, Apollonius, Archimedes, and
Ptolemy was another fine mathematician himself. The only surviving fragment of his original
work contains an exceptionally brilliant chapter on the solution and properties of cubic equations.
Umar Khayyam, the famous poet, was another great mathematician[9]. He invented the second and
third degree of quadratic equations. The efforts of these mathematicians become all the more
remarkable when we realise that they had not yet developed the symbolic algebra. Even for
third degree equations, Khayyam had to write his problems and procedural steps in words and
sentences.”
The algebraic symbols were introduced quite late. Al-Banna and Al-Marrakushi used them in
thirteenth and fourteenth century. Later mathematicians like Qunfudh’s and Al-Qalasadi’s works
of fourteenth and fifteenth century show quite a developed system of symbols for operations
entailing extraction of square roots, exponentiation, and for unknown quantities in algebraic
equations.
The numerals and the decimal notation used today originally came from India but these scholars
gave them a much more explicit, simple and easy to use form, than the highly cumbersome Roman
numerals, which it ultimately replaced. The development of Trigonometry, Spherical Trigonometry
and Geometry also show the intensely original creative work done by these scholars. Here too
the concepts of Sine and Cosine came from India, but Habsh Al-Hasib and Al-Battani extended
them to other Trigonometrical ratios, like tangent, secant and their reciprocals. It was
Al-Battani, who had derived this formula:
sin a = tan a / Ö (1+tan²a) and Cosa = 1 / Ö(1 + tan²a).
Later Al-Nayrizi, Abul Wafa, Al-Khujandi and Abu Nasr Mansur etc. helped develop this branch.
It was Abul Wafa who had given this famous formula:
sin (a + ß) = sin a cos ß + sin ß cos a.
Abul Wafa had also discussed the quadrature of the parabola and the volume of the paraboloid.
Yet trigonometry remained mainly the work of Al-Battani, Al-Bairooni and Al-Tusi etc. For the
degree of accuracy in mathematical works, Jamshed Al-Kashi tops the list. He gave the value of
p up to 16 decimal places and of Sine 1° up to 18 places.
I must also mention two other mathematicians of this era, whose contributions were quite
revolutionary in content. Ali Ahmad Nasawi who died in 1030 AD, studied an alternative Indian
system of time division based on 60. Indians had divided the day into 60 Ghatika. One Ghatika
into 60 pal and one pal into 60 bapal. Thus one pal was equal to 24 seconds and one Ghatika or
Ghari was equal to 24 minutes. Nasawi revolutionised this system, by dividing the day into 24
Saat, one Saat into 60 Daqeeqa and each Daqeeqa into 60 Sania. It was this division of time
that was taken by rest of the world as standard. In the language of Message Daqeeqa means a
small or minute quantity and Sania means second or the other unit. Thus we can see that the
terms ‘minutes and seconds’ are exact translations of the original words used by Nasawi.
Moreover, he also worked on the decimal system and made complete conversion charts between both
the systems.”
Masalima al-Majriti, an expert mathematician, zoologist and chemist of tenth century, was the
World’s first economist. From eighth century till thirteenth century, ‘followers of the
Message’ were dominating the world’s economic scene. The entire known world was either trading
with them or through them. Majriti studied markets, commercial transactions, different types of
businesses and associated traditions. After that he laid down exhaustive guidelines, rules
and laws for the entire commerce. He organised the information, rules, and laws in such a
manner that after him commerce became a separate subject by itself. Besides commerce, he also
studied zoology and prepared an exhaustive book on species of animals, their characteristics
and observation about their habitats. His third interest was chemistry and on this subject
too, he left a standard work.
The next important field where this civilisation showed its most sustained effort was medical
science. General medicine, pharmacy, ophthalmology, surgery and gynaecology, all received
attention from their researchers. One of the brightest star of this era was Mohammed Zakaria
Razi [932]. An astronomer, philosopher, botanist, physicist and physician par excellence, Razi
contributed immensely to the development of medical science. He not only improved the working
of several hospitals of Baghdad but also established a new hospital with a streamlined
procedure, devising a way to check pollution of the area.
The pollution was checked by placing pieces of meat at all the proposed sites for the new
hospital. After three days, the site where the meat showed least deterioration was selected. In
this hospital the patients were first screened by a batch of doctors and those with serious and
complex diseases were sent to Razi. He studied them, suggested medicines, observed the progress
and noted every change and its effect exhaustively. Thus he experimented on hundreds and
thousands of herbs and plants; and placed them in suitable categories in a book, which can be
called the first medical encyclopaedia[10]. He also wrote ‘A Treatise on the Small Pox and
Measles’. This treatise contains the first clear description of the major symptoms of the two
diseases[11]. The concept of ‘First Aid’ was introduced by him for the first time. He also
invented the Hydrostatic Balance to measure small quantities and designed several surgical
instruments.
