Arab is a race isnt it? I mean you read stories of Arab racism to non Arabs.
Arab modern scientific achievements
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Arab is a race isnt it? I mean you read stories of Arab racism to non Arabs.
The SC
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Here is a good read about Arabic science in History, which shows how bright is the future for Arabic science, ounce everything is put in place again.
Saudi Aramco World : Rediscovering Arabic Science
President Obama, for instance, in his June 4, 2009 speech in Cairo, praised Muslims for their historical scientific and intellectual contributions to civilization:
It was Islam that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment. It was innovation in Muslim communities that developed the order of algebra; our magnetic compass and tools of navigation; our mastery of pens and printing; our understanding of how disease spreads and how it can be healed.
Saudi Aramco World : Rediscovering Arabic Science
President Obama, for instance, in his June 4, 2009 speech in Cairo, praised Muslims for their historical scientific and intellectual contributions to civilization:
It was Islam that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment. It was innovation in Muslim communities that developed the order of algebra; our magnetic compass and tools of navigation; our mastery of pens and printing; our understanding of how disease spreads and how it can be healed.
Mosamania
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No Arab is not a race, Not by far.
You can say being an Arab is like being an American, people who live close to each other who share a common culture and a common language. Race was never ever ever something of value in Arabic history, for instance if your parents gave birth to you in an Arabic country and you have assimilated yourself into that country with language and culture then you will be considered an Arab regardless of race or genetics.
Serpentine
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You can't compare science output of 22 Arab countries with 450 million population with one nation,Iran or Turkey.Like it or not,Iran and Turkey lead the Islamic world and also western and cenral Asia and Africa in science output.That would be a good thing if all Islamic countries reached the highest point in science.
Btw,here's a good article about science output in ME
http://researchanalytics.thomsonreuters.com/m/pdfs/globalresearchreport-aptme.pdf
Banglar Lathial
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On one side, you say Arab scientific output can not be compared with Iran and Turkey because Arabs are greater in number, then you say Iran and Turkey lead Western/Central Asia and Africa. Which Arab country except Egypt, which has only recently removed its long time dictator from power with much work left to be completed, has comparable population to Iran or Turkey?
If you like to compare with less populated countries, then you can compare with so called "Israel" or Hong Kong or Singapore. They produce greater scientific output than Iran or Turkey in per capita terms.
Arabs should start to see themselves as part of one Muslim Ummah, and beware of all those nonmuslim groups and also beware of countries like Iran, Turkey or others that would like to claim superiority over Arabs despite having very little to show for all those tall claims.
Not sure what "modern" means in the context of this thread, but I post some names to consider:
Dr Mostapha Musharrafa (contemporary of Albert Einstein, and praised by him; supposedly one of the first doctorates in science in the world)
Dr Sameera Mousa
Dr Farouk El Baz
Dr Ahmed Zewail
Dr Hafid Aourag
(Numerous Iraqi scientists recognized for their genius during the reign of Saddam Hussein)
and many others
The SC
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It's time to herald the Arabic science that prefigured Darwin and Newton
In this era of intolerance and cultural tension, the west needs to appreciate the fertile scholarship that flowered with Islam
Watching the daily news stories of never-ending troubles, hardship, misery and violence across the Arab world and central Asia, it is not surprising that many in the west view the culture of these countries as backward, and their religion as at best conservative and often as violent and extremist.
I am on a mission to dismiss a crude and inaccurate historical hegemony and present the positive face of Islam. It has never been more timely or more resonant to explore the extent to which western cultural and scientific thought is indebted to the work, a thousand years ago, of Arab and Muslim thinkers.
What is remarkable, for instance, is that for over 700 years the international language of science was Arabic (which is why I describe it as "Arabic science"). More surprising, maybe, is the fact that one of the most fertile periods of scholarship and scientific progress in history would not have taken place without the spread of Islam across the Middle East, Persia, north Africa and Spain. I have no religious or political axe to grind. As the son of a Protestant Christian mother and a Shia Muslim father, I have nevertheless ended up without a religious bone in my body. However, having spent a happy and comfortable childhood in Iraq in the 60s and 70s, I confess to strong nostalgic motives for my fascination in the history of Arabic science.
If there is anything I truly believe, it is that progress through reason and rationality is a good thing - knowledge and enlightenment are always better than ignorance. I proudly share my worldview with one of the greatest rulers the Islamic world has ever seen: the ninth-century Abbasid caliph of Baghdad, Abu Ja'far Abdullah al-Ma'mun. Many in the west will know something of Ma'mun's more illustrious father, Harun al-Rashid, the caliph who is a central character in so many of the stories of the Arabian Nights. But it was Ma'mun, who came to power in AD813, who was to truly launch the golden age of Arabic science. His lifelong thirst for knowledge was such an obsession that he was to create in Baghdad the greatest centre of learning the world has ever seen, known throughout history simply as Bayt al-Hikma: the House of Wisdom.
We read in most accounts of the history of science that the contribution of the ancient Greeks would not be matched until the European Renaissance and the arrival of the likes of Copernicus and Galileo in the 16th century. The 1,000-year period sandwiched between the two is dismissed as the dark ages. But the scientists and philosophers whom Ma'mun brought together, and whom he entrusted with his dreams of scholarship and wisdom, sparked a period of scientific achievement that was just as important as the Greeks or Renaissance, and we cannot simply project the European dark ages on to the rest of the world.
