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Post by James Hannam on Mar 7, 2009 9:37:00 GMT
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Post by zameel on Mar 11, 2009 13:43:35 GMT
You don't honestly take Huff seriously? His bigotry and affinity to generalise without evidence sits well with today's culture of catchy soundbites and headlines, but not with historical reality - Saliba's previous replies to Huff reveal his false assumptions and methodological flaws that Huff can't seem to get out of. It is a lie that Ibn al-Nafis's view was 'conjecture' or a 'brilliant guess' - any historian of science can determine that Ibn al-Nafis (and others before him like Avenzoar and Avicenna) practised postmortem autopsies (btw Ibn Nafis was an Ash'arite Sunni theologian and despite his occasionalism, produced sound science - generalisations like a Ghazalian initiated opposition to science has been demolished long ago so Saliba had no need to bring it up). And such cold analyses like 'these basic historical facts suggest that the "golden age" of Islamic civilization took place during a time when Muslims were a minority and Islamic institutions such as madrasas had not yet had a significant impact on educational training' betray his wilful ignorance of the evidence - AI Sabra (who Huff cites) shows how madrasas were created as alternatives to scienctific learning in order to distinguish between them but they had no inherent hostility to science and in fact astronomy and logic were parts of the early curriculum of madrasas; but more importantly are the facts that Saliba clearly documents which do away with such easy generalisations e.g. Saliba showed in his last reply that by using Huff's criteria 'al-Khwarizmi (fl. 830), al-Razi (d. 923), Ibn al-Haytham (c. 1039), Mu’ayyad al-Din al-`Urdi (d. 1266), Nasir al-Din al-Tusi (d. 1274), Ibn al-Nafis (c. 1288), `Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi (d. 1232), Ibn al-Shatir (d. 1375), Shams al-Din al-Khafri (d. 1550) and even Dawud al-Antaki (d. 1600), to name only a few, would be just as much the makers of ‘modern’ science as the savants of Renaissance Europe'. How are figures like Ibn Khaldun, Ibn al-Shatir, Kamal al-Din Farisi, Khafri and Antaki (of the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries) who were not mere exceptions explained in Huff's model? He cannot, that is why he does not address them. The facts are there for all to observe and do not fit Huff's or your assumptions.
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Post by humphreyclarke on Mar 11, 2009 15:06:03 GMT
Hi Zameel On the Ibn al-Nafis dissection issue, Huff's argument is that: What is especially problematic here is the fact that al-Nafis tells us that he avoided the practice of dissection because of the shari’a and his own ’compassion’ for the human body. He also says that ‘we will rely on the forms of the internal parts [of the human body] on the discussion of our predecessors among those who practised this art [of dissection] including the excellent Galen, since his books are the best o f the books on this topic which have reached us’. Ibn al-Nafis was a specialist in Islamic Jurisprudence, so that his construal of the practice of dissection as un-Islamic carries special weight. books.google.com/books?id=DLxRGjr1gYQC&pg=PA167&dq=Ibn+al-Nafis&ei=9sy3Sb-YIJj4MLzaqMAP#PPA168,M1 Those comments are apparently from the introduction to Ibn al-Nafis's commentary on ibn Sina's anatomy. Was he really doing post mortem dissection?, or was he doing what people like Avicenna and Averroes were doing and relying on the descriptions of early Greek writers and causal observations made in the course of medical and surgical practice. |
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Post by James Hannam on Mar 11, 2009 16:19:19 GMT
I certainly take Huff more seriously than someone who thinks Ibn al-Nafis practiced human dissection. Even Savage-Smith admits the evidence is agqainst this. (Savage-Smith, Emilie, “Attitudes Toward Dissection in Medieval Islam.” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 50, no. 1 (January 1, 1995): 67-110.)
As for Saliba, his views are of great interest but his belief that the natural philosophy practiced by Islamic savants was of a piece with modern science is untenable, as we have previously discussed.
