NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/talk/philosop/misc/3084

Text File | 1992-12-24 | 3.2 KB | 70 lines

Newsgroups: talk.philosophy.misc
Path: sparky!uunet!mcsun!sun4nl!ruuinf!maria
From: [e-mail] (Maria Ferreira)
Subject: Re: Arab preservation of "european" thought
Sender: [e-mail]
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 10:32:40 GMT
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Organization: Utrecht University, Dept. of Computer Science
Lines: 58

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Joseph Askew) writes:

... lots of things deleted...
>
>Nor did the Europeans conquer Iberia - they LIBERATED it. You know like
>Palestine might one day be liberated from the foreigners who have come
>and stolen the land from the rightful owners killing thousands of them.
>(spot the sarcasm)
>
>The Arabs played little or no part in Western Civilisation. What part
>they did play was mostly as intermediaries - bring paper to Europe from
>China for instance. You can see this by listing the number of European
>scholars who felt the need to learn Arabic.     That's about all of them.
>
>
>Joseph Askew
>
>
>--
>Joseph Askew, Gauche and Proud  Barbarian horns draw out the northern wind;
>[e-mail]  Paler than water lies the Thistle Pass;
>Disclaimer? Sue, see if I care  Sky swallows up the road to Kokonor;
>One China One Korea One Eire32  Moonlight, a thousand miles along the Wall.



I don't have time nor references here to discuss/contest all your other
statements but for somebody coming from Iberia that was too much to take. The
europeans "liberated" Iberia? To start with the arabs living in Portugal/Spain
were *ALSO* europeans, or is it that you consider europeans only the northern
barbarians with blue eyes and blond hair? Furthermore we had invasions from
about everywhere and anybody (we still do mostly every summer... )as Urnfield
expansion (Bronze Age), the Celtic invasion (2650 B.C.- 1425 B.C.), the
Phonecians (9th century), the Greeks (sixth-century) and the Carthaginians
(5th century) traders..; the Romans to whom the the Carthaginians lost the
Iberian peninsula in the Second Punic War.  Finally the Arabs came in 711 AD
and by that time part of the peninsula was occupated by Goths again not native
to the peninsula. So as you can see stating that "europeans liberated Iberia"
is, to say the least, a very gross mistake.
As far as culture or better yet civilization is concerned, the Arabs were
clearly superior to the rest of the people in Europe (including Iberia) with the
exception perhaps of the Byzantine Empire. They had a very refined civilization
and their (good) influence (in Iberia)  ranges from gastronomy to architecture
not forgetting mathematics, agriculture, irrigation tecniques, etc.

You say also
The Arabs played little or no part in Western Civilisation....

To make it short where do you think the word algebra comes from? And
algorithm? And yes, as other people mentioned in their posts, the works of
Aristotle survived mostly thanks to the Arabs.
Without meaning any offence, I think that your knowledge of the arab influence
in western world and Europe in particular needs either a good refreshing of
memory or a far deeper study.

Regards

Maria