Of course some Islamic scholars are well known in the west. The Persian philosopher Avicenna - born in AD980 - is famous as the greatest physician of the middle ages. His Canon of Medicine was to remain the standard medical text in the Islamic world and across Europe until the 17th century, a period of more than 600 years. But Avicenna was also undoubtedly the greatest philosopher of Islam and one of the most important of all time. Avicenna's work stands as the pinnacle of medieval philosophy.
But Avicenna was not the greatest scientist in Islam. For he did not have the encyclopedic mind or make the breadth of impact across so many fields as a less famous Persian who seems to have lived in his shadow: Abu Rayhan al-Biruni. Not only did Biruni make significant breakthroughs as a brilliant philosopher, mathematician and astronomer, but he also left his mark as a theologian, encyclopedist, linguist, historian, geographer, pharmacist and physician. He is also considered to be the father of geology and anthropology. The only other figure in history whose legacy rivals the scope of his scholarship would be Leonardo da Vinci. And yet Biruni is hardly known in the western world.
Many of the achievements of Arabic science often come as a surprise. For instance, while no one can doubt the genius of Copernicus and his heliocentric model of the solar system in heralding the age of modern astronomy, it is not commonly known that he relied on work carried out by Arab astronomers many centuries earlier. Many of his diagrams and calculations were taken from manuscripts of the 14th-century Syrian astronomer Ibn al-Shatir. Why is he never mentioned in our textbooks? Likewise, we are taught that English physician William Harvey was the first to correctly describe blood circulation in 1616. He was not. The first to give the correct description was the 13th-century Andalucian physician Ibn al-Nafees.
And we are reliably informed at school that Newton is the undisputed father of modern optics. School science books abound with his famous experiments with lenses and prisms, his study of the nature of light and its reflection, and the refraction and decomposition of light into the colours of the rainbow. But Newton stood on the shoulders of a giant who lived 700 years earlier. For without doubt one of the greatest of the Abbasid scientists was the Iraqi Ibn al-Haytham (born in AD965), who is regarded as the world's first physicist and as the father of the modern scientific method - long before Renaissance scholars such as Bacon and Descartes.
But what surprises many even more is that a ninth-century Iraqi zoologist by the name of al-Jahith developed a rudimentary theory of natural selection a thousand years before Darwin. In his Book of Animals, Jahith speculates on how environmental factors can affect the characteristics of species, forcing them to adapt and then pass on those new traits to future generations.
Clearly, the scientific revolution of the Abbasids would not have taken place if not for Islam - in contrast to the spread of Christianity over the preceding centuries, which had nothing like the same effect in stimulating and encouraging original scientific thinking. The brand of Islam between the beginning of the ninth and the end of the 11th century was one that promoted a spirit of free thinking, tolerance and rationalism. The comfortable compatibility between science and religion in medieval Baghdad contrasts starkly with the contradictions and conflict between rational science and many religious faiths in the world today.
The golden age of Arabic science slowed down after the 11th century. Many have speculated on the reason for this. Some blame the Mongols' destruction of Baghdad in 1258, others the change in attitude in Islamic theology towards science, and the lasting damage inflicted by religious conservatism upon the spirit of intellectual inquiry. But the real reason was simply the gradual fragmentation of the Abbasid empire and the indifference shown by weaker rulers towards science.
Why should this matter today? I would argue that, at a time of increased cultural and religious tensions , misunderstandings and intolerance, the west needs to see the Islamic world through new eyes. And, possibly more important, the Islamic world needs to see itself through new eyes and take pride in its rich and impressive heritage.
· Jim Al-Khalili is a professor of physics at the University of Surrey; he is the 2007 recipient of the Royal Society's Michael Faraday Prize
Jim Al-Khalili: It's time to herald the Arabic science that prefigured Darwin and Newton | Comment is free | The Guardian
Have you heard about the Arab spring? so they are following on the footsteps of Turkey, Iran and even other non Muslim nations, like china for instance,or even the US and Europe or what is left of them.
They are modern by all means.
In this era of intolerance and cultural tension, the west needs to appreciate the fertile scholarship that flowered with Islam
Watching the daily news stories of never-ending troubles, hardship, misery and violence across the Arab world and central Asia, it is not surprising that many in the west view the culture of these countries as backward, and their religion as at best conservative and often as violent and extremist.
I am on a mission to dismiss a crude and inaccurate historical hegemony and present the positive face of Islam. It has never been more timely or more resonant to explore the extent to which western cultural and scientific thought is indebted to the work, a thousand years ago, of Arab and Muslim thinkers.
What is remarkable, for instance, is that for over 700 years the international language of science was Arabic (which is why I describe it as "Arabic science"). More surprising, maybe, is the fact that one of the most fertile periods of scholarship and scientific progress in history would not have taken place without the spread of Islam across the Middle East, Persia, north Africa and Spain. I have no religious or political axe to grind. As the son of a Protestant Christian mother and a Shia Muslim father, I have nevertheless ended up without a religious bone in my body. However, having spent a happy and comfortable childhood in Iraq in the 60s and 70s, I confess to strong nostalgic motives for my fascination in the history of Arabic science.
