Crickett does not work well with tv. Same thing with hockey, the puck is hard to follow. I've never seen any, but crickett balls must be very small.

The Conservative peer also criticised Islam, saying "the Muslim religion is so unreformed since it was created that nowhere in the Muslim world has there been any real advance in science, or art or literature, or technology in the last 500 years".

Are you listening, Mr. Burnet ?

Mr.Herdegen, Sir:

You betcha. Our Norman does enjoy his little rants, he does.

Same with Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism, and much of Eastern Orthodoxy, right? How about Roman Catholic Latin America until comparatively recently? Better save some powder for them.

Mr.Herdegen, Sir:

You betcha. Our Norman does enjoy his little rants, he does.

Same with Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism, and much of Eastern Orthodoxy, right? How about Roman Catholic Latin America until comparatively recently? Better save some powder for them.

I don't break it down into sects, but I could if you'd like me to.

Of all the world's major religions, only Islam is a thinly practiced religion in any nation that produces writers, scientists, engineers, doctors, and entertainers that cause the world to take notice, and only Islam isn't associated with any super-successful nation where it is the overwhelmingly practiced religion.
India is the only exception to the first condition that I can think of, and that may be because Muslims are a minority.

Even places like Russia, Sweden, Finland, and Cuba produce people or products that are world-class.

Pakistan is the most powerful Muslim-majority nation that I know about, and they bought their weapons ability from China and North Korea.
Their technical ability is one-dimensional, and is an aberration in their culture.
Their society remains primitive. One might think that a nation which could produce nuclear weapons could also produce software engineers or even a hundred year old technology like automobiles, but no.

Contrary to what you apparently believe, I don't think that Islam is to blame for the backwardness of its adherents.
As you point out, there are plenty of second and third world nations that have highly religious populations practicing religions other than Islam.

My guess is that the combination of Arab cultures and Islam has been toxic for both.

If Orrin is correct, and Shi'ism grows in influence within Islam going forward, and the Shi'ites manage to integrate majority-Islamic populations with Western culture, then Islam will survive.

Michael:

Well, your (and Tebbit's)approach makes me think of the old adage that civilization is hard-won and easily lost. Reading his and your words, one would think that the "advances" he talks about are the default mode of most peoples and most times, and that the lack of them is something peculiar to modern Islam. To the contrary, there have been such "golden ages" in many cultures, but they tend to be rare and widely-spaced. Most of the ones in the last five hundred years have been in the West or Western-inspired. Tebbit's implication otherwise is, in fact, a cross-cultural slur and quite irrelevant to his main point. Imagine a hard-working, pious British Muslim caring for his family and wowing them at work listening to that as he surveys the yob-infested neighbourhood with all its pathologies and hair-trigger racism.

Rome and Greece were pagan, but would you say that paganism is responsible for the "advances" of their golden ages? How has paganism been doing on that score since? Has Judaism made such advances, as opposed to Jews? Guys like Harry see Christianity as a brake on all progress, but not even I would credit it exclusively and simplistically for Western progress--the Nicene Creed doesn't lead straight to a better mousetrap and there have been lots of Christian backwaters. Fifty years ago you might have scorned the Asians similarly, but look at them now. Is this because of Asian faiths? In spite of them? Both? Are they really making advances or just clever copycats?

The creative dynamism referred to simplistically here doesn't come in a package out of a particular creed; it comes from rare and unique tensions and contradictions (viz. Barzun), not to mention extraordinary individuals, and it doesn't last forever. In the West, technology is still humming nicely, but one would be hard pressed to find great advances in art and literature over the past hundred years (unless you measure such things by tonnage)and science is starting to gasp. Is Christianity at fault, or its decline? Take your time.

