Dubai Is Nuts!!!!

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Darius871
Why is it so stupid?

Originally posted by Oerdin
The Arabs were little better then desert barbarians prior to 700 and nothing more then foamingg at the mouth religious fanatics ever since.

[Darius871]

I admitted that bathwater was stupid; it just sounded like you were throwing the baby out too.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Darius871
I admitted that bathwater was stupid; it just sounded like you were throwing the baby out too.

The baby is acceptable, but even then, one shouldn't be too hard.
There are plenty of great civilizations that took concepts from others, and mixed/refined them. The Romans, for example, plagiarized the Greeks like hell.
I'd also say that the Arabs were smart of adapting and mixing advances from other civs (be they Civs they traded with, or Civs the conquered), as it shows they were definitely more open minded than quite a few civs of the time.

Also, there are quite a few genuinely Arabic achievements, such as their architecture.

[Darius871]

Agreed on all points.

[Colon™]

There's more to progress than Grand New Ideas (tm). Most of it takes place through adoption, modification and/or combining of previously existing ideas. Claiming that this isn't significant is akin to claiming the contribution of rubber tires isn't worthwile because the basic concept already existed in stone wheels.

[edit]what spiffy said

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Darius871
Why is it so stupid? Most if not all of the 'discoveries' commonly attributed to the Abassid golden age were in fact either modification, amalgamation, or even outright adoption of ideas originating in China, India, the ancient Near East, and/or the Mediterranean classical tradition. I wouldn't use that as an indictment of Islamic culture itself as Oerdin did, but the underlying point is a valid historical observation.

Every successful civilization has copied from the past. Hell, the two 'inventors of calculus' as we claim them (Newton and Leibnitz) used principles invented by ancient Greeks and in India and combined them together and put their own little mark on them. As Einstein said, he was "standing on the shoulders of giants" when he made his discoveries.

Though to claim that the Muslim empires didn't add anything or shouldn't be commended for bringing together all of that information and adding their own gloss or that the entire culture is nothing as a result is just plain moronic.

edit: Errr... what the two Euros said

[Colon™]

This is an interesting fella for instance, amongst others considered to be a great forerunner of 18th & 19th century classical economics.

[Colon™]

To whom it concerns, here's a lengthy article that explores on Khaldun's economic ideas: http://islamic-world.net/economics/f..._economics.htm

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Oerdin
I can honestly say that there are virtually no inventions or original scientific thoughts which originated from Arabia and instead Arabs just trafficed in other people's ideas (Chinese, Indian, European). The Arabs were little better then desert barbarians prior to 700

Well you could 'honestly' say it if you truly believed it, but it wouldn't be true.

As for Arabs being little better than desert barbarians prior to 700 a.d., that is so inaccurate in so many ways it deserves to be laughed out of court.

There were Arab kingdoms before 700 a.d.- one which was a power in the Middle East, and partly ruled by a woman- Zenobia in Palmyra.

Then there was the Kingdom of Edessa, ruled by the Abgar Arab line. Then there were the Lakhmid and Ghassanid kingdoms, and the Nabataean city of Petra. Along with the southern Arabian states, such as the Kingdom of Himyar which warred against Axum.

The notion that Arabs never invented anything is again so laughably inaccurate it's like something you'd expect from a Right-Wing Christian or rabid Zionist website or pamphlet.

I can't believe that you have a science degree and yet do not or cannot recognise the Arab contribution (original conribution) to astronomy, mathematics, algebra and the practical sciences.

They didn't just inherit Roman and Greek engineering and science, they improved upon it.

Algebra which was a combination of Greek and Indian ideas which can't be traced back to any individual.

Yeah right.

Al'Khwarizmi was an Islamic mathematician who wrote on Hindu-Arabic numerals and was among the first to use zero as a place holder in positional base notation. The word algorithm derives from his name. His algebra treatise Hisab al-jabr w'al-muqabala gives us the word algebra and can be considered as the first book to be written on algebra.

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Mathematicians/Al-Khwarizmi.html

Don't throw the baby out with the lemon scented bathwater.

[molly bloom]

Rose red city:

The Nabataeans were a nomadic Arab people from Arabia who began to arrive and slowly settle in Petra at the end of the 6th century BC. It seems their arrival at Petra was unplanned, as their original intent was to migrate to southern Palestine. No doubt they found this place attractive with its plentiful supply of water, defensive canyon walls and the friendly Edomites, with whom it seems they had a peaceful coexistence.

http://www.visitjordan.com/visitjordan_cms/MajorAttractions/Petra/HistoryCulture/tabid/86/Default.aspx

Edessa:

On the foundation of the Kingdom of Osrhoene, Edessa became the capital under the Abgar dynasty. This kingdom was established by Nabatæan or Arabic tribes form North Arabia, and lasted nearly four centuries (132 B. C. to A. D. 244), under thirty-four kings.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05282a.htm

The Ghassanid Kingdom:

The Sixth-Century Church Complex at Nitl, Jordan. The Ghassanid Dimension – I. Shahîd

