On his book Success and Suppression: Arabic Sciences and Philosophy in the Renaissance
Cover Interview of April 05, 2017
Lastly
The hostility of the humanist movement to
Arabic sciences was far from monolithic. There are many examples of humanist
scholars who contributed to the flourishing of Arabic sciences and philosophy
in the Renaissance. Moreover, humanists did not explicitly oppose Arabic
sciences because they were Oriental or because they originated from Islamic
culture. Rather, they opposed them partly for scientific reasons, partly as a
result of ideological beliefs in linguistic purism and in Greek superiority,
and partly because Arabic authors were an obstacle – an obstacle to the humanists’
project of renewing Europe through Greece and Rome.
The fact remains that Arabic traditions were
attacked for being Arabic, that is, they were attacked on the basis of a
cultural and linguistic labeling. Renaissance humanists are the inventors of
cultural clichés that persist even today – that Arabic science amounts to
plagiarism; that it is nothing more than Greek thought in Arabic garb; that Arabic
scholars were mere transmitters of science from antiquity to medieval Europe;
in other words, as Epicurus is said to have claimed, that “only the Greeks are
able to philosophize.” This is the sad inheritance of the humanist polemics
against Arabic science.
It is one of the tasks of historical research
to point out the historical falsity of clichés such as these, especially given
that they survive even today. Many medieval and many Renaissance scholars knew
better and were fully aware that Arabic scholars, too, are able to
philosophize.
Spontaneous generation is one of those wrong theories that clutter the basements of the biological sciences and that now look so very obviously wrong that it is hard to see how anyone could have taken them seriously in the first place. Why wouldn’t it occur to anyone that flies might be laying eggs that were too small for us to see? How simple would the crucial experiment be? What I have tried to do in much of my work is to turn this ‘obvious wrongness’ on its head—why, exactly, does it seem so obviously wrong?—and see what the new picture that emerges from that inquiry says about science and our belief in its results.Daryn Lehoux, Interview of November 13, 2017
It’s commonplace to say that humor is subjective, since what’s funny to you might not be funny to me. But humor is also a loaded concept. If you – or your people – have no sense of humor, or the wrong one, that means you’re less rational, tolerant, understanding, or civilized. You don’t get it. Or, worse, you lack something human. Modern Chinese debates about humor were very much caught up with these fundamental questions of value.Christopher Rea, Interview of October 26, 2016
Lastly
The hostility of the humanist movement to Arabic sciences was far from monolithic. There are many examples of humanist scholars who contributed to the flourishing of Arabic sciences and philosophy in the Renaissance. Moreover, humanists did not explicitly oppose Arabic sciences because they were Oriental or because they originated from Islamic culture. Rather, they opposed them partly for scientific reasons, partly as a result of ideological beliefs in linguistic purism and in Greek superiority, and partly because Arabic authors were an obstacle – an obstacle to the humanists’ project of renewing Europe through Greece and Rome.
The fact remains that Arabic traditions were attacked for being Arabic, that is, they were attacked on the basis of a cultural and linguistic labeling. Renaissance humanists are the inventors of cultural clichés that persist even today – that Arabic science amounts to plagiarism; that it is nothing more than Greek thought in Arabic garb; that Arabic scholars were mere transmitters of science from antiquity to medieval Europe; in other words, as Epicurus is said to have claimed, that “only the Greeks are able to philosophize.” This is the sad inheritance of the humanist polemics against Arabic science.
It is one of the tasks of historical research to point out the historical falsity of clichés such as these, especially given that they survive even today. Many medieval and many Renaissance scholars knew better and were fully aware that Arabic scholars, too, are able to philosophize.