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Formation of startups and new companies
Commercial exploitation of science, technology, and novelty
System of laws, regulations, strategies, and funding priorities
Discovery and creation of new knowledge of the natural world
Application of new knowledge towards useful social ends
By: Ekmeludin Ihsanoglu, The Secretary General of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)
Excerpts from a Speech delivered American University of Sharjah
The subject of Science and the faith, particularly the Islamic faith, has been close to my own academic interests for many years. It has been a personal interest of mine to conduct and encourage scholarship on Islam and the History of Science and to explore the debates between science and faith in the context of modern life. I hope that this meeting will provide opportunities to explore these issues and many others over the coming days.
Perhaps unlike some other belief systems Islam and science have had a remarkably harmonious relationship over the centuries. Islam is a religion which is based on the Holy Book, the Quran. In fact the first command of the Quran is ‘iqra’, (read) and this emphasis on reading and acquiring knowledge is a fundamental part of Islamic teaching and has pervaded its culture throughout the past fourteen centuries. References are frequently made in the Quran to those who
think, those who reflect and those who contemplate. The words related to knowledge, learning, studying, contemplating, using intellect, reason, and also to wisdom are the second most frequently mentioned words in the Quran after those referring to God. In this way the Islamic faith instilled in its adherents a quest for knowledge as a
means of serving the Divine, not only in religious subjects but across all realms.
By: Mohamad Abdalla
Published at: The Free Library (here)
Recent studies in the history of Islamic science illustrate that Islam’s contributions were richer and more profound than was previously thought. In their attempt to provide answers to what happened to Islamic science after the eleventh century, historians and scholars construct a simplified model that describes all branches of Islamic science in terms of failure. In this article, Ibn Khaldnn’s analysis of the fate of Islamic science will be examined to show his insightful understanding of, and the failure of scholars in, understanding what happened.
Dominant Understanding: the Decline Theory
The e...
By: Ibrahim Kalin
Published at MuslimPhilosopy.com
There is hardly any subject as vexed and vital for the contemporary Islamic world as the question of modern science. Since its earliest encounter with modern Western science in the 18th and 19th centuries, the Islamic world has had to deal with science for practical and intellectual reasons. At the level of practical needs, modern science was seen as the sine qua non of the advancement and defense of Muslim countries in the field of military technology. The Ottoman political body, which, unlike the other parts of the Islamic world, was in direct contact with European powers, was convinced that its political and military ...
By: Athar Osama
Published on SciDev.Net on 15 December 2011
Arab Spring revolutionaries turning to governance must adopt knowledge and innovation as barometers for progress, says Athar Osama.
As revolutions swept countries and shook governments across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region this year, they created opportunities for greater public voice in governance. Tunisia, for example, recently went through an election, and the Egyptian people are in the process of electing an assembly whose job is to write a new constitution.
And as revolutionaries turn to governance, they will have to address the socioeconomic and cultural challenges facing ten...
By: Frank Lehner
Published in Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy on 30 August 2011.
The idea of generating solar energy on a large scale in the sun-intensive countries of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) to satisfy their own increasing energy demand and to export surplus energy to Europe as advocated in the DESERTEC concept1 has publicly received much attention in some countries, particularly in Germany, Morocco, Tunisia, and also substantial support from their governments. Besides the DESERTEC Foundation, an industrial consortium (Dii GmbH) was founded in 2009 which consists of major European and MENA companies to push this project further b...
By: Dr. Athar Osama
Muslim-Science.Com met with Tan Sri Dr. Omar Abdur Rahman, Mahathir’s Science Advisor for over a decade and half and, the “prime mover” behind Mahathir Mohammed’s vision of a Knowledge-driven Malaysia. A deeply humble man, Tan Sri Omar insists that Mahathir was a science policymaker par excellence in his own right and that he would hardly have needed a science advisor. However, he played a critical role in providing scientific credibility to Mahathir’s plans and helping the Prime Minister reach out to the scientific community to build support for his policies.
As Malaysia’s first and longest serving Science Advisor – a position t...