If there is anything I truly believe, it is that progress through reason and rationality is a good thing - knowledge and enlightenment are always better than ignorance. I proudly share my worldview with one of the greatest rulers the Islamic world has ever seen: the ninth-century Abbasid caliph of Baghdad, Abu Ja'far Abdullah al-Ma'mun. Many in the west will know something of Ma'mun's more illustrious father, Harun al-Rashid, the caliph who is a central character in so many of the stories of the Arabian Nights. But it was Ma'mun, who came to power in AD813, who was to truly launch the golden age of Arabic science. His lifelong thirst for knowledge was such an obsession that he was to create in Baghdad the greatest centre of learning the world has ever seen, known throughout history simply as Bayt al-Hikma: the House of Wisdom.
We read in most accounts of the history of science that the contribution of the ancient Greeks would not be matched until the European Renaissance and the arrival of the likes of Copernicus and Galileo in the 16th century. The 1,000-year period sandwiched between the two is dismissed as the dark ages. But the scientists and philosophers whom Ma'mun brought together, and whom he entrusted with his dreams of scholarship and wisdom, sparked a period of scientific achievement that was just as important as the Greeks or Renaissance, and we cannot simply project the European dark ages on to the rest of the world.
Of course some Islamic scholars are well known in the west. The Persian philosopher Avicenna - born in AD980 - is famous as the greatest physician of the middle ages. His Canon of Medicine was to remain the standard medical text in the Islamic world and across Europe until the 17th century, a period of more than 600 years. But Avicenna was also undoubtedly the greatest philosopher of Islam and one of the most important of all time. Avicenna's work stands as the pinnacle of medieval philosophy.
But Avicenna was not the greatest scientist in Islam. For he did not have the encyclopedic mind or make the breadth of impact across so many fields as a less famous Persian who seems to have lived in his shadow: Abu Rayhan al-Biruni. Not only did Biruni make significant breakthroughs as a brilliant philosopher, mathematician and astronomer, but he also left his mark as a theologian, encyclopedist, linguist, historian, geographer, pharmacist and physician. He is also considered to be the father of geology and anthropology. The only other figure in history whose legacy rivals the scope of his scholarship would be Leonardo da Vinci. And yet Biruni is hardly known in the western world.
Many of the achievements of Arabic science often come as a surprise. For instance, while no one can doubt the genius of Copernicus and his heliocentric model of the solar system in heralding the age of modern astronomy, it is not commonly known that he relied on work carried out by Arab astronomers many centuries earlier. Many of his diagrams and calculations were taken from manuscripts of the 14th-century Syrian astronomer Ibn al-Shatir. Why is he never mentioned in our textbooks? Likewise, we are taught that English physician William Harvey was the first to correctly describe blood circulation in 1616. He was not. The first to give the correct description was the 13th-century Andalucian physician Ibn al-Nafees.
And we are reliably informed at school that Newton is the undisputed father of modern optics. School science books abound with his famous experiments with lenses and prisms, his study of the nature of light and its reflection, and the refraction and decomposition of light into the colours of the rainbow. But Newton stood on the shoulders of a giant who lived 700 years earlier. For without doubt one of the greatest of the Abbasid scientists was the Iraqi Ibn al-Haytham (born in AD965), who is regarded as the world's first physicist and as the father of the modern scientific method - long before Renaissance scholars such as Bacon and Descartes.
But what surprises many even more is that a ninth-century Iraqi zoologist by the name of al-Jahith developed a rudimentary theory of natural selection a thousand years before Darwin. In his Book of Animals, Jahith speculates on how environmental factors can affect the characteristics of species, forcing them to adapt and then pass on those new traits to future generations.
Clearly, the scientific revolution of the Abbasids would not have taken place if not for Islam - in contrast to the spread of Christianity over the preceding centuries, which had nothing like the same effect in stimulating and encouraging original scientific thinking. The brand of Islam between the beginning of the ninth and the end of the 11th century was one that promoted a spirit of free thinking, tolerance and rationalism. The comfortable compatibility between science and religion in medieval Baghdad contrasts starkly with the contradictions and conflict between rational science and many religious faiths in the world today.
The golden age of Arabic science slowed down after the 11th century. Many have speculated on the reason for this. Some blame the Mongols' destruction of Baghdad in 1258, others the change in attitude in Islamic theology towards science, and the lasting damage inflicted by religious conservatism upon the spirit of intellectual inquiry. But the real reason was simply the gradual fragmentation of the Abbasid empire and the indifference shown by weaker rulers towards science.
Why should this matter today? I would argue that, at a time of increased cultural and religious tensions , misunderstandings and intolerance, the west needs to see the Islamic world through new eyes. And, possibly more important, the Islamic world needs to see itself through new eyes and take pride in its rich and impressive heritage.
· Jim Al-Khalili is a professor of physics at the University of Surrey; he is the 2007 recipient of the Royal Society's Michael Faraday Prize
Jim Al-Khalili: It's time to herald the Arabic science that prefigured Darwin and Newton | Comment is free | The Guardian
Have you heard about the Arab spring? so they are following on the footsteps of Turkey, Iran and even other non Muslim nations, like china for instance,or even the US and Europe or what is left of them.
They are modern by all means.
