David S. Powers

On his book Muhammad is Not the Father of any of Your Men: The Making of the Last Prophet

Cover Interview of September 03, 2009

Comments

August 08, 2017

I believe more research in this field is very beneficial. I hope there are more researchers inspired by your efforts.

June 13, 2016

In reply to a question about al-kalala, the Qur’an itself at Q4: 176 takes the question to refer to a person who dies leaving no offspring (walad), giving some support to the traditional Muslim interpretation.

June 13, 2016

Does kalala at Q4: 176 in the Paris MS show the same evidence of tampering as at Q4: 12?

polemics / religion / christianity / ideology / islam / judaism / muhammad / kinship / interpretation /

[T]he Holocaust transformed our whole way of thinking about war and heroism. War is no longer a proving ground for heroism in the same way it used to be. Instead, war now is something that we must avoid at all costs—because genocides often take place under the cover of war. We are no longer all potential soldiers (though we are that too), but we are all potential victims of the traumas war creates. This, at least, is one important development in the way Western populations envision war, even if it does not always predominate in the thinking of our political leaders.

Carolyn J. Dean,
Interview of February 01, 2011

The dominant premise in evolution and economics is that a person is being loyal to natural law if he or she attends to self’s interest and welfare before being concerned with the needs and demands of family or community. The public does not realize that this statement is not an established scientific principle but an ethical preference. Nonetheless, this belief has created a moral confusion among North Americans and Europeans because the evolution of our species was accompanied by the disposition to worry about kin and the collectives to which one belongs.

Jerome Kagan,
Interview of September 17, 2009