Another contemporary of Razi, who has several firsts to his credit was Sinan bin Thabit Harrani
[943]. Prior to his time there was no standardization and no law regulating the practice of
medicine. Being in charge of administration and an expert physician he introduced numerous laws
to regulate the practice of medicine. He was the one who invented the system of examination and
registry of medical practitioners with the government for the first time in the world. He also
produced guidelines for medical students; instituted numerous improvements in the hospital
administration[12]; launched mobile hospitals for the first time and introduced medical
check-up and treatment of prisoners.
First Gynaecologist of the world, Qartabi’s [976] research was on pregnancy; embryology; mother
and child; and pre and post natal care[13]. He was also a philosopher, historian and botanist.
Another pioneer of the same time was Abul Qasim Zahrawi[1009]. He introduced the technique of
surgery in the treatment of diseases. In his book he has emphasised cleanliness and
sophistication in the operation and laid down guidelines and rules for surgical operations. He
was also the inventor of more than 100 surgical instruments[14].
In Ophthalmology, although Amar Mansuli[1005] introduced the technique of surgery in eye
diseases, it was Ali bin Isa who provided the world detailed information on this subject. His
book, which is in three parts, is virtually an Encyclopaedia on Ophthalmology. There are a
total of 130 eye diseases listed in this book; 143 herbals and medicinal plants beneficial for
the eye and hundreds of precautions, and the type of food to keep the eyesight healthy[15]. The
other big names of Ophthalmology were Caliph Ibn-Ali-Al-Mahasin [1265], who had an unrivalled
reputation for removing cataracts even in cases when one eye was already lost[16] and
Al-Shahdili [1375], whose Kitab al-umda also contains details regarding the development of
Trachoma and the description of Cancer of the eyelid.
Another Ophthalmologist, Ibn Nafis Al-Qurshi [1289] brought a revolution in the Medical science
by discovering the ‘Pulmonary Blood circulatory system’ of the body, which was known in the
medieval world as ‘lesser circulation’, almost 300 years before Harvey and Survetus, who are
credited with this discovery. Another revolution was brought by two contemporary researchers.
Ibn Khatima [1369], who has left in his writings, description of extremely small agents that
he thought were responsible for diseases. And Ibn al-Khatib [1374], the writer, poet,
historian, politician, geographer, philosopher and a great physician who, working
independently, differentiated the diseases into Infectious and non-infectious category, and
presented the novel concept that invisible insects seemed responsible for Infectious diseases.
He named them Gerasemes. A word that later got converted into germs[17].
Then men like Abdul Lateef Baghdadi [1162-1231] and Mansoor bin Mohammed have contributed
greatly to the study of human anatomy. In this regard, the book on Anatomy written by Mansoor,
in 1396, is still extant.
This world of medicine went hand in hand with the researches in Pharmacy and Botany also. Abu
Mansur Harawi [961] was an expert Botanist, who divided the medicines into organic and
inorganic category. His book contains a total of 585 medicines - 510 in the organic category
and 75 in the inorganic category[18].
In the field of zoology, Abdul Malik Asmaee [831], was a pioneer who wrote five books on this
subject, describing the life of the forest through the animals’ perspective. These books have
the distinction of being the first on this subject. Another important contributor to this
field, a multifaceted genius was Ibn Maskoya [1032]. Philosopher, intellectual, critic,
historian, biologist, sociologist, psychologist, researcher on ethics, metaphysics, rural and
urban civilisation etc.. He was the first scientist to suggest relationship and grades in the
entire kingdom of living beings, including plants, animals, and human beings.
We do not mean to belittle Darwin’s enormous efforts in the collection of all the data and its
interpretation, but as far as the evolution of the ‘concept of evolution’ is concerned, a part
of the credit should also be given to Farabi and Maskoya, specially Maskoya. Some of his
tremendous output is still available, and can be studied to prove or disprove this claim.