Banglar Lathial
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Another issue with Arabs is that Arabs as a group have not publicized their efforts, achievements (and failures as well) and their side of the story to the world in sufficient number and ways. How many English language defence forum is run by Arabs? You (Arabs taken as one group) could have removed a lot of misconceptions propagated by Western and Zionist evil entities against Arabs.
There was one global English language 24 hour news channel, Al Jazeera English, coming from the Arab world and I had high hopes initially. Presentation was sleek, professional, but overtly Western (British) in its editorial policy. No representation of Muslims or Islam in Al Jazeera English was also another policy failure. How many Al Jazeera English reporters or top management staff were not UK/Canada/ USA/Australia/Western citizens? How many were Arab citizens? How many were from other Muslim countries? How many of them catered to the Muslim masses? That's a topic for another discussion altogether. What nobody can deny, and I think Arabs will also admit this, is that Arabs have not highlighted their failures or successes as adamantly as some other countries like Iran, pakistan or Turkey.
This is Ramadan, and I was warned by moderators for 'trolling' because I reminded that Saiful Azam (who shot down so called "Israeli" planes) is a Bangladeshi, not a Pakistani. These 3 countries have many more media outlets, childish "fans" who would argue like Indians for petty things, that might fool the gullible reader into thinking that somehow these 3 countries have achieved far more than Arabs, while in reality, Arabs have outdone these 3 countries in most fields despite being ruled by pathetic leaders that are mostly agents of the West or subservient to the West.
If you had plenty of Arab members in various international and Arab fora in English and other foreign languages, various Arab reporters, promoters, in various important and more visible international arena highlighting Arab achievements, then all this nonsensical misconception generated by Western Zionist vindictive media could be countered. As I have mentioned in a reply in another thread, despite many chants and threats, the most that those 3 countries could do against so called "Israel" was using so called "Hezbollah" (which is Arab) to hit so called "Israel", or beat a hasty and meek retreat after getting its citizens killed, or bowing down in submission after being threatened to be bombed back to the stone age.
Arabs should start multiple English language fora of their own. I know you operate many Arabic and French language fora, and I participate in some of them too. It's just that English is much more popular all around the world as an international language for communications amongst citizens of different countries.
The SC
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ARAB SCIENCE TODAY
To document the contributions of Arab countries to science today, we performed a bibliometric evaluation of the current biomedical research productivity in Arab countries, updating the relevant literature (10⇓ , 11)⇓ by analyzing data of the last decade and expanding on the issue with the use of various methods of measuring research output and the inclusion of more Arab countries. Although bibliometric analyses have several limitations, such as the inclusion of only a proportion of journals in indexing databases (12⇓ , 13)⇓ , the results of our study offer useful data about the biomedical research productivity in Arab countries during the last decade. The research productivity of 23 Arab countries was evaluated by three different methods. First, by using the PubMed search engine, we identified the number of biomedical articles in which the first author’s address was in one of the Arab countries for the period 1994–2003. We used a methodology similar to other bibliometric studies performed by our group (14)⇓ .
In addition, the total number of articles originating from all Arab countries was calculated and compared with worldwide productivity. This method included the use of the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) Essential Science Indicators (ESI) database. The ESI database provides science trends and statistical information derived from other ISI databases. At the time of our analysis (April 2005) a total of 4941 journals were included in the ESI database and were categorized into 22 broad scientific fields for the 10-year period 1995–2004. We focused our search on nine biomedical scientific fields: biology and biochemistry, clinical medicine, immunology, microbiology, molecular biology and genetics, multidisciplinary, neuroscience and behavior, psychiatry / psychology, and pharmacology and toxicology. Data in the ESI database is organized in various ways, including national rankings for research productivity in the above scientific fields. Thus, data pertaining to the total number of publications, total number of citations, as well as to the number of citations per paper for the examined 10-year period, was collected and evaluated for each of the 23 Arab countries. Some Arab countries did not have data in the ESI rankings because they did not pass the needed cumulative citation count threshold as set by ESI.
We also evaluated articles published in the top 50 clinical medicine journals as categorized in the ESI database, sorted on the basis of the number of citations per paper. Then, by making use of the ISI Web of Science “advanced search” tool, we identified articles in these journals in which at least one author had an address in an Arab country. We analyzed data on original articles only, excluding publication types such as letters, editorials, and news items. In order to adjust for confounders that affect research productivity, the average population and gross domestic product (GDP) for each country during the study period were calculated from data obtained from the online World Bank databases (15)⇓ .
Raw and adjusted indicators for the biomedical research productivity of the Arab world during the last 10 years are shown in Table 1⇓ . The last two columns present data adjusted for population size and GDP. Researchers from Saudi Arabia published the largest number of articles. However, when adjustments for population and GDP were made, Kuwait and Jordan, respectively, were the most productive. Looking at the cumulative indices of scientific production of the Arab countries, one may notice that although the population of these countries represented 4.6% of the global population and had 1.4% of the global GDP during the study period, they produced 0.5% of the biomedical research indexed in the PubMed database and 0.1% of the articles published in the top 50 clinical medicine journals. Only 30 articles from those published in the top 50 clinical medicine journals during the period 1994–2004 originated exclusively from Arab countries, whereas in 254 others there was also participation of authors from non-Arab countries [in 146, authors from the USA; and in 112, authors from Western Europe (there were co-authors from the USA, Western Europe, and Arab countries in some papers)].
