Science and Enlightenment: East and West

#14 Posted by banjara286

I used to be very skeptical about this till I started reading primary sources and they have definitely won me over. Lets take for example Islamic Historiography – guys like Al Tabri or Ibn Ishaq. For every statement that Al Tabri puts down he gives a copious detail of the source that the information came from. Then when there are more then one versions of the same incident he does not use his ‘judgement’ to figure out what seems most appropriate to him – he just dutifully lists all those versions giving the details of their sources as well. Now what could be more scientific then that.

This is precisely the difference between history and myth. Nobody considers Baburnama, Akbarnama or Firdausi’s Shahnama as history, you can glean some information from them but everything is doubtful as sources and motives of the author are unclear. Similarly secondary sources where people interpret the results of what the earlier authors wrote without providing copious details of their sources loose authenticity, but just like any scientific paper you have to defend your research infront of your peers and thankfully there is a robust community of scholars here who can critique your work.

hashim mian,

...... imran khan is doing what any politician would do - he is is saying what the unwashed massses want to hear ...... and unlike most of us, who are still trying to get laid, he has already slept with nine hundred women ..... now it is time for him to go to haj and, in a different time, he could have crawled into a cave and emerged as a prophet ....... if anyone is to blame for his stupid and outrageous statments, it is the washed civil society and the unwashed uncivlil society of pakistan that doesn't know its elbow from a hole in the ground and yet gets to vote ........ democracy is a dangerous thing in the hands of the wretched and the ignorant ....... it creates monsters like imran khan ....... shame on us for not being able to produce a good dicatator like pinochet or omar ibn khattab .........

Re: # 15 Thanks for the feedback and for taking the time to read the article, vanguard. I had never seen this essay by Imran Khan before (just saw it for the first time a few months ago). I am still a huge fan of Imran's cricketing prowess as well as his work as a social activist (primarily the SKMT hospital. I hear he is also building a university somewhere). I think the simplest reason that people are more critical of Imran is that we expect more from him. I would not bother to write a critique of Zardari, Musharraf etc. because no one expects anything different from them. By joining the political fray, Imran has set the bar higher, both for himself and everyone else. He is probably a little ahead of where Pakistani politics is, at the moment. But that's OK, his role may be more like Ralph Nader, to stir the debate, get people thinking about new ways of doing things and then other people in years to come will have to take it forward.
Also, most of us expect/want change to happen quicker than it actually does. Significant social/historical changes, especially, happen over decades and centuries, not weeks or months. However, we as humans are limited by our brief life spans and cannot help being impatient...:-)

Thanks again for the feedback.

Re: # 12 That does not say good about usa. If you work very hard with work ethics is not bad but not good.I expected some thing more .They say Hard work does not kill you, problem for person like me is I know it will not kill me but why take risk. Hope for few countries where you can advance without hard work , atleast our place is better in this matter.

Make Imran live in Dhravi as in Slum Dog Milioneer .He resounds like Bollywood movies made in the same metropolis..Mere desh ke dharti ..ala Manoj Maine Bharat Kumar .Incidently both these chaps are demagogue deriving Material comfort by these rhetoric .

I am not a follower of Imran Khan but these articles in last couple of weeks have really started me thinking about him.

He did not turnout to be a lota when Musharraf offered him premiership and even admitted that it was a mistake (which the politicians nor the citizens of this country ever do and god forbid if Army ever stoop so low as to even realize that they have committed a mistake), promised to build a world class cancer hospital, not only built it but is also not micromanaging it rather has put in place a system to run it efficiently... That is a huge achievement even by world standards and that says a lot about his character...a feat no other politician nor army has or can replicate...

This is the umpteenth article I am reading about Imran Khan in a fortnight and I am amazed that all of them have the same thing to say...his article of 2002 (could not find anything newer to complain about) and his anti-military operation stance...If you don't like his views, ignore him

Let me count the ways people have criticized Imran Khan in last fortnight on his anti military stance (not on the base of his arguments but on the base of his 2002 article) ...the sheer opposition has made me feel that there is more to it than meets the eyes

1. This pathetic article by the graduate of KEMC and later turned psychiatrist. (Theory of Evolution is a "theory" and not a fact...it might explain a lot of things but still remains a theory and any one is free to reject it as long as it remains a theory....like a big bang theory, superstring theory, inflationary universe theory, steady state universe theory...what is gravity by the way since you raised the issue? do two bodies exert forces on each other? is it caused by gravitons exchange? or by a bend in space-time? or is it something else? A stupid example given to debunk a stupid argument!!!
2. Last week in Daily Times by former Dean of social sciences of Quaid-e-Azam Uni
3. Last week again in Daily Times by Samad Khurram who is undergrad student at Harvard and reached fame by protesting against drone attacks and refusing to be honored by US Ambassador
4. An article on Pakistaniat.com why I dont like Imran Khan
5. An article by Rauf Klasra and Haroon (whats his name) from Daily Jang so oft quoted by Catchy or Cachy and Dawa-i-Dil
6. NFP on his blog as well as article in DAWN directly and indirectly
7. Where I stand article by Imran Khan on Pak Tea House taken from of all the places from a Bangladeshi website
8. This has been quoted a lot in posts and comments: somebody who had it from somebody who had it from somebody that Imran Khan tried to assault Hoodbhoy on live TV once the transmission stopped

All of this in last two weeks. He has really gotten people's goat this time. Or has he become to big to ignore suddenly.

