Ari Siletz

faryarm

I checked some of the refrences claiming the Koran suggests a heliocentric world. Specifically, Koran 36:37 and 36:38. Those verses don't imply anything about the issue one way or the other.

36:37 says that God made the night dark and the day bright.

36:38 says that the sun is stable. We can stretch "stable" to mean "fixed" but the lead up from the previous verses suggests an argument to show that the celestial spheres do not behave unpredictably (opposite of stable).

So, no go on the oracular angle where the Koran predicts the future of scientific knowledge. We can however take the verse as an argument for faith in order in the Universe. The takeaway lesson being that if the Koran reader encounters phenomenon that appear to behave without an order, they should have faith that there is a hidden order somewhere that eludes them for the moment. Of course, the  search for this hidden order is nothing but the scientific process.

By the way, this faith in order would be threatened in the case of Quantum Mechanics, but it can be made safe again by redefining the concept of "order."

Also, our most advanced formulation of gravity makes it so that it makes no differene whether the Earth goes around the Sun or the other way around. There are no preferred frames of reference in General Relativity. Insisting that Koran cosmology specifies a heliocentric system dates the Koran to a pre 1925 scientific mindset.

Laboring to squeeze sense out of it.....

" 

      The blogger with Bahaii faith below wrote:

"But there are some verses revealed in the Qur’án contrary to the theory of the Ptolemaic system. One of them is “The sun moves in a fixed place,” which shows the fixity of the sun, and its movement around an axis. 6 Again, in another verse, “And each star moves in its own heaven.” 7 Thus is explained the movement of the sun, of the moon, of the earth, and of other bodies. "

        These are at best vague statements open to wild speculations. Perhaps something lost in translation too!!!

         For God (the one you believe in) sake take a course in Astronomy 101! Are we suppose to take away from this that Sun is fixed in its place and rotate around it's axis?! That is what is boasted here?

 Sun ain't fixed in its position! It goes around the center of the galaxy which itself is moving in cosmos! So should the faithful lose their faith because of this?

       Again, everyone please take a 101 astronomy in a college next to you. Don't try to squeeze astrnomy and physics and chemistry and bilogy out of "holy" books!

The Bahai View of The Prophet Muhammad and The Quran.

Friends,

Please excuse this long "paste", as i think it is particularly relevant in balancing some of the opinions expressed here. For those with little patience ,please  jump right to the bold print, as it is directly relevant to a remarkable verse in the Quran about the Sun and its relation to the planets.

For those more curious, and open minded with regard to a less prejudiced  view of Islam, its contributions as well as the Prophet Muhammad and His Book , the Quran, there is more background provided.
//reference.bahai.org/en/t/ab/SAQ/saq-7.html

Beautiful English version of Hafez poem

In the tavern of the Magi I see the bright light of Divine
O what a light, such a delight, how can it so brightly shine?
Stop showing off to me, O pilgrim of the House of God
In that place you see the house, while I see God’s grand design.
Secrets of the divine, for myself I wish to define
This is a mindless design, myself I further misalign.
Painful heart, tearful eyes, sigh of the morn, cry of the night
These are the lot of mine, and are favors that Thou assign.
Each moment my fantasies, my phantasm of Thee refine
How could I share my visions? With whom open this heart of mine?
Fragrance of oriental perfumes do not begin to approach
That aromatic breeze, that life-giving morning sign.
Hafiz’s poetic and playful words do not malign
Because I consider him an ardent lover of Thine.

Shahriar Shahriari
Los Angeles, Ca
//www.hafizonlove.com/divan/08/357.htm

Science & scritpure don't mix! see how:

Claims of discovery of scientific facts in scriptures are absurd for the following reason:

The absurdity becomes clear when you ask which scientific paradigm was presented in the scriptures. If it was consistent with our current theories it must have sounded outlandish to those who lived at the time of revelations!

    Just imagine Jesus saying, my brethren you are sitting on a ball that is rotating around itself and going crazy around the sun! Well we know what would have become of Christian faith then! He for sure would be put in a mental hospital! As everyone believed the earth is flat and center of the universe!

On the other hand if the so called scientific descriptions of scriptures matched the view of its era, it should look absurd and outdated to us. This conundrum is inevitable for those who strive to find a match between relative and ever changing theories of science and the absolute and constant facts of scriptures.

Of course the third alternative (most likely) scenario is that what amounts to scientific digression in scriptures is either limited to phenomenological aspects of nature that remain the same as far as human perception is concerned or that they are expressed in such vague and poetic manner that are subject to interpretations and in the eye of faithful of any era are considered factual and lend credence to the scripture itself! Needless to say anything that affords that flexibility is void of any value especially scientific value. As Scientific theories have to muster the rigors of experimental tests.