View this table: Table 1
http://www.fasebj.org/content/20/10/1581/T1.expansion.html
Raw and adjusted indicators for biomedical research productivity of Arab countries
Most Arab countries located in the African continent produced less research, in absolute or adjusted numbers, than the majority of non-African Arab countries. Although researchers from Egypt and Morocco published a relatively large number of papers and received a good number of citations compared to researchers from other Arab countries, they ranked lower when the data for research productivity were adjusted for population and GDP.
Data regarding the number of articles indexed in PubMed, in which the first author’s address was in an Arab country, for the years 1994–2003 are presented in Table 2⇓ . As shown, there was a continuous increase in the number of articles originating from Arab countries. In 1994 these articles represented 0.4% of the total articles indexed in PubMed, whereas this figure was 0.6% for 2003.
Table 2
http://www.fasebj.org/content/20/10/1581/T2.expansion.html
Number of articles indexed in PubMed for each Arab country during the years 1994–2003
Previous SectionNext Section
ON TO THE FUTURE
Biomedical research is important not only because of its direct significance for the health and well being of humans, but also because of the great economic advantages it affords. We are persuaded that the scientific community as well as the public and private funding organizations of Arab countries share the responsibility of increasing the funding for biomedical research and for improving the research infrastructure of each Arab country. Also, increased collaboration between Arab countries and their neighbours will offer a considerable benefit to those involved. Moreover, wealthy nations and regions, such as the USA and Europe, have the responsibility to assist Arab countries in their efforts to increase research productivity. This may be accomplished by incorporating well-trained Arab scientists in international research networks, and by helping them to stay in their home countries, thus increasing the local research productivity. Arabs have a long history of contribution to science, especially during the Arabic-Islamic Golden Age. However, political, social and economic problems have hampered scientists in Arab countries, making is difficult to optimize their capacity in research productivity in most scientific fields.
Arab science in the golden age (750
Table 1
Arab science in the golden age (750
Table 2
Arab science in the golden age (750
To document the contributions of Arab countries to science today, we performed a bibliometric evaluation of the current biomedical research productivity in Arab countries, updating the relevant literature (10⇓ , 11)⇓ by analyzing data of the last decade and expanding on the issue with the use of various methods of measuring research output and the inclusion of more Arab countries. Although bibliometric analyses have several limitations, such as the inclusion of only a proportion of journals in indexing databases (12⇓ , 13)⇓ , the results of our study offer useful data about the biomedical research productivity in Arab countries during the last decade. The research productivity of 23 Arab countries was evaluated by three different methods. First, by using the PubMed search engine, we identified the number of biomedical articles in which the first author’s address was in one of the Arab countries for the period 1994–2003. We used a methodology similar to other bibliometric studies performed by our group (14)⇓ .
In addition, the total number of articles originating from all Arab countries was calculated and compared with worldwide productivity. This method included the use of the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) Essential Science Indicators (ESI) database. The ESI database provides science trends and statistical information derived from other ISI databases. At the time of our analysis (April 2005) a total of 4941 journals were included in the ESI database and were categorized into 22 broad scientific fields for the 10-year period 1995–2004. We focused our search on nine biomedical scientific fields: biology and biochemistry, clinical medicine, immunology, microbiology, molecular biology and genetics, multidisciplinary, neuroscience and behavior, psychiatry / psychology, and pharmacology and toxicology. Data in the ESI database is organized in various ways, including national rankings for research productivity in the above scientific fields. Thus, data pertaining to the total number of publications, total number of citations, as well as to the number of citations per paper for the examined 10-year period, was collected and evaluated for each of the 23 Arab countries. Some Arab countries did not have data in the ESI rankings because they did not pass the needed cumulative citation count threshold as set by ESI.
We also evaluated articles published in the top 50 clinical medicine journals as categorized in the ESI database, sorted on the basis of the number of citations per paper. Then, by making use of the ISI Web of Science “advanced search” tool, we identified articles in these journals in which at least one author had an address in an Arab country. We analyzed data on original articles only, excluding publication types such as letters, editorials, and news items. In order to adjust for confounders that affect research productivity, the average population and gross domestic product (GDP) for each country during the study period were calculated from data obtained from the online World Bank databases (15)⇓ .
Raw and adjusted indicators for the biomedical research productivity of the Arab world during the last 10 years are shown in Table 1⇓ . The last two columns present data adjusted for population size and GDP. Researchers from Saudi Arabia published the largest number of articles. However, when adjustments for population and GDP were made, Kuwait and Jordan, respectively, were the most productive. Looking at the cumulative indices of scientific production of the Arab countries, one may notice that although the population of these countries represented 4.6% of the global population and had 1.4% of the global GDP during the study period, they produced 0.5% of the biomedical research indexed in the PubMed database and 0.1% of the articles published in the top 50 clinical medicine journals. Only 30 articles from those published in the top 50 clinical medicine journals during the period 1994–2004 originated exclusively from Arab countries, whereas in 254 others there was also participation of authors from non-Arab countries [in 146, authors from the USA; and in 112, authors from Western Europe (there were co-authors from the USA, Western Europe, and Arab countries in some papers)].