Your sweeping certainties about how other cultures do and don't work is leading you into Margaret Mead territory--she extols and you condemn, each with similar accuracy. It must be frustrating in the extreme for you to see so clearly while all one billion of them stumble along in darkness and confusion. Perhaps you are asking the wrong question. Instead of fretting about what Islam has or hasn't done, why not leave the reform of Islam to the Muslims and focus on whether individual Muslims can give you a run for your money on all those good things while remaining believers? Obviously they can and do.

ratbert said it well:

[P]rior to Muhammed, the Arabian peninsula was just a pathway to somewhere else. But Iran, Iraq, and Egypt have histories much older than Islam (and they seem to be caught in an endless struggle to 'reconcile' them). And that doesn't even begin to cover the "culture" of Palestine, Hezbollah, and all the tribes in Afghanistan & Pakistan (and other Islamic states) that have been absorbed into Islam. Their practices are hardly different from most sub-Saharan cultures, even if they have cell phones and Al-Jazeera. For whatever reason, Islam seems to retain many of the nativist features of local culture, while it struggles to inculcate anything universal (other than the patterned religious observances). - ratbert, August 20, 2005

Well, your (and Tebbit's)approach makes me think of the old adage that civilization is hard-won and easily lost. Reading his and your words, one would think that the "advances" he talks about are the default mode of most peoples and most times, and that the lack of them is something peculiar to modern Islam.

"Advances" are the default mode of Europeans, whether organic, or an adaptation of the discoveries of other peoples.
Gunpowder, glassblowing, chariots, and spaghetti were invented or discovered elsewhere, but perfected and/or put to practical use in Europe.

Why else do you think that Europeans and the descendants of Europeans rule the world ?

Of the seven continents of Earth, Europeans and their descendants absolutely dominate four, one is a curiosity, (although if we ever figure out a cheap way to get at Antarctica's coal, uranium, and oil, you may be sure that the West will both do the bulk of the work, and reap the lion's share of the rewards), Asia is successful to the extent that they mimic the West, and Africa & the Middle East are regarded as humanity's cesspool, although here too the West dominated in the past, and could again in the future, if we care to do so.

Where in the modern world, (except to the extent that artists are inspired by them), do you see the West being influenced by Asian, African, or Arab cultures ?
It's all one way, from us --> them.
This is what Orrin and Fukuyama are talking about when they speak of "The End of History".

That isn't a rhetorical question, by the way, I'm interested in knowing if there are any changes being made to Western culture due to outside influence.
"Taking over", as one might argue that Eastern Muslims may do in Europe, doesn't count as "cultural influence", since it would be a cultural substitution, such as what happened in Japan after WW II.

Rome and Greece were pagan, but would you say that paganism is responsible for the "advances" of their golden ages? How has paganism been doing on that score since? Has Judaism made such advances, as opposed to Jews?

As I wrote earlier: "Contrary to what you apparently believe, I don't think that Islam is to blame for the backwardness of its adherents. [...] My guess is that the combination of Arab cultures and Islam has been toxic for both."

Paganism and the cultures of Greece and Rome were apparently a good combination - considering that the Anglosphere is largely and directly descended from both, (among many other contributors, of course), and the Anglosphere dominates the Eurosphere, which in turn dominates the Earth.

Judaism is CLEARLY not a hindrance to intellectual discovery, rather the opposite.

However, more to the point, I've never claimed that Islam alone will be responsible for the death of Arab cultures, nor the pitiful state that they find themselves in now; nor have I claimed that Christianity or Buddhism, IN AND OF THEMSELVES, make practicing cultures better than Muslim ones.

In fact, I've said the opposite many times.

Fifty years ago you might have scorned the Asians similarly, but look at them now. Is this because of Asian faiths? In spite of them? Both? Are they really making advances or just clever copycats?

It's neither due to, nor in spite of, Asian religions.
What it is, is that Asian religions CAN ACCOMMODATE the underlying cultures changing to mimic Eurosphere cultures.

Japan makes unique advances - for instance, LCD televisions and other display panels were made possible by a discovery that a Japanese chemist spent 19 years researching, and subsequently won a Nobel Prize for. Japan rivals the U.S. for advances made in electronics and robotics, et al.

China, Singapore, and South Korea are in "clever copycat" mode, but Japan started there as well, at the beginning of the 20th century.