Saliba and others have no explanation as to why Islamic science stalled and then failed. That suggests that the conditions for modern science to develop were not present in that culture, regardless of what those conditions actually were. For instance, who followed up Al-Nafis? When Columbo rediscovered the pulmonary circulation, building on the work of Vesalius and Fallopio, it leads us to Harvey and the circulation of the blood.
Best wishes
James
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Post by zameel on Mar 11, 2009 17:47:15 GMT
I certainly take Huff more seriously than someone who thinks Ibn al-Nafis practiced human dissection. Even Savage-Smith admits the evidence is agqainst this. (Savage-Smith, Emilie, “Attitudes Toward Dissection in Medieval Islam.” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 50, no. 1 (January 1, 1995): 67-110.) Emilie Savage-Smith in fact does away with the old myths of Meyerhoff and Shacht that there was a general juristic ban on human dissection. She explains that not only would such a ban not have meant dissection was absent (as wine-drinking was common despite its unequivicol prohibition in the Shariah) but that a legal prohibition does not in fact exist in the earliest judicial writings. She writes: “In none of the early writings in jurisprudence or in the collections of hadith does there seem to be any mention of anatomy/dissection either approvingly or disapprovingly...tashrih (anatomy or dissecttion) appears never to have been actually prohibited...we can...conclude from a legalistic viewpoint, human post-mortem dissection was not an impossibility within the medieval Islamic world’. The silence and lack of interest legally, she says, is impressive. Both al-Ghazali and Averroes advocated anatomy (not necessarily dissection) and the dictum 'knowledge is twofold: knowledge of religion and of bodies' was widely promulgated. She mentions the hadith prohibiting muthla (mutilation) in the chapters on Jihad and the hadith 'breaking the bones of a person when dead is like breaking them when living' but explain they do not specifically refer to dissection and the jurists (like Malik and Ahmad) in fact restricted the latter to Muslim corpses and did not provide general guidelines on human dissections. Ironically, she mentions, Ibn Nafis's statement (translated incorrectly by Meyerhoff, above in Humphrey's post) was the first juristic one of its kind: 'the precepts of the Shariah have discouraged us [saddana] from the practice of dissection' which she points out does not give an authority nor prohibit it outright. Meyerhoff seems to ignore the apparent contradiction between his assumption of an overarching ban and the passages which appear to indicate he did in fact dissect - especially Ibn Nafis's insistence that no pores exist between the ventricles and that there are only two ventricles which imply an intricate knowledge of the human heart. Savage-Smith concludes: 'It is difficult to determine were in fact Ibn Nafis’s views regarding the practice of human dissection. On the one hand, he says Islamic law has deterred people from human dissection but does not go so far as to say it is prohibited, while on the other he discusses ways of preparing specimens for examination, admittedly primarily animals, and proceeds to give a description of the heart that would imply an examination of the human heart'. jhmas.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/50/1/67However, Dr. Sulaiman Oataya, trained medically, argues that Ibn Nafis's descriptions contra Galen and Avicenna cannot be explained except by admitting he dissected humans (and not just animals). His primary example is Ibn Nafis's correction of Avicenna's view of blood flow in the brain, which means he was the first to dissect the human brain. See: Ibnul Nafees has Dissected the Human Body, 1982 (http://www.islamset.org/isc/nafis/oataya.html) where he outlines the various opinions, giving convincing arguments for his view. As for Saliba, his views are of great interest but his belief that the natural philosophy practiced by Islamic savants was of a piece with modern science is untenable, as we have previously discussed. You still have not given a proper understanding of what is meant by 'modern' science - Saliba's claim merely is that by whatever criterion Huff used, 'modern' science certainly extends beyond early modern times (perhaps to Greek times, perhaps to Arabic science). Saliba and others have no explanation as to why Islamic science stalled and then failed. That suggests that the conditions for modern science to develop were not present in that culture, regardless of what those conditions actually were I hope you do see the circularity in this form of argumentation: the culture or conditions for science did not exist, therefore science failed - but this assumes that there is a 'culture of science' and that that 'culture' is European, therefore the Arabs could not have practiced this mysterious 'modern' science. So unless you provide these conditions, your