How Accurate is the Standard Presentation of the Innovation Level of the Islamic Golden Age?

Executive Summary

• Muslims and even western sources will present the Islamic Golden Age as the basis for our current discoveries.
• How accurate is this presentation of history?

Introduction

Muslims and westerns sources have tended to repeat, without performing the research, that scientific and philosophical discoveries in Europe were highly dependent upon both Islamic discoveries and the maintenance and translation of Greek intellectual property. In this, I cover the accuracy of this claim.

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Islamic Science?

One of the major misunderstandings related to the Islamic Golden Age of Discovery is to paper over or misappropriate the term science and Islamic societies. This is explained in the following quotation.

Whatever modern science owes to Arabic science, the intellectual activity of the medieval Islamic world was not of the same kind as the European scientific revolution, which came after a radical break from ancient natural philosophy.

Indeed, even though we use the term “science” for convenience, it is important to remember that this word was not coined until the nineteenth century; the closest word in Arabic — ilm — means “knowledge,” and not necessarily that of the natural world. – The New Atlantis

The following quote from the same source explains why the Golden Age is referred to as Arabic.

preliminary caution must be noted about both parts of the term “Arabic science.” This is, first, because the scientists discussed here were not all Arab Muslims. Indeed, most of the greatest thinkers of the era were not ethnically Arab. This is not surprising considering that, for several centuries throughout the Middle East, Muslims were a minority (a trend that only began to change at the end of the tenth century).

Still, there are two reasons why it makes sense to refer to scientific activity of the Golden Age as Arabic. The first is that most of the philosophical and scientific work at the time was eventually translated into Arabic, which became the language of most scholars in the region, regardless of ethnicity or religious background. And second, the alternatives — “Middle Eastern science” or “Islamic science” — are even less accurate. This is in part because very little is known about the personal backgrounds of these thinkers. – The New Atlantis

The Lack of Division Between Church and State Under Islam

Of all of the world’s major religions, Islam has proven the least willing to accept a partition between religion and politics, economics, and learning. One reason for this is that Islam is incredibly prescriptive, telling its adherents even how to go to the bathroom. Islam considers itself the total solution to everything. Since its inception, this has built up a superiority complex among Muslims that has inhibited them from learning from other societies, as Islam teaches Muslims to detest non-Muslims.

Islam creates a crackerjack system for converting non-Muslims and recruiting warriors, with things like the promise of 72 virgins. For centuries, Islam was fueled by the spoils of war.

The Role in Exaggerating the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery

The following video series challenges the claims made about the reliance on Europe on Arabic translations of Greek texts.

Video #1: On the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery

For example, scientific developments slowed by roughly 950 AD. This is during the Umayyad caliphates. This was the end of the greatest spread of Islam. Why did the improvements in science stop at least 350 years before the Islamic empire began its decline?

The previous reason Europeans took back cities like Seville, where great Islamic libraries were located, did not happen until around 1250. This was 300 years after the scientific developments began to slow.

This timeline shows a strong correlation between invasions of countries and Islamic discoveries. The zenith of Islamic discovery occurs roughly 70 years after it stops expanding and begins to come into contact with the intellectual property of newly conquered regions. 

Video #2: On the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery

This describes how the Vikings raided many monasteries, greatly reducing the availability of books, and the reduced number of Greek speakers restricted access to existing books. However, the standard narrative makes it sound as if the entirety of Greek intellectual property was lost and only maintained by the Muslims. If it weren’t for the Muslims, European society would have never had access to this intellectual property.

Video #3: On the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery

This video describes the dates of the decline of Islamic discoveries and the “PR campaign” by Muslims to propose that Europe had lost the lead in science and transferred to Muslim countries. This was based upon Muslim’s natural superiority complex as taught by the Koran and their military victories. Muslims declared themselves, rather than Europeans, the proper inheritors of Greek culture.