View this table: Table 1
http://www.fasebj.org/content/20/10/1581/T1.expansion.html
Raw and adjusted indicators for biomedical research productivity of Arab countries
Most Arab countries located in the African continent produced less research, in absolute or adjusted numbers, than the majority of non-African Arab countries. Although researchers from Egypt and Morocco published a relatively large number of papers and received a good number of citations compared to researchers from other Arab countries, they ranked lower when the data for research productivity were adjusted for population and GDP.
Data regarding the number of articles indexed in PubMed, in which the first author’s address was in an Arab country, for the years 1994–2003 are presented in Table 2⇓ . As shown, there was a continuous increase in the number of articles originating from Arab countries. In 1994 these articles represented 0.4% of the total articles indexed in PubMed, whereas this figure was 0.6% for 2003.
Table 2
http://www.fasebj.org/content/20/10/1581/T2.expansion.html
Number of articles indexed in PubMed for each Arab country during the years 1994–2003
Previous SectionNext Section
ON TO THE FUTURE
Biomedical research is important not only because of its direct significance for the health and well being of humans, but also because of the great economic advantages it affords. We are persuaded that the scientific community as well as the public and private funding organizations of Arab countries share the responsibility of increasing the funding for biomedical research and for improving the research infrastructure of each Arab country. Also, increased collaboration between Arab countries and their neighbours will offer a considerable benefit to those involved. Moreover, wealthy nations and regions, such as the USA and Europe, have the responsibility to assist Arab countries in their efforts to increase research productivity. This may be accomplished by incorporating well-trained Arab scientists in international research networks, and by helping them to stay in their home countries, thus increasing the local research productivity. Arabs have a long history of contribution to science, especially during the Arabic-Islamic Golden Age. However, political, social and economic problems have hampered scientists in Arab countries, making is difficult to optimize their capacity in research productivity in most scientific fields.
Arab science in the golden age (750
Table 1
Arab science in the golden age (750
Table 2
Arab science in the golden age (750
Banglar Lathial
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Because Arabic is spoken by so many people across so many countries across such a vast swath of territory, hardly any Arab institutes published their works in English or European languages. Consequently, the true standing of Arab countries were always underrepresented in Western publications. Arabs should have paid attention to this issue as well considering the importance of the Arab world and its historical contributions.
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The House of Wisdom
How Arabic Science Saved Ancient Knowledge and Gave Us the Renaissance
Amazon.com: The House of Wisdom: How Arabic Science Saved Ancient Knowledge and Gave Us the Renaissance (9780143120568): Jim al-Khalili: Books
Modern times examples:
MIT
MIT Arab Students Organization
Our list of previous Lifetime Achievement Award Winners can be found below:
1. Farouk El-Baz (Director of the Center for Remote Sensing at Boston University).
2. Hassan Ali (Professor Emeritus of Anaesthesia at the Massachusetts General Hospital).
3. Charles Elachi (Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and VP of Caltech).
4. Huda Zoghbi (Professor at Baylor College of Medicine).
5. Ahmed Zewail (Director of the Physical Biology Center for Ultrafast Science and Technology at Caltech).
6. Mostafa El-Sayed (Director of the Laser Dynamics Laboratory at Georgia Institute of Technology).
7. Elias Zerhouni (Former Director of the National Institute of Health).
8. Fawwaz Ulaby (Former Provost of KAUST).
MIT-ASO Science and Technology Awards | MIT Arab Students Organization
Building a Knowledge Society in the Arab World
Arab societies need nurturing institutions and supportive policies to achieve a significant boost in knowledge production and creation, according to the new Arab Knowledge Report 2009. The report, launched by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) on 28 October, maintains that reforms in areas like the media and information technologies are vital if Arab societies are to bridge the knowledge gap.
The Arab Knowledge Report 2009: Towards productive intercommunication for knowledge, emphasises two central and mutually dependent premises. The first is the connection between knowledge, development and freedom. The second is the close relationship between the demands of development and the building of the knowledge society.
“With solid commitment and long-term vision, the route to the knowledge society will not be impossible,” asserted Adel El Shared, Vice Chairman and Managing Director of the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation, which collaborated with UNDP on the report.
The report addresses the factors that impede the knowledge society in the Arab World and assesses the state of education, information and communication technologies, research and innovation in the region. It concludes with a roadmap for action so that the Arab World can integrate itself in a rapidly globalising knowledge society.
“Knowledge is a tool and a goal that influences all levels of society equally and involves all fields. It is a primary avenue for renaissance and human development in the region,” said Adel Abdellatif, Chief of the Regional Programme Division at UNDP’s Regional Bureau for Arab States. “But for this to happen, the right policy, institutional and funding environment must be in place for a knowledge society to materialize.
The report is the first product of the strategic partnership between the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation and the UNDP which aims to issue a series of analytical reports on the state of knowledge in the Arab World.
Gateway to reform and development
The report highlights that progress has been achieved in areas of economic liberalisation in the Arab World, particularly in the Gulf, resulting in increased foreign investment, expansion in the role of the private sector in the production cycle and modernisation of the region’s infrastructure.
The report argues that the knowledge revolution at the global level offers possible entry points for reform in the region as a whole and calls for the Arab world’s involvement in the global knowledge revolution.
Education: meeting global standards
The report expresses concerns over the state of education in the Arab World. Efforts undertaken in many Arab countries since the 1990s are still to realise the goal of universal education and of meeting global standards with regard to occupational, technical and higher education.