In the West, technology is still humming nicely, but one would be hard pressed to find great advances in art and literature over the past hundred years (unless you measure such things by tonnage)and science is starting to gasp.

Hmmmm...
Not a fan of Picasso, Dali, Poe, Doyle or Shelley, I take it ?

What of photography and cinema ?
Those aren't advances in art forms ?

"[S]cience is starting to gasp" is such a bizarre assessment that I am willing to join you in pretending that you never wrote it, if you like.

The past twenty-five years have produced more advances in knowledge and practical applications than the seventy-five years previous to 1980.

If you have any evidence that the pace of discovery will slow, rather than increase, going forward, please let me know soonest.

Your sweeping certainties about how other cultures do and don't work is leading you into Margaret Mead territory--she extols and you condemn, each with similar accuracy. It must be frustrating in the extreme for you to see so clearly while all one billion of them stumble along in darkness and confusion.

As to accuracy, we shall see.

As to frustration, although I may SEE clearly, I apparently cannot COMMUNICATE clearly.

I don't care what happens to Arab cultures.
They may fail; they may succeed. They might all die; they may somehow figure out a way to survive the 21st century.

I merely record my opinion that they will fail, based on the historical record. It's hardly a
radical insight - it's what gamblers call "a sure thing".

All one billion of them DON'T "stumble along in darkness and confusion".
Many of them can see what has happened, and what's going to happen, which is why there is so much anti-Western anger.
It's a typical human response to attempt to drag down the successful, rather than to strive for success one's self.
Further, they may have the mistaken impression that fracturing Western cultures is possible, whereas they KNOW how difficult changing Arab cultures for the better is.
After all, it took the mightiest nation that the Earth has ever seen to begin to affect change in the Middle East.

If it were easy, they would have done it themselves.

Instead of fretting about what Islam has or hasn't done, why not leave the reform of Islam to the Muslims and focus on whether individual Muslims can give you a run for your money on all those good things while remaining believers? Obviously they can and do.

You are the one who likes to focus on Islam.

I merely note that Islam is a negative factor in Arab cultures, in the context of the larger point that Arab cultures are dying.

Obviously INDIVIDUAL Muslims can compete with Westerners.
However, they HAVE TO MOVE TO THE WEST TO DO SO.

As you can see from the emphasis, I find that point both critical, and hilariously ironic.

Individual Muslims are competitive with individual Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, et al., and citizens of Western cultures - as long as the Muslims live in Western cultures, where some religion other than Islam is dominant.

While we're at it:

What I object to is your sweeping argument that it all stems inherently from Islam and that there is nothing admirable or redeemable or anything to build on unless they chuck the whole package. That is so obviously wrong (not to mention self-defeating), but not surprising as you seem blind to the fact that there are any problems at all in the West, at least none that couldn't be solved by a quick technological fix. - Peter B, August 19

I don't argue that it stems inherently from ONLY Islam - it's inherent to the combination of Islam and Arabs.

They don't have to chuck Islam, they have to chuck Arab cultures.

However, Islam and Arab cultures have become so intertwined that they may indeed find themselves throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

There IS nothing unique about Arab cultures that is admirable or redeemable.
If you disagree, please give an example of something UNIQUE to Arab CULTURES, (not to the religion of Islam), that the West would do well to emulate.

As for "self-defeating", I say again, I don't care if they reform or not, I merely recognize that they cannot survive if they DON'T reform.

I'm not blind to problems with the West.

In my opinion, most of my posts at BrosJudd have to do with those very issues.
However, I expect us to muddle through, as we always have.
These problems are either marginal, or essentially disagreements over style, rather than issues which could destroy us, such as chattel slavery. (Which is still practiced in some Muslim nations, by the way).

I do recognize that the West, led by America, is the very finest and most dominent civilization that has ever been in human history.

I don't expect that to change during the 21st century - in fact, I expect both Western and American dominance to GROW during the 21st century.

We are, after all, The End of History™.