The Ghassanid Church Complex at Nitl, in the Madaba region of Jordan, is truly a landmark in the history of Arab Federate art and architecture in this Late Antique period. It is the first indubitably Ghassanid Arab monument to be discovered in the south of Oriens, (Biläd al-Shäm), while others, such as Qas†al, have been only inferentially declared Ghassanid, since they are anepigraphic, unlike this one, the inscriptions of which have survived and they establish its Ghassanid identity beyond doubt. It is also the first Ghassanid church to be discovered. The excavation of a Church in this region with a clear Ghassanid Arab patronage could raise the question whether the zealous Ghassanid kings of the region participated, perhaps in a small way, with the Chalcedonian Church of Byzantium in the artistic renaissance in this region.

http://198.62.75.1/www1/ofm/sbf/edit/LA2001.html

The Lakhmid Kingdom:

Lakhmids

The Lakhmids (Arabic: اللخميون) less commonly Muntherids (Arabic: المناذرة) were a group of Arab Christians who lived in Southern Iraq, and made al-Hirah which was a fabulous city with many castles and bath-houses and palm gardens their capital in (266). Poets described it as a Paradise on earth, an Arab Poet described the city's pleasant climate and beauty "One day in al-Hirah is better than a year of treatment".

al-Hirah ruins are located 2 miles south of Kufa, on the west bank of the Euphrates.

http://www.answers.com/topic/lakhmids

The Himyarites (and others):

Saba (capital: Marib, later Sana) was the leading power in Yemen under the kings Yathî'amar (last quarter of the eighth century BCE?) and Karib'il Watar (first half seventh century). These men may be identical to the kings Itiamara and Kariba'ilu mentioned in Assyrian annals. The famous story of the queen of Sheba's visit to the Jewish king Solomon (1 Kings 10.1-10) is somehow related to Saba, but is is unclear how.
The city state Ma'in was a kingdom of traders, which gained its independence from Saba at an unknown moment before circa 375 BCE. The Minaeans controlled the incense trade.

Qataban (capital Timna) had been an ally of Saba, but became its main rival. In the third century, it seized the southwest from Saba; these territories were called Himyar.

Hadramaut (capital Šabwa) was situated in the East. The Hadramautians produced incense and traded cinnamon from the port of Qana'.

Zufar was situated in modern Oman. Hardly anything about this country is known, because archaeologists have not found texts. The Roman geographer Ptolemy of Alexandria calls its capital Trade center of the Omanians; others have identified this with other towns known from ancient texts, Ubar and Iram.

Each of these kingdoms possessed extensive hydraulic installations, enabling the population to cope with both drought and the sometimes devastating river floods.

However, Himyar's control of the sea routes was decisive. At the end of the third century, its king Šamir Yuhar`iš united Yemen. He was important enough to negotiate on equal terms with the king of the Parthian empire. At a later stage (sixth century), king Dhu Nuwas of Himyar (518-525) converted to Judaism. Several inscription mention his 'merciful Lord', a title that was later used for Allah.

http://www.livius.org/ap-ark/arabia/arabia.html

Some Arabs were nomadic; some were sophisticated polylingual city dwellers who engaged in long range trade from China to the Volga, from the Malabar coast to the Pillars of Hercules.

[Tuberski]

What Oerdin said, is like saying that the Japanese don't invent anything. The Janpanese took ideas that already existed and made them better and cheaper. Which lead to new idaes, which are now better, cheaper and readily available.

ACK!

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Tuberski
What Oerdin said, is like saying that the Japanese don't invent anything.

As I recall when Japan was the hate figure (or hate country) in the 1980s, some Americans came out with that very nonsense, even supposedly having 'scientific' research that showed that the Japanese brains were hardwired genetically without some alleged creative ability.


Of course this was before the filthy Aye-Rabs, Aye-Rackeys and Al Kider became the new hate kids on the block.


Whatever did happen to the nasty ol' Japan that was buying up all of America and erecting those hateful trade barriers and buying Van Gogh paintings for ludicrous sums ?

It did, after all, give us the masterful literary work that is Michael Crichton's 'Rising Sun'...

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by molly bloom



As I recall when Japan was the hate figure (or hate country) in the 1980s, some Americans came out with that very nonsense, even supposedly having 'scientific' research that showed that the Japanese brains were hardwired genetically without some alleged creative ability.


Of course this was before the filthy Aye-Rabs, Aye-Rackeys and Al Kider became the new hate kids on the block.


Whatever did happen to the nasty ol' Japan that was buying up all of America and erecting those hateful trade barriers and buying Van Gogh paintings for ludicrous sums ?

It did, after all, give us the masterful literary work that is Michael Crichton's 'Rising Sun'...

LOL I had completely forgotten about Rising Sun!

[Pekka]

Tuberski, Right, except that Japanese did copy most of everything from China. If not from China, then from somewhere else .

[Barnabas]

Islamic doesnt mean arabic, most of the islamic mathematicians were persians.