The Arab Knowledge Report 2009 observes that “the lights of knowledge” have not yet reached all adults in equal measures. Major discrepancies —such as between males and females and between younger and older adults— persist between Arab countries and within them.
Women make up some two thirds of the 60 million Arab people who are illiterate. Close to nine million primary school-aged children in the Arab countries do not attend school, and among those who do, over a large number do not pursue education beyond the basic level, hampering economic growth and sustainable development in the region as a whole.
Moreover, the quality of university education needs addressing, says the report. Often, it lacks emphasis in specialized science and modern techniques, including up-to-date communication technology. As a result, the region lacks a critical mass of highly skilled professionals equipped with the ability to innovate and capable of answering the needs of the marketplace.
Progress in ICT
Arab countries have recorded an improvement in technological performance surpassing any other region of the world in 2008, according the report.
Four Arab countries –the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait — are listed among the 50 countries in the world most ready for investment in this area.
In addition, the increase in the number of Arabic users of the Internet is the highest among the top 10 languages used on the Internet, with almost 60 million Arabic-speakers today.
This exponential growth in Internet use promises greater potentials for success in promoting technological applications in various fields and for enhancing Arabic knowledge performance in general.
The Arab Knowledge Report 2009 stresses the need for further research to understand the interaction of the Arabic language with technological developments in terms of recognition, voice reproduction and semantics. Additionally, the Report reveals that the necessary investment in information and communication technology for the Arab region may surpass the resources of any one Arab country and urges enhanced cooperation.
Research and innovation
Arab innovation performance remains by far the weakest point in the current Arab knowledge landscape, concludes the report. Despite the efforts of scientists and researchers in the region, the low levels of investment by Arab countries in research and development impacts negatively on Arab innovation performance in both quantitative and qualitative terms.
Spending on scientific research does not exceed 0.3 percent of GDP in most Arab countries, 97 percent of which depends on government funding. Levels of annual expenditures on scientific research per capita in the Arab world do not exceed US$10, compared to US$33 in Malaysia, and US $1,304 in Finland.
Moreover, unlike the industrialized world, Arab scientific research agencies are usually attached to higher education institutions rather than to production and service sectors.
Following decades of absence from scientific publishing, Arab researchers and scientists now account for 1.1 percent of global scientific publishing. Yet, the number of patents registered with national institutions remains minimal, finds the report.
Action plan for a future knowledge society
The report proposes an action plan towards integrating the Arab region into the global knowledge society. The plan rests on three interlinked pillars – broadening freedom of thought and expression in the region, responding better to the development needs of the society, and participating in the global knowledge revolution.
Global Arab Network
http://www.english.globalarabnetwork.com/200911123586/Technology/building-a-knowledge-society-in-the-arab-world.html
How Arabic Science Saved Ancient Knowledge and Gave Us the Renaissance
Amazon.com: The House of Wisdom: How Arabic Science Saved Ancient Knowledge and Gave Us the Renaissance (9780143120568): Jim al-Khalili: Books
Modern times examples:
MIT
MIT Arab Students Organization
Our list of previous Lifetime Achievement Award Winners can be found below:
1. Farouk El-Baz (Director of the Center for Remote Sensing at Boston University).
2. Hassan Ali (Professor Emeritus of Anaesthesia at the Massachusetts General Hospital).
3. Charles Elachi (Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and VP of Caltech).
4. Huda Zoghbi (Professor at Baylor College of Medicine).
5. Ahmed Zewail (Director of the Physical Biology Center for Ultrafast Science and Technology at Caltech).
6. Mostafa El-Sayed (Director of the Laser Dynamics Laboratory at Georgia Institute of Technology).
7. Elias Zerhouni (Former Director of the National Institute of Health).
8. Fawwaz Ulaby (Former Provost of KAUST).
MIT-ASO Science and Technology Awards | MIT Arab Students Organization
Building a Knowledge Society in the Arab World
Arab societies need nurturing institutions and supportive policies to achieve a significant boost in knowledge production and creation, according to the new Arab Knowledge Report 2009. The report, launched by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) on 28 October, maintains that reforms in areas like the media and information technologies are vital if Arab societies are to bridge the knowledge gap.
The Arab Knowledge Report 2009: Towards productive intercommunication for knowledge, emphasises two central and mutually dependent premises. The first is the connection between knowledge, development and freedom. The second is the close relationship between the demands of development and the building of the knowledge society.
“With solid commitment and long-term vision, the route to the knowledge society will not be impossible,” asserted Adel El Shared, Vice Chairman and Managing Director of the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation, which collaborated with UNDP on the report.
The report addresses the factors that impede the knowledge society in the Arab World and assesses the state of education, information and communication technologies, research and innovation in the region. It concludes with a roadmap for action so that the Arab World can integrate itself in a rapidly globalising knowledge society.
“Knowledge is a tool and a goal that influences all levels of society equally and involves all fields. It is a primary avenue for renaissance and human development in the region,” said Adel Abdellatif, Chief of the Regional Programme Division at UNDP’s Regional Bureau for Arab States. “But for this to happen, the right policy, institutional and funding environment must be in place for a knowledge society to materialize.
The report is the first product of the strategic partnership between the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation and the UNDP which aims to issue a series of analytical reports on the state of knowledge in the Arab World.