One of Muslims’ highly problematic arguments was that Christians had ruined their claim to Greek intellectual property because they had chosen Christianity over Islam. And that only Muslims possess philosophy, and that Christianity is incompatible with philosophy. And that these arguments were made for hundreds of years by Muslims.

Video #4: On the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery

In this video, the claim that access to Greek texts was lost to Europeans is challenged. Europeans already had better and more original Greek texts. This is an enormous issue because the claim is routinely made that all of the Greek work would have been lost without Muslim society. 

Video #5: On the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery

This video explains that the claims by Muslims of being foundational to European science are not true. The works of Aristotle, for example, were not translated from Arabic until the 12th century, by which time Europeans had been studying them for over 200 years from their own sources. 

This quote is also of interest.

Over the centuries, the number of identifiable Islamic philosophers is relatively small. Among these, the most eminent were al-Kindi, al-Farabi, Avicenna, Avempace, and Averroes. Some see Averroes, who died in 1198 as the last significant commentator on Aristotle. – Edward Grant

Secondly, Muslim scholars, blinded by their adherence to Islam, repeatedly pushed their conclusions to be consistent with Islam. This brings up the question of how much Muslim scholars were able to “think out of the Islamic box.” One cannot interpret new knowledge if everything has to be made consistent with Islam.

About al-Ghazali

The video provides the following analysis of Al Ghazali’s work. Al Ghazali stated that there is no causality and that there is no event between an event and a subsequent event.

al-Ghazali charges the Islamic Hellenistic philosophers with heresy for heir belief in the eternity of the world, God’s lack of knowledge of particular events, and the denial of physical resurrection, all of which are in opposition to the literal sense of the Qur’an.

Like earlier Ash’arites, al-Ghazali uses this argument in a radical sense. The fact that we experience cotton as burning every time it touches fire informs us neither 1) about any causal connection between the fire and the burning or cotton nor 2) whether the fire is the only cause. – Frank Griffel

While philosophers like Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd made some progress, al-Ghazali would have led to a dead end if European philosophers had adopted it. And in the eleventh century, Hellenistic, so Greek studies in Islamic civilization were on their way out.

How can these three scholars be considered such a significant basis for the development of European discoveries?

After the mid-thirteenth century, there was a shift back to translating directly from Greek. This interest in Greek is marked in the studies of Roger Bacon and Robert Grosseteste. With respect to Aristotle’s libri naturales, it led to the replacement of earlier Arabic-Latin translations by new translations from Greek, the correction of earlier Greek translations, and the completion of the corpus, first by Grosseteste and then by William of Moerbeke. – Charles Burnett

Pillar Claim of Muslim Origin #1: Alchemy

I cover alchemy, which is often cited as an area in which Muslims made significant contributions, in the article Was Jabir Ibn Hayyan The Founder of Modern Chemistry?

However, my conclusion is that the Muslim contribution to both alchemy — and then the mental jump to claiming credit for the development of chemistry — which was entirely developed in Europe without Muslims is a highly inaccurate representation of the history of science.

Pillar Claim of Muslim Origin #2: Advancements Towards Modern Algebra

The strongest claim for the beneficial output of the Golden Age of Discovery of Islam was Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi’s work.

His major discoveries are found in Wikipedia.

Al-Khwarizmi’s popularizing treatise on algebra (The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing) presented the first systematic solution of linear and quadratic equations. One of his principal achievements in algebra was his demonstration of how to solve quadratic equations by completing the square, for which he provided geometric justifications.

It’s hard to see how that is true, since this book contained no mathematical symbols of any kind. 

In the 12th century, Latin translations of his textbook on arithmetic (Algorithmo de Numero Indorum) which codified the various Indian numerals, introduced the decimal positional number system to the Western world. The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing, translated into Latin by Robert of Chester in 1145, was used until the sixteenth century as the principal mathematical text-book of European universities.

