Science in the medieval Islamic world
Science in the medieval Islamic world was the science developed and practised during the
.Medieval Islamic science had practical purposes as well as the goal of understanding. For example, astronomy was useful for determining the
During the Middle Ages, Islamic science flourished across a wide area around the Mediterranean Sea and further afield, for several centuries, in a wide range of institutions.
Context and history
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Islam |
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The Islamic era began in 622. Islamic armies eventually conquered
Islamic science survived the initial Christian
Fields of inquiry
Medieval Islamic scientific achievements encompassed a wide range of subject areas, especially
Alchemy and chemistry
The early Islamic period saw the establishment of theoretical frameworks in
Astronomy and cosmology
Astronomy became a major discipline within Islamic science. Astronomers devoted effort both towards understanding the nature of the cosmos and to practical purposes. One application involved determining the
Botany and agronomy
The study of the natural world extended to a detailed examination of plants. The work done proved directly useful in the unprecedented growth of
Geography and cartography
The spread of Islam across Western Asia and North Africa encouraged an unprecedented growth in trade and travel by land and sea as far away as Southeast Asia, China, much of Africa, Scandinavia and even Iceland. Geographers worked to compile increasingly accurate maps of the known world, starting from many existing but fragmentary sources.[22] Abu Zayd al-Balkhi (850–934), founder of the Balkhī school of cartography in Baghdad, wrote an atlas called Figures of the Regions (Suwar al-aqalim).[23]
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Modern copy ofal-Idrisi's 1154 Tabula Rogeriana, upside-down, north at top
Mathematics
Islamic mathematicians gathered, organised and clarified the mathematics they inherited from ancient Egypt, Greece, India, Mesopotamia and Persia, and went on to make innovations of their own. Islamic mathematics covered algebra, geometry and arithmetic. Algebra was mainly used for recreation: it had few practical applications at that time. Geometry was studied at different levels. Some texts contain practical geometrical rules for surveying and for measuring figures. Theoretical geometry was a necessary prerequisite for understanding astronomy and optics, and it required years of concentrated work. Early in the Abbasid caliphate (founded 750), soon after the foundation of Baghdad in 762, some mathematical knowledge was assimilated by al-Mansur's group of scientists from the pre-Islamic Persian tradition in astronomy. Astronomers from India were invited to the court of the caliph in the late eighth century; they explained the rudimentary trigonometrical techniques used in Indian astronomy. Ancient Greek works such as Ptolemy's Almagest and Euclid's Elements were translated into Arabic. By the second half of the ninth century, Islamic mathematicians were already making contributions to the most sophisticated parts of Greek geometry. Islamic mathematics reached its apogee in the Eastern part of the Islamic world between the tenth and twelfth centuries. Most medieval Islamic mathematicians wrote in Arabic, others in Persian.[27][28][29]
Sometime around the seventh century, Islamic scholars adopted the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, describing their use in a standard type of text fī l-ḥisāb al hindī, (On the numbers of the Indians). A distinctive Western Arabic variant of the Eastern Arabic numerals began to emerge around the 10th century in the Maghreb and Al-Andalus (sometimes called ghubar numerals, though the term is not always accepted), which are the direct ancestor of the modern Arabic numerals used throughout the world.[42]
Medicine
Islamic society paid careful attention to medicine, following a
Optics and ophthalmology
Optics developed rapidly in this period. By the ninth century, there were works on physiological, geometrical and physical optics. Topics covered included mirror reflection. Hunayn ibn Ishaq (809–873) wrote the book Ten Treatises on the Eye; this remained influential in the West until the 17th century.[50]
In the eleventh century
Pharmacology
Advances in
Physics
The fields of physics studied in this period, apart from optics and astronomy which are described separately, are aspects of
In the Shadows,
Zoology
Many classical works, including those of Aristotle, were transmitted from Greek to Syriac, then to Arabic, then to Latin in the Middle Ages. Aristotle's zoology remained dominant in its field for two thousand years.[75] The Kitāb al-Hayawān (كتاب الحيوان, English: Book of Animals) is a 9th-century Arabic translation of History of Animals: 1–10, On the Parts of Animals: 11–14,[76] and Generation of Animals: 15–19.[77][78]
The book was mentioned by
Significance
Muslim scientists helped in laying the foundations for an
See also
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Alhazen (or Al-Haytham; 965–1039 CE) was perhaps one of the greatest physicists of all times and a product of the Islamic Golden Age or Islamic Renaissance (7th–13th centuries). He made significant contributions to anatomy, astronomy, engineering, mathematics
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Notes
- ^ Lindberg & Shank 2013, chapters 1–5 cover science, mathematics and medicine in Islam.
Sources
- Linton, Christopher M. (2004). From Eudoxus to Einstein—A History of Mathematical Astronomy. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-82750-8.
- ISBN 978-1-785-78202-2.
- McClellan, James E. III; Dorn, Harold, eds. (2006). Science and Technology in World History (2 ed.). Johns Hopkins. ISBN 978-0-8018-8360-6.
- Morelon, Régis; Rashed, Roshdi (1996). ISBN 978-0-415-12410-2.
- Turner, Howard R. (1997). Science in Medieval Islam: An Illustrated Introduction. University of Texas Press. ISBN 978-0-292-78149-8.
Further reading
- ISBN 978-0-471-90320-8.
- ISBN 978-0-262-19482-2.
- ISBN 978-0-7486-0455-5.
- Huff, Toby (1993). The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China, and the West. Cambridge University Press.
- Kennedy, Edward S. (1983). Studies in the Islamic Exact Sciences. Syracuse University Press. ISBN 978-0-8156-6067-5.
- Lindberg, D. C.; Shank, M. H., eds. (2013). The Cambridge History of Science. Volume 2: Medieval Science. Cambridge University Press. (chapters 1–5 cover science, mathematics and medicine in Islam)
- Morelon, Régis; ISBN 978-0-415-02063-3.
- ISBN 978-0-262-19557-7.
External links
- "How Greek Science Passed to the Arabs" by De Lacy O'Leary
- Saliba, George. "Whose Science is Arabic Science in Renaissance Europe?".
- Habibi, Golareh. is there such a thing as Islamic science? the influence of Islam on the world of science, Science Creative Quarterly.