Gateway to reform and development
The report highlights that progress has been achieved in areas of economic liberalisation in the Arab World, particularly in the Gulf, resulting in increased foreign investment, expansion in the role of the private sector in the production cycle and modernisation of the region’s infrastructure.
The report argues that the knowledge revolution at the global level offers possible entry points for reform in the region as a whole and calls for the Arab world’s involvement in the global knowledge revolution.
Education: meeting global standards
The report expresses concerns over the state of education in the Arab World. Efforts undertaken in many Arab countries since the 1990s are still to realise the goal of universal education and of meeting global standards with regard to occupational, technical and higher education.
The Arab Knowledge Report 2009 observes that “the lights of knowledge” have not yet reached all adults in equal measures. Major discrepancies —such as between males and females and between younger and older adults— persist between Arab countries and within them.
Women make up some two thirds of the 60 million Arab people who are illiterate. Close to nine million primary school-aged children in the Arab countries do not attend school, and among those who do, over a large number do not pursue education beyond the basic level, hampering economic growth and sustainable development in the region as a whole.
Moreover, the quality of university education needs addressing, says the report. Often, it lacks emphasis in specialized science and modern techniques, including up-to-date communication technology. As a result, the region lacks a critical mass of highly skilled professionals equipped with the ability to innovate and capable of answering the needs of the marketplace.
Progress in ICT
Arab countries have recorded an improvement in technological performance surpassing any other region of the world in 2008, according the report.
Four Arab countries –the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait — are listed among the 50 countries in the world most ready for investment in this area.
In addition, the increase in the number of Arabic users of the Internet is the highest among the top 10 languages used on the Internet, with almost 60 million Arabic-speakers today.
This exponential growth in Internet use promises greater potentials for success in promoting technological applications in various fields and for enhancing Arabic knowledge performance in general.
The Arab Knowledge Report 2009 stresses the need for further research to understand the interaction of the Arabic language with technological developments in terms of recognition, voice reproduction and semantics. Additionally, the Report reveals that the necessary investment in information and communication technology for the Arab region may surpass the resources of any one Arab country and urges enhanced cooperation.
Research and innovation
Arab innovation performance remains by far the weakest point in the current Arab knowledge landscape, concludes the report. Despite the efforts of scientists and researchers in the region, the low levels of investment by Arab countries in research and development impacts negatively on Arab innovation performance in both quantitative and qualitative terms.
Spending on scientific research does not exceed 0.3 percent of GDP in most Arab countries, 97 percent of which depends on government funding. Levels of annual expenditures on scientific research per capita in the Arab world do not exceed US$10, compared to US$33 in Malaysia, and US $1,304 in Finland.
Moreover, unlike the industrialized world, Arab scientific research agencies are usually attached to higher education institutions rather than to production and service sectors.
Following decades of absence from scientific publishing, Arab researchers and scientists now account for 1.1 percent of global scientific publishing. Yet, the number of patents registered with national institutions remains minimal, finds the report.
Action plan for a future knowledge society
The report proposes an action plan towards integrating the Arab region into the global knowledge society. The plan rests on three interlinked pillars – broadening freedom of thought and expression in the region, responding better to the development needs of the society, and participating in the global knowledge revolution.
Global Arab Network
http://www.english.globalarabnetwork.com/200911123586/Technology/building-a-knowledge-society-in-the-arab-world.html
The SC
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Arab world
Declaration on Media and Information Literacy adopted by Fez International Forum
The push for Arabic content online
The Web (Barely) Speaks Arabic
Developing a Knowledge Management Strategy for the Arab World
Towards Information Society - National e-Strategies in the Arab World
Arab Media Outlook 2009-2013: Inspiring Local Content
UNESCO-supported e-learning association launched in Middle East
Bringing e-Books to Africa and the Middle East. Infrastructure, economics and censorship are major issues
Arab Knowledge Report 2009: Towards Productive Intercommunication for Knowledge
Typekit For Arabophones: Arabic Fonts When You Want Them
Arab world | </br></br>IFAP Information Society Observatory
Declaration on Media and Information Literacy adopted by Fez International Forum
The push for Arabic content online
The Web (Barely) Speaks Arabic
Developing a Knowledge Management Strategy for the Arab World
Towards Information Society - National e-Strategies in the Arab World
Arab Media Outlook 2009-2013: Inspiring Local Content
UNESCO-supported e-learning association launched in Middle East
Bringing e-Books to Africa and the Middle East. Infrastructure, economics and censorship are major issues
Arab Knowledge Report 2009: Towards Productive Intercommunication for Knowledge
Typekit For Arabophones: Arabic Fonts When You Want Them
Arab world | </br></br>IFAP Information Society Observatory
Joe Shearer
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Sinnerman108
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There indeed was a period of Arabic science.
That came to an abrupt stop when Ibn Rushd ( Aviross ) was substituted by Ghazali.
This is a crime, that we can NEVER EVER forgive.
Today, Islam and Muslims are what we are, because of this single mistake.
That came to an abrupt stop when Ibn Rushd ( Aviross ) was substituted by Ghazali.
This is a crime, that we can NEVER EVER forgive.
Today, Islam and Muslims are what we are, because of this single mistake.
Banu Umayyah
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No its not. It used to mean Qahtan and Adnan tribes until the Arabization - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia of other peoples.
Syrian Lion
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