Optics was one such branch. And although several great names were associated with this field,
Ibn Al-Haithem, known to West as Alhazen, easily tops the list. In fact, his contribution to
this branch of physics is so tremendous and revolutionary that H.J.J. Winter, a British
Historian had described him as ‘After Archimedes (287-212 BC) no really great physicist
appeared until Ibn Al-Haithem (965-1039 AD)’ Ibn Al-Haythem provided the proof of the specular
reflection and complete formulation of laws of reflection. He also designed and used a copper
instrument to measure reflection from plane, spherical, cylindrical and conical mirrors and
also from paraboloidal surfaces. His theories about spherical aberration, focus, foci and his
method of determining the location of images were quite ahead of his time. He also made
improvements to the Ptolemaic apparatus to measure accurately the refraction of the ray of
light, through air, glass and other mediums, thus discovering a large number of relationships,
between the angles of incidence, refraction and deviation. These discoveries benefited humanity
tremendously and ultimately paved the way for Snell’s Sine-law of refraction. A German science
historian, Mathias Schramm, has suggested that in his lectures, Snell had depended to a large
extant on a treatise of optics, which was jointly written by Petras Ramus and Friedrich Risner
and was published after their death at Kassel, Germany, in 1606. Friedrich Risner, in turn, was
much influenced by Al- Haythem’s treatise on optics, which he had also edited and published in
1572, eight years before his death in 1580. Thus the connection seems obvious. Al-Haythem’s
numerous other findings too are revolutionary. He had declared that ‘light’ is an essential
characteristic of self luminous bodies, diverging totally from Aristotelion physics. He had
also distinguished between light from source as primary, and reflected light from bodies as
secondary, and proved that moonlight was reflected light from the sun. Moreover, studying
shadows of objects and solar and lunar eclipses, he showed that emission of light takes place
‘in the form of a sphere’, rectilinearly in all directions.[19] He was also the first to
consider velocity of light to be finite, too quick to perceived by senses, and easier and
quicker in rarer mediums and slower in denser mediums. Surprisingly, this concept forwarded in
1000 AD, has been found to be correct, while Newton of a much later date was wrong. Then
Al-Haythem also studied atmospheric refraction, rainbow, twilight and physiological optics. His
extant manuscripts, include a major work on vision and numerous theories, explanations and
experiments etc.
Chemistry[20] was another product of this period. One of the greatest names of this field was
Jabir bin Hayyan [817], who can rightly be called ‘Father of Chemistry’. He was the first
scientist who gave preference to experiments and laid down rules and methodology for
experiments, which are still in use. Among his discoveries and inventions are - the process of
crystallisation, sublimation and distillation; the way of filtration; different type of salts;
several new metallurgical processes; phenomenon of oxidation[21]; a way for waterproofing
cloth; a way for colouring leather; the invention of hair dye; invention of sulphuric acid,
Nitric acid and Aqua Regia; and a way to turn iron into steel. The name was not given by him.
The contents and description of the action of the acid, identifies the product.
The first recorded geologist, who was also a metallurgist and a Calligraphist, belonged to this
era. His name was Attar Al-Katib. He had collected thousands of different varieties of stones
and recorded his observations and experiments in a book. The science of writing Encyclopaedias
also started with this civilisation. The first man to compile all the available information
regarding all branches of science in an alphabetical order was Mohammed Bin Ahmad Khwarizmi.
This method was later adopted universally for writing the modern Encyclopaedia. Prior to him
all such books listed the information subject wise.
Ibn Batuta and Al-Idrisi, studied lands, continents, climate and weather patterns and organised
all their observations and experiments into a science which later became known as geography,
improving tremendously upon Ptolemy.
In those days, Arab navigators were dominating the world’s naval scene.[22] Idrisi correlated
and organised all the data, made world maps and wrote several books on this subject. He
discovered the source of Nile which has been shown on his map of Africa.
People like Ibn Rushd popularly known as Avverros, in whose name a movement had started in the
West; or Shaikh bu ali-Sina who is known as Avicina - the greatest benefactor of medicine of
medieval west; Al-Bairooni, the multifaceted genius, who introduced India to the West, besides
contributing immensely to astronomy, physics, astrology, history, mathematics and other
branches; or Ibn Khaldun - the first sociologist of the world, an all time great historian and
a man who is credited to have the maximum information in the world at the time..”
[1]The Observatories in Islam, - A. Sayili, Publications of the Turkish Historical Society
Series VII, No. 38, 1960.
[2]Obliquity i is the angle between the plane of earth's orbit and the celestial equator.
[3]The orbit of the earth is not a circle but an ellipse. The sun is not at its center but at
one of its foci. The shape of this ellipse is characterized by this quantity. The Obliquity of
the Ecliptic, Astronomy and Astrophysics - A. Wittmann, (Berlin), 73 (1979), pp.129-131.
[4] It is called Evection. Tych Brahe in 16th. century corroborated this view. JA
[5] R.A. Ansari's work - p 46.
[6] Fuat Sezgin, in his History of Arabic-Islamic Mathematics [Vol v, Leiden 1974] lists 155
Arab Islamic Mathematicians upto 11th. century only. The bibliography of Al-Biruni's comprises
of 183 works and that of Ibn Al-Haitham of about 100 scientific works.
[7] The laws of inheritance needed the development of operations for handling fractions.
[8]The word `Algorithm or Algorism' is the distorted version of his name. He died in 850 CE. Of
the three mathematicians considered all time greats in the medieval world, two of them were
Al-Khwarizmi and Al-Battani.