assumptions hold no water. For instance, who followed up Al-Nafis? When Columbo rediscovered the pulmonary circulation, building on the work of Vesalius and Fallopio, it leads us to Harvey and the circulation of the blood. Ibn Nafis's work on the lesser circulation did go into obscurity but there is evidence to suggest Severtus (a theologian turned medic) from Spain may have been influenced by Ibn Nafis's work as there are parallels in their writings. Columbus and Harvey may have, in turn, been influenced by Severtus. Neither Vesalius nor Fallopio mentioned the lesser circulation, so I do not know what you mean by "bulding on the work of" because that was certainly done with Ibn Nafis (e.g. by Antaki) - in fact Ibn Nafis himself 'built on the work of' Avicenna as demonstrated in the titles of his work. You clearly have a prejudiced view of the 'science' of the Arabs and the 'science' of the Europeans which undermines the former and strengthens the latter. |
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Post by James Hannam on Mar 11, 2009 18:41:31 GMT
Ibn Nafis's work on the lesser circulation did go into obscurity but there is evidence to suggest Severtus (a theologian turned medic) from Spain may have been influenced by Ibn Nafis's work as there are parallels in their writings. Columbus and Harvey may have, in turn, been influenced by Severtus. Not a chance, unless you have the evidence we have all missed. By the way, Savage-Smith combed the sources and found no evidence of human dissection in Islam. In history, if we have no evidence we say it didn't happen and even Savage-Smith eventually and grudgingly admits that is what the evidence points to. The lack of a juridicial prohibition means only that the question was never brought to the jurists. As for Sulaiman Oataya, it reminds me of the old saw about medical language in Luke/Acts. He'll need to get his work peer reviewed and accepted by the academy before I'll buy it. Best wishes James |
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Post by zameel on Mar 11, 2009 20:23:29 GMT
Not a chance, unless you have the evidence we have all missed Why is there not a chance? Even Meyerhoff admits "It is all the more curious to observe that Servetus' famous passage on the circulation of blood is very similar to certain passages in Ibn Nafis's commentary. It reads as if it were an extract made from the latter's work." It is also curious that Servetus was an assistant to Johan Guinter an Arabist who translated many medical works. Servetus was also a Unitarian (for which he was burned together with his book) reflecting perhaps Arab influence (as is known for example that John Locke accepted Unitarianism due to Muslim influence). Colombo most likely borrowed from Servetus. Besides, Saliba's favourite example of Tusi's Maragheh school, Urdi, Ibn Shatir and Copernicus does represent a clear example of continuity and 'building on the work of' earlier scientists. By the way, Savage-Smith combed the sources and found no evidence of human dissection in Islam. In history, if we have no evidence we say it didn't happen and even Savage-Smith eventually and grudgingly admits that is what the evidence points to She admits there is a lack of "explicit descriptions of particular dissections" but there are certainly "references to [human] dissections" and she cites MLJ Young who believes there may in fact have been descriptions of particular dissections. The fact is, however, that dissections were cited and used as evidence to increase anatomical knowledge. Importantly she writes "It is not the purpose of this study to explore the possibility that certain anatomical structures described in a given treatise might be interpreted as having required prior dissection in order to frame the description in the given manner" which is a major lacuna in her study if her conclusion is no dissections were performed but also means she does not contradict Oataya who bases his conclusions on precisely this. Do you find any objections to Oataya's examples of Ibn Nafis's anatomical descriptions which must have "required prior dissection"? The lack of a juridicial prohibition means only that the question was never brought to the jurists. That is very unlikely as Savage-Smith shows dissections were being discussed as early as the eighth century and the jurists were not unaware of the medical concept - hence why she describes their silence as "impressive". |
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Post by James Hannam on Mar 12, 2009 10:45:10 GMT
