Christianity has hijacked human values

A short answer to a question often asked of atheists and other non-believers. Professor Jim Al Khalili points out that those people asking the question have got it the wrong way around

 ‘Christian values have hijacked human values’ – Professor Jim Al Khalili

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The greatest show

Here’s a book to look forward to.

Coming this September is Richard Dawkins‘ latest book The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution. I understand that this book will engage more with the arguments of those who seek to deny this evidence – the creationist/intelligent design proponents.

It should be good. Not only is Dawkins an excellent presenter and populariser of science – he is also an extremely good writer. This is why he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1997 and the Royal Society in 2001.

Science & Islam

I have never accepted the proposition that science started with Galileo and Newton. Or that it grew out of Christianity. This just seems to be a Eurocentric and Christian chauvinist distortion of history.

The BBC documentary series Science and Islam will help to break down these misunderstandings. Jim Al-Khalili fronts the documentary. He is a physicist from the University of Surrey and author of the book Quantum: A Guide for the Perplexed. Science and Islam is a 3-part series and in episode 1, “The Language of Science,” Jim Al-Khalili describes the “translation movement’ – the translation of Egyptian,  Greek, Persian, Indian and Chinese scientific sources into Arabic. This helped preserve the ideas for later exploitation. But it is important to stress that this wasn’t passive.  Islamic medieval societies also contributed to science – especially in areas of mathematics, medicine and map making.

In Episode 2 “The Empire of Reason” Al Khalili discusses the origins of chemistry, measurement of the circumference of the earth and the immense contribution of al-Hassan Ibn al-Haytham – who he describes as the inventor of the scientific method. Fascinating!

Can we now look forward to a similar treatment of the history of science in Greek, Egyptian, Indian and Chinese societies?

My hat tip to Science & relgion News