Al-Khwārizmī’s Zīj al-Sindhind also contained tables for the trigonometric functions of sines and cosine. A related treatise on spherical trigonometry is also attributed to him.

Al-Khwārizmī produced accurate sine and cosine tables, and the first table of tangents.

Al-Khwārizmī’s third major work is his Kitāb Ṣūrat al-Arḍ (Arabic: كتاب صورة الأرض‎, “Book of the Description of the Earth”), also known as his Geography, which was finished in 833. It is a major reworking of Ptolemy’s 2nd-century Geography, consisting of a list of 2402 coordinates of cities and other geographical features following a general introduction.

Certainly, al-Khwarizmi is one of the great scholars in history. However, the video points out that al-Khwarizmi’s contribution was rhetorical algebra, meaning it did not use numbers or symbols.

See this quote on the stages that algebra went through from the article The History of Algebra. 

Algebra did not always make use of the symbolism that is now ubiquitous in mathematics; instead, it went through three distinct stages. The stages in the development of symbolic algebra are approximately as follows:[3]

1. Rhetorical algebra, in which equations are written in full sentences. For example, the rhetorical form of
   x+1=2 is “The thing plus one equals two” or possibly “The thing plus 1 equals 2”. Rhetorical algebra was first developed by the ancient Babylonians and remained dominant up to the 16th century.
2. Syncopated algebra, in which some symbolism is used, but which does not contain all of the characteristics of symbolic algebra. For instance, there may be a restriction that subtraction may be used only once within one side of an equation, which is not the case with symbolic algebra. Syncopated algebraic expression first appeared in Diophantus’ Arithmetica (3rd century AD), followed by Brahmagupta’s Brahma Sphuta Siddhanta (7th century).
3. Symbolic algebra, in which full symbolism is used. Early steps toward this can be seen in the work of several Islamic mathematicians such as Ibn al-Banna (13th–14th centuries) and al-Qalasadi (15th century), although fully symbolic algebra was developed by François Viète (16th century). Later, René Descartes (17th century) introduced the modern notation (for example, the use of x—see below) and showed that the problems occurring in geometry can be expressed and solved in terms of algebra (Cartesian geometry).

Therefore, al-Khwarizmi did not advance beyond the earliest stage of algebra. Naturally, his contributions were in the 8th century.

But algebra was not first conceived by al-Khwarizmi — instead, it is credited to the Babylonians.

The origins of algebra can be traced to the ancient Babylonians, who developed a positional number system that greatly aided them in solving their rhetorical algebraic equations.

The Babylonians were not interested in exact solutions, but rather approximations, and so they would commonly use linear interpolation to approximate intermediate values.

One of the most famous tablets is the Plimpton 322 tablet, created around 1900–1600 BC, which gives a table of Pythagorean triples and represents some of the most advanced mathematics prior to Greek mathematics.

Babylonian algebra goes back to roughly 1750 BC. Al-Khwarizmi did his work 2550 years after this — yet was still in the rhetorical algebra stage.

In what is an unending, repeating pattern, European scholars created what we know as modern algebra in the 16th century. And once again, as with other Muslim claims of the central importance of Muslims who supposedly inspired other societies to accomplish scientific discoveries, there is a considerable time lag between the Muslim discovery being communicated and the supposed outcome. As with Jabir Ibn Hayyan’s contributions to alchemy, there is an 800-year gap between al-Khwarizmi’s work and the development of modern algebra. How can al-Khwarizmi be considered the father of a field of mathematics that is not considered to have matured until 800 years after his works were published?

The video contradicts Muslim apologists’ claims that the work of Copernicus and Newton was based on Muslim geometry, stating that Newton used Euclidean geometry and that Copernicus did not use algebra but used geometric algebra from the Greeks and trigonometry, with nothing from the Muslim world.

The video uses the following quote to explain the work of Newton and Galileo concerning algebra.

