Mosques takenover by hardliners

[Michael]

Good old monotheism - the key to Europes 12 centuries of intellectual numbness.

From wiki:

In 529 the Byzantine emperor Justinian closed all of the pagan philosophical schools (the year 529 is now taken to be the beginning of the medieval period). Most scholars fled the West towards the more hospitable East, particularly towards Persia, where they found haven under King Chosroes and established what might be termed an "Athenian Academy in Exile". Under a treaty with Justinian, Chosroes would eventually return the scholars to the Eastern Empire. During the dark ages, European mathematics was at its nadir with mathematical research consisting mainly of commentaries on ancient treatises; and most of this research was centered in the Byzantine Empire. The end of the medieval period is set as the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453. The twelfth century saw a flood of translations from Arabic into Latin....


I'd say it was the rise of an intolerant monotheism that precipitated the Dark Ages and it was the fall of this monotheism that prompted the Renaissance.

 

[chuuush]

Sounds good. But instead I went for fast food - chicken kabab with the Lot + humus & chili

I did bake a loaf of banana bread last weekend. First time too. I used a silicon baking dish I bought a Kmart and it worked very well. Tonight I'm going to buy a silicon pie pan, maybe, and make a sweat potato pie

That also is a good choice buddy! Though it's first time ever I hear about banana bread

It depends on the question. I think Thomas Lippman sums up the manner in which I would view Mohammad.

“It seems safe to say that Muhammad was sincere, dedicated, courageous, generous, compassionate, and committed to social justice and reform. The uncritical admiration of him that one hears from ordinary Muslims, however, overlooks the evidence that the Prophet was also sometimes vengeful, spiteful, and duplicitous. He was, after all, human and ambitious too.”

I would be happy to if you had supplied some example by Mr. Lippman to support his argument.

Yet, in a debate, it’s basically up to me to defend my position.
For example, you Chuuush made a comment along the lines that Scientology is bullshit. (ok maybe you didn’t say BS, but we both know it is). Well, you are not an expert in Scientology are you? No. Yet, you were pretty confident in your assessment that Scientology is a crock of shit. (which I agree – it is). Well, we both know there is no more evidence that the moon split in two then there is that there is a God then there is that of Xenu of the Galactic Confederacy visited Earth. If you were to debate the point with a Scientologist I don’t think you’d have to be an expert in Scientology to do. But you would have to know something about it.

Well, I tell you the truth, though some may raise eyebrows thinking how ignorant I am. But anyway, I didn't have no shred of info about scientology until I read your above post and then decided to study a bit about it. I'm sure I have never made any comments on Scientology as I never talk about what I don't know (But of course from what I read, it seems quite a bullshit, may I say it sounded to me like a childish story to me).
But that's not the point here, you can not claim that I ever post anything here about what I do not have a good knowledge of, and all my posts here are only on subjects I am knowledged in.

I have a another question. During the “Islamic” Golden Age; Who was the greatest mathematician? (in your opinion).

I'm not sure about the exact reply to this question. I have not seen any mentioning of who was the biggest muslim mathematician anywhere but I personally think the the biggest muslim mathematician may be Al-Khwarizmi (Algoritmi) or İbn al-Haytham