Why is there not a chance? Even Meyerhoff admits "It is all the more curious to observe that Servetus' famous passage on the circulation of blood is very similar to certain passages in Ibn Nafis's commentary. It reads as if it were an extract made from the latter's work." It is also curious that Servetus was an assistant to Johan Guinter an Arabist who translated many medical works. Servetus was also a Unitarian (for which he was burned together with his book) reflecting perhaps Arab influence (as is known for example that John Locke accepted Unitarianism due to Muslim influence). Colombo most likely borrowed from Servetus. Having read both Al-Nafis and Severtus last week when checking my footnotes, I failed to see the resemblence beyond the shared background of Avicenna. Columbo certainly did not use Severtus as the context of his work makes abundantly clear. Agreed and the evidence here is much better. I wholeheartedly agree that western natural philosophers build on Arabic achievements with optics and astronomy the best examples. But exaggerating the achievements of Arabic science and pretending that it was the same as modern science does the argument no good at all. People like me find they can't rely on Muslim historians which makes my job much harder. I can't evaluate this. But as I've said, there is so much misinformation on this topic coming off Muslim websites, unless I see peer review, I'm not interested. That is very unlikely as Savage-Smith shows dissections were being discussed as early as the eighth century and the jurists were not unaware of the medical concept - hence why she describes their silence as "impressive". She is bending over backwards to avoid the obvious conclusion but is forced to reach it anyway. She shows the discussion is all within the Galenic rhetorical paradigm. He also recommends human dissection and never did it himself. Look, either dissections took place in secret which must have been because they were unacceptable or they didn't happen at all. In neither case can Islam take much credit. Best wishes James |
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Post by zameel on Mar 12, 2009 13:08:01 GMT
Having read both Al-Nafis and Severtus last week when checking my footnotes, I failed to see the resemblence beyond the shared background of Avicenna. In other words when it is favourable to Arabic science, you refuse to accept peer-reviewed work? According to Manfred Ullman (not a Muslim and in a peer-reviewed work) "Servetus' presentation of the lung circulation resembled Ibn Nafis's so strongly that one can hardly reject a direct influence" (Islamic medicine. (Islamic Surveys). Vol 11 Edinburgh: University Press; 1978 p. 68-69) Rabie Abdel Halim (http://www.geocities.com/rabieabdelhalim/) writes in a peer-reviewed article (cited in pubmed) [footnotes removed]: Early in the 16th century, Andrea Alpagus (1450-1522), a professor of medicine in Padua University who spent 30 years in Syria, studying Arabic Medical manuscripts, translated into Latin sections of Ibn Nafis’s book...including his views on the pulmonary circulation. This translation, printed in Venice in the year 1547, helped to spread Ibn Nafis’s description of pulmonary circulation to Medieval European scholars, and thus, raise their doubts on Galen’s anatomy. Six years later Ibn Nafis’s description of pulmonary circulation was accepted by Michel Servetus (1511-1553) who included it...in his book Christianismi Restituto.
Then in 1555, Andreas Vesalius (1514-1553) another Padua University professor, described pulmonary circulation in a manner similar to Ibn Nafis’s description, in the second edition of his famous book De Fabrica Humani Corporis. Another similar description was given by Juan Valvarde in 1554 and Realdus Columbus (1510-1559) in 1559 in their books on anatomy and in 1571 by Andrea Cesalpino (1519-1603) in his book...which included more elaboration and experimentation including the first use of the word “circulation”. Finally William Harvey (1578-1657) who got his doctorate from Padua University in 1602 gave the full description of the blood circulation in his lectures in 1616 then in his famous book...printed in 1628...It is also significant, in this evolution chain, that out of the above mentioned medieval European medical scholars, three were fluent in Arabic: Alpagus, Servetus and Vesalius. (Contributions of Ibn al-Nafis to the Progress of Medicine and Urology, 2008) According to AZ Iskander's definitive work on medieval Arabic manuscripts on medicine (London 1967) he finds some later Arabic medics (in the fourteenth century) who mentioned pulmonary circulation following Ibn Nafis, e.g. Sadid al-Din al-Kazaruni and Ali ibn Abdullah al-Misri. But exaggerating the achievements of Arabic science and pretending that it was the same as modern science does the argument no good at all. People like me find they can't rely on Muslim historians which makes my job much harder. Can you provide some examples of where professional Muslim historians and scholars have exaggarated the achievements of Arabic science? And you fail to mention that Orientalists since the nineteenth century have consistently undermined and downgraded Arabic science, including the historiographical assumptions Saliba seeks to disprove in his works (like there was no advancement beyond the thirteenth century and it was merely a reworking of the Greek tradition). |
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Post by James Hannam on Mar 12, 2009 13:50:44 GMT
The Saudi Medical Journal? Hmm.