Nowhere in Newton’s and Galileo’s theoretical work on motion can one find an algebraic equation. Now neither Kepler nor Galileo had a useful notation for representing motion. they do not use algebra, but relied on Greek models, including the detailed use of geometric proportion theory. – Ed Dellian

This raises the question of whether Muslim apologists say these things have the technical knowledge to know what European scholars used or whether they are “making things up” as they go. It is also suspicious that some of the most prominent European scholars, not obscure ones, base their contributions on Muslim discoveries. It is almost as if the Muslim apologist looked up the most prominent discoveries in Europe and tried to backward engineer the Muslim invention into their work. This claim is nefarious, as very few people have the background to falsify it.

Furthermore, the claim may also be based on Muslim apologists’ guessing. The Muslim world has a low understanding of math and science. This is widely acknowledged as a problem, even by Muslim governments, making Muslims susceptible to the Dunning-Kruger Effect if they try to find pathways to Muslim contributions in European mathematical or scientific accomplishments. As Muslims want to believe that this is true, they are likely to believe it as soon as they hear the claim.

Pillar Claim of Muslim Origin #3: Details on Islamic Astronomical Discoveries in Assisting Copernicus

The video goes into great detail on how Copernicus cites several Arabic astronomers; these are observational citations rather than direct ones.

This is explained in the included quotation.

The difficulty becomes critical when we realize that so far we can establish similarities between the works of Copernicus and the works of Urqi Tusi and Ibn al Shatir, but in such a way that none of those Arabic sources could account for all those similarities.

That is, if we were to assume that Copernicus knew of Urqi’s work, we cannot explain from that work alone his knowledge of the Tusi Couple.

And if we assume he knew of Tusi’s work, then we cannot explain his acquaintance with Urqi’s work through Tusi’s work. And if we assume that he knew of Ibn al-Shatir’s work, who lived a century after Urqi and Tusi, then we cannot explain Copernicus’ insistence on proving the Tusi Couple which is nowhere proved in the work of Ibn al-Shatir. – George Saliban

And this question naturally arises.

If Arabic astronomers made such fantastic contributions to the field, why did Copernicus not use their work?

Why does he use the Greek works, which were developed many hundreds of years before the Muslim scholars?

What must be emphasized again is the passage of time. Muslim scholars had roughly 500 years to make progress on the Greeks’ works, yet we see European scholars repeatedly turning to Greek works rather than Muslim ones. And this is not a matter of translations. Many scholars spoke neither Greek nor Arabic but had access to these texts translated into their own languages.

Pillar Claim of Muslim Origin #4: Avicenna or Ibn Sina on Medicine

The new Atlantis has the following to say about the great scholar Avicenna.

Breakthroughs in medicine continued with the physician and philosopher Avicenna (also known as Ibn-Sina; died 1037), whom some consider the most important physician since Hippocrates. He authored the Canon of Medicine, a multi-volume medical survey that became the authoritative reference book for doctors in the region, and — once translated into Latin — a staple in the West for six centuries.

The Canon is a compilation of medical knowledge and a manual for drug testing, but it also includes Avicenna’s own discoveries, including the infectiousness of tuberculosis.

However, very few, if any, ideas from the Muslim world were adopted or considered usable outside of the Muslim world. Today, the Muslim world is dominated by Western Medicine, not the other way around.

What About the Intellectual Property Regions Conquered by Islam?

Another problem with the Golden Age narrative is that it presumes that none of the regions conquered by Muslims would have made progress over 500 years. That is, these civilizations would remain unchanged unless the Muslims conquered them. However, it should go without saying that this is not true. This is a critical point that the narrative of the Golden Age ignores.

Muslim societies had hundreds of years to make progress based on what they captured. However, considering the timescale, they did not make very much progress. They were experiencing diminishing returns on their investment in science, as their discoveries declined within 70 years after the expansion of the Caliphates and associated Muslim kingdoms ended in 880.