[9]The Algebra of Omar Khayyam, translated with commentaries by Daoud S. Kasir.
[10]This book was so popular in the west that between 1486 and 1542 the Latin translation of
such massive work was printed five times.
[11] This treatise has been reprinted more than forty times during the last four hundred years.
[12]The Emergence of the Prototype of the Modern Hospital in Medieval Islam, - A. Sayili,
Proceedings of the Intern. Congress on the Hist. And Phil of Sci, published in journal of
Central Asia, Vol.III, No.2 (1980).
[13] His three books containing exhaustive data related to his researches were the first books
on Gynaecology in the world. An expert Botanist, he wrote another book on herbs and plants. He
also wrote on the history of Cardova.
[14] His book entitled `Tasreef' is the most complete book on this subject.
[15] First Latin translation came in 1499 AD; French edition in 1903 and German edition in 1904.
[16] His Kitab al-kafi fi al-kuhal - “The sufficient treatise on collyrium”, contains a
systematic account of the anatomy of eye, its diseases and treatment, including detailed
discussion of some surgical operations.
[17] He had written a total of sixty books, out of which 20 are available.
[18] Inorganic category contains some very important drugs like Sodium and potassium Carbonates
and Antimony and Silicon oxide etc. He also pointed out that Copper and Lead compounds are
poisnous and another compound, which is now known as `Plaster of Paris' should be used on
broken bones.
[19]This concept is known to us today as Huygen’s principle.
[20] Chemistry is a derivative of Al-chemi, a discipline which started out of a wish to turn
any metal into gold.
[21] He noticed for the first time that weight of metal increases after burning.
[22] Suhal Bin Aman and Ibn Majid were called Asadul-bahar or Captain of the oceans.
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is the zionists worst nightmare, We are Muslims, and we are extremely
proud of it, Born To Serve Islam, All praise is due to Allah Lord of
the Worlds, the Owner of all of the creation, Ardalan Keykavoussi,
Tommy Davis, LORD RAMA. (The 19 terrorists who attacked our nation on
September 11, 2001 used a total of 364 aliases.)
Islam broke world records of genocide, slavery, religiously sanctioned
rape, abuse of human rights, and prohibition of scientific inquiry. It
forbids Muslim emigration to the lands of the infidels because a
Muslim minority cannot enslave the infidel majority. Despite this
prohibition Muslims emigrate to the West, not as migrants, but as
conquerors. They live in sharia mini-states and expand these mini-
states by terrorizing infidel neighbors and driving them out. Arabic
proverb says "first comes Saturday, then Sunday." It means that Arabs
are going to exterminate Jews before they exterminate Christians. It
also means that Israel is the first line of defense against Islam.
“I have been made victorious with terror.” - Muhammad (according to
Sahih Bukhari)
Europe’s Muslim population is set to increase from around 13% today to
between 22% and 37% of the population by 2025. source:
http://news.scotsman.com/europeanunion/CIA-gives-grim-warning-on.2595505.jp
The average European couple now has fewer than 1.4 babies, compared to
3.6 babies born to the average Muslim immigrant couple in Europe.
Across Western Europe 16 to 20 percent of babies are being born into
Muslim families… By 2025, one-third of all European children will be
born to Muslims… In Italy, 95% of all rapists are Muslims. Eighty-five
percent of all murderers are Muslims… France will have a Muslim
majority in less than 25 years! Another telling statistic is that
although the Muslims are 12% of France's population, 70 percent of a
total of 60,775 prisoners in France are Muslims! All of France's urban
suburbs are being roamed by Muslim black African or Arabic gangs… A
very high proportion of French Muslims are in the underclass, that
segment of the population that relies not so much on education and
work as on welfare and predatory activities. In fact, over one
thousand Muslim neighborhoods are under monitoring throughout France.
Seven hundred of those Muslim neighborhoods are listed as "violent"
and nearly 400 hundred are listed as "very violent." Violence ranges
from rape (95% of rapists are Muslim), murder (85% of murderers are
Muslim), theft and looting of cars (58% committed by Muslims) and
street fighting to assault on teachers and civil servants… source:
http://www.masada2000.org/islam.html
"There does not exist an identifiable body of Muslims, substantive in
number or an outright majority, who could be described as "moderate"
by their repudiation of Muslim extremists. Violence has been an
integral part of Muslim history, irrespective of whether it is
sanctioned by Islam, and Muslims who unhesitatingly use violence to
advance their political ambitions have created a climate within their
faith culture that any Muslim who questions such practice is then
deemed apostate and subject to harm. Consequently, what might pass for
"moderate" Muslims, the large number of Muslims unaccounted for as to
what they think, in practical terms constitute a forest within which
extremists are incubated, nurtured, given ideological and material
support, and to which they return for sanctuary." - Salim Mansur