We have so many other people to write about and who actually matter in current scheme of things such as but we are ignoring them...

1. Altaf Hussain (let us not start on that)
2. Nawaz Sharif (who fled to Saudi and still can't come around to admitting that it was a 10 year exile rather than five year despite his signature on the contract).
3. Asif Zardari (Mr 10 percent)
4. Musharraf who build a million dollar home with million pound fixtures (independent.co.uk) in chak shehzad, has not paid his hundreds of thousand rupees electricity bills and the meter that is currently installed at his house charges him FATA rate (the News) and sells Pakistani citizens to CIA for bounty money and when people are massacred in broad daylight in Karachi on May 12, from behind a bullet proof shield in Islamabad proclaims to a crowd collected by promising them food and 300 rupees from all over Punjab that "today we have demonstrated street power in Karachi"
5. The religious lot of MMA

Politicians die their own death when no one listens to them. Left on his own, he would have been forgotten. But these columnists and articles keep bringing him up and breath new life to him...I wonder why??? What has happened in last two weeks to bring about so many articles??? Any ideas

Re: # 5 tehsin sb,
history is, no doubt, a valuable resource. but one can interpret it the way they like to suit their own agenda; a bit like statistics in that regard, don't u think?

A good read. Imran Khan would be better off without publicising his ideas on society and life. I think his decision to join politics and choosing handlers like Hamid Gul landed him in a hardplace. The man is physically endowed with good looks and athleticsm but he has failed as a politician for bad alliances and lack of education.He shows no signs of coming out of this dilemma.

"I see Chinese, Indians and Pakistanis and other Asians with good work ethics outperforming their native white counterparts in almost all fields of endeavor in the United States..." Riaz Haq

That says a lot about your ability to "see".

Ali Hashimi sahib,

Are you using a reverse psychology by introducing a failed person turned politician? Some people could frame this as an "earned advertising," but I wouldn't.

I know, i know, pakis have this uncanny nature of getting acceptance by creating a hulla-gulla atmosphere, even on a web-site.

While I disagree with Imran on his stand regarding the Taliban and his right-wing politics in general, I think there is some truth what he says about eastern values. Having lived in the West for almost all of my adult life, I find that Asians have much stronger family connections, much lower divorce rates, higher education and incomes, an admirable culture of achievement and caring for each other in America.

I see Chinese, Indians and Pakistanis and other Asians with good work ethics outperforming their native white counterparts in almost all fields of endeavor in the United States while maintaining strong family ties at the same time.
Riaz Haq, PakAlumni Worldwide

Re: # 5, thanks TehsinA. Philosophy, history, the history of philosophy and other such esoteric subjects have been a passion of mine since a young age. Unfortunately, I am now trapped in a psychiatrist's life ;-)
It's not just in 'Muslim lands' that education and knowledge is being progressively narrowed down to the strictly utilitarian i.e. whatever is of immediate use. It also follows logically that in capitalist societies (including the US), utility is defined by whether or not something makes a monetary profit. If so, good enough, if not, it is disallowed/discouraged.

I find it sad that so many young people are being funnelled into learning just about business/finance/commerce etc etc with no encouragement to read the humanities, philosophy, literature, art etc since those can lead to 'dangerous' ideas. I'm just trying to do my humble part in undermining the official dogma.

Thanks for the feedback.

Re: # 3, good point about 'Eastern family life', nb. Also, if one uses the conventional definition of materialism i.e. grasping and thirsting after material things, poorer countries like Pakistan have more people in the grip of this since, as you correctly point out, they do not have their basic needs met. I wrote about this a while ago in another article here. Glad you liked the article.

Re: # 1, thanks zarrar2. As far as 'diagnosing' Imran Khan, I try not to get too carried away with labels. Besides, a person's actions speak louder than any words, don't you think?

A very good article, very factual. I hope Pakistan comes out of its dark ages and shine like the star it is.

Hashmi Sahib:

Very well done! We need more people to take up the cause of history and philosophy, two disciplines which have been decimated in Muslim lands as they directly challenge monolithic indoctrinations essential for religious orthodoxy and regressive regimes.