How Much Intellectual Property Was Destroyed or Discarded by Muslims During Their Conquests?

Most of the focus on the Golden Age of Islamic Discovery focuses on the intellectual property that was retained and translated. However, this is not the entire story. A great deal of intellectual property was destroyed by Muslims. Why is the subject not discussed when the topic of the Golden Age is put forward?

Why Don’t We Attribute to the Nazis a Golden Age of Invention and Art?

The Nazis produced a great deal of good scientific work; however, how much intellectual property in Europe was destroyed by the Nazis? How many historical buildings alone were destroyed on both sides of the war? There are sunken ships all over the Atlantic and Pacific oceans that are leaking toxic materials into the water. The Nazis, combined with the following conquests of the Soviet Union, which lasted far longer, of central and eastern Europe, put those countries into a stagnant condition to which they have still only partially extricated themselves. Is that fact cleansed by the fact that Nazi science was instrumental in the US eventually getting to the Moon? How much intellectual property was destroyed by the Allied bombing of Nazi Germany? The Nazis also stole an enormous amount of art from the countries they conquered, and some of this art was destroyed. Again, why don’t we refer to this period as the Nazi Golden Age of art?

The Golden Age of Islamic Discovery appears to be one of the only instances where we focus only on the intellectual contributions of a conquering society, and to add to this distortion, we completely ignore the progress that would have been made if those societies had not been conquered by Muslims.

Non-Islamic Studies as “Foreign Sciences”?

Legally autonomous institutions were utterly absent in the Islamic world until the late nineteenth century. And madrassas nearly always excluded study of anything besides the subjects that aid in understanding Islam: Arabic grammar, the Koran, the hadith, and the principles of sharia. These were often referred to as the “Islamic sciences,” in contrast to Greek sciences, which were widely referred to as the “foreign” or “alien” sciences (indeed, the term “philosopher” in Arabic — faylasuf — was often used pejoratively). – The New Atlantis

Who Has Ruled Islamic Societies?

With a couple of exceptions, every country in the Middle Eastern parts of the Muslim world has been ruled by an autocrat, a radical Islamic sect, or a tribal chieftain. Islam has no tradition of separating politics and religion. – The New Atlantis

This video does a brilliant job of explaining how the Islamic Golden Age is what led to the decline of Europe.

More is covered in the second Dr. Warner video.

This covers how the Islamic Caliphate was constantly attacking Europe and also many other places.  

David Wood makes a very good point when he states that Islamic scholars had a hard time sustaining any advances they made. He then says, if a Muslim scholar came up with something, eventually Islam would smother it. Notice that the entire Golden Age concept is that all these things later invented in Europe were first developed by Muslims. But there is no ultimate fruition of science in an Islamic country. 

Specifically, what Dr. Wood means by “suffocate” is that, after making some progress, Iman would find that some aspect of the discovery conflicted with Islam, and continued progress on that topic was stopped.

Dr. Ibrahim points out in this video that many of those contributing to the “Golden Age” are not Muslims. 

Conclusion

An investigation of the details concludes that the Golden Age’s contribution to European discoveries that followed has been greatly overestimated. One thing to remember is that Islamic sources were perpetuating the idea that science had died in Christian Europe for hundreds of years. And the arguments used to support this are not legitimate, and are Islamic-centric, such as Christianity being incompatible with philosophy. What comes through in the research is how little European scholars relied on the work of Muslim scholars and how little progress Muslim scholars made over the 500-year period of the Golden Age of Discovery. Islamic sources have essentially claimed they held all the keys to the scientific revolution and the Renaissance. They could have proven this by, in fact, creating the scientific revolution and the Renaissance in Muslim lands — however, as we know, this did not happen.

It is not uncommon for civilizations to have leads and lose them, as the following quotation explains.

Like the Muslims, the ancient Chinese and Indian civilizations, both of which were at one time far more advanced than the West, did not produce the scientific revolution. – The New Atlantis