No matter, I'll have another read and see if it changes my mind.
The Jeber/Geber controversy is a clear case of exaggeration. So are claims by Saliba that Arabic science was the equivalent to modern science.
As for the orientalists, I could not care less what they said. But whatever it was, it does not excuse Muslims going the other way.
Best wishes
James
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Post by zameel on Mar 12, 2009 14:31:12 GMT
So are claims by Saliba that Arabic science was the equivalent to modern science. Saliba does not say they are equivilent but that such qualifiers of "science" are redundant except as indicators of time, place, language etc. But you still have not provided a reasonable understanding of the practice of "modern science" that was absent before early modern times. Can you answer the following questions: firstly, why does "modern science" have to exist (not in a termporal sense but in the method science is practiced)? And secondly, what exactly forms part of this method that is absent before the early modern period? I think this is crucial as it informs our historiography and distorts rather than enhances our interpretation of history. I don't think Fuat Sezgin and AY Hassan's (and Holmyart and others before them) exaggarated Geber - the view is present in non-Muslim scholars too (although marginal) and is merely a different interpretation of the evidence. Do you dispute Hassan's evidence for nitric acid being isolated before the thirteenth century? - I ask because I think that is the easiest to verify and creates a formidable challenge to Newman's assumptions. |
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Post by James Hannam on Mar 12, 2009 17:26:16 GMT
We discussed what makes modern science modern a few threads ago.
As for Nitric Acid, perhaps you could provide the verification.
I've no doubt it was possible to produce a weak solution which we can identify as containing nitric acid, but my understanding was that distillation was enough to isolate the acid.
I will follow up about whether al-Nafis's work on the pulmonary circulation had been printed prior to Servetus. But the reason that Harvey never mentioned Severtus was that no one had any idea he'd included the point in his banned book. Harvey got it from Columbo who did not get it from Servetus either.
By the way, the bit you quote is from a letter to the editor so is not peer reviewed.
Best wishes
James
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Post by James Hannam on Mar 13, 2009 9:40:36 GMT
I've done some digging on Ibn al-Nafis and Servetus.
As I mentioned, it is beyond doubt that Columbo discovered the pulmonary circulation independently and he did not use Servetus's work. Harvey built off Columbo as he explains at great length in De motu cordis.
However, one comment in Zameel's post pulled me up short. Rabie Abdel Halim in a letter to the Saudi Medical Journal (not a peer reviewed article) says that Alpago translated the relevant sections of Al-Nafis's book which included the pulmonary circulation and this was printed in Venice in 1547, some years after Alpago's death. The book does exist and a copy is in the British Library. However, it is not Al-Nafis's commentary on Avicenna's anatomy in which he makes his famous observation. This was only realised in the West in 1924 from a manuscript in Berlin. The printed book does not include the pulmonary circulation as Rabie Abdel Halim claims.
So, we are back where we started. We have no evidence that Ibn al-Nafis's discovery was known in the West prior to 1924 except that his words and Servetus's are very similar. Even if Servetus used Al-Nafis, the trail ended with him and the discovery was made independently by Columbo a few years later. So, another case of Islamic exaggeration.
But none of this changes the fact that Ibn al-Nafis really did discover the pulmonary circulation and does have priority. But the scientific culture of the time meant that there appears to have been little follow up and no one took the next step that Harvey did. This illustrates how early-modern science was a culture of enquiry different to what came before.
Best wishes
James
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