Some replies

Iqbal: Interesting observation regarding blasphemy in "reflected" vs. "source." This is compounded by the Greek Emission Theory of light accepted by many Islamic scientists prior to Al Haytham. The idea of the light of God originating from the human eye would seem even more blasphemous.

MM: Surah 32 is Sajdah (prostration). To my mind, the most interesting statement in this Surah is the following: "If We had so willed, We could certainly have brought
every soul its true guidance: but the Word from Me
will come true, "I will fill Hell with Jinns and men
all together."God could have made it so we could all go to Heaven, but chose not to. Any idea why?

SK: Looking forward to your Science/Koran findings. Wear your blogging armor.

Anahid: The problem is simpler in reverse: by what factor would the moon have to speed up to match the speed of light. This is close to the ratio of a thousand years to one day.

Dr. Saadat Noury: Thank you for the beautiful and insightful Hafez verse. The last beit is noteworthy as it shows Hafez too had problems with commenters.

AO: I agree. In fact I overagree. Creating meaning and significance by adding the human interpretation factor is the very stuff of artistic talent. Religious interpretation may not be valuable as science but satisfies all the criteria of art...and then some. 

Disenchanted: Fun observation regarding God residing in a deep gravity well. All this time I thought the Jamkaran well was a hoax.

Science and scriptures!

        Interesting find Ari!

        I think I settled the issue in this blog pretty much! ( My friend Soosan Khanom specially make a note please)

        By the way, I am not sure why the Egyptioan decided to go by speed of light etc to pursue his absurd goal! The better choice would have been GRAVITY!

       General Releativity has it that: the clock that is closer to the gravitational mass, appears to go slower than the clock that is more distant from the mass ! That must be telling you GOD resides near a very MASSIVE OBJECT! :-)

Trying to find scientific evidence in the Quran or any other

"holy" book is kind of like a Rorschach test. You can find whatever you want in those books by interpreting vague, often contradictory and meaningless sentences any way you want. Once you master that art, you can explain, and more importantly, justify anything, from having sex with a nine year old to ethnic cleansing, to mass murder. You can even explain the speed of light. And if all of that fails, you can always write a poem about God!

On another note, I find all these references in ancient books to beings controlling things from the sky quite fascinating. I think these ancient astronaut theorists may not all be nut jobs after all.

 Theory of relativity and

 Theory of relativity and a few other things were written in Torat according to the philosopher Mamonides. These were probably copied from the Torat.

Reform requires the consent of the corrupt

این عجب بین که چه نوری ز کجا می‌بینم

این هم شاهدی از حافظ قرآن

در خرابات مغان نور خدا می‌بینم
این عجب بین که چه نوری ز کجا می‌بینم 
جلوه بر من مفروش ای ملک الحاج که تو
خانه می‌بینی و من خانه خدا می‌بینم 
خواهم از زلف بتان نافه گشایی کردن
فکر دور است همانا که خطا می‌بینم 
سوز دل اشک روان آه سحر ناله شب
این همه از نظر لطف شما می‌بینم 
هر دم از روی تو نقشی زندم راه خیال
با که گویم که در این پرده چه‌ها می‌بینم 
کس ندیده‌ ست ز مشک ختن و نافه چین
آن چه من هر سحر از باد صبا می‌بینم 
دوستان عیب نظربازی حافظ مکنید
که من او را ز محبان شما می‌بینم 
 

Interesting blog Ari

i am not god so i have to read your blog again to understand how his highness did it.

Giving the fact that Quran

was written 14 centuries ago, when it comes to Quran and science, there are several verses that really leave one speechless. 

No explanation as how these facts got there but just simple amazement.   We do not know more than what is written in there. Besides what is written may have not been seen, for example fifty years ago, as we see it today beause scientific discoveries are happening as we speak.  So any interpretation can be changed later. But the fact that there are verses which talk about certain scientific facts is something that can not be denied.  

As a scientists I am entitled to read these verses and examined them. Actually, I have done that on a few verses which I would not mind to bring it up later .... I just do not have time right now ....

This is, actually, a very thought provoking blog Ari. I hope this is not going to be turned to another Quran bashing blog by the commentators... I certainly hope we can examine the verses with the scientific facts and just accept or reject our own findings instead.     I think we should not see it as a holly book but rather as an old book with some scientific points in it that can be discussed. You can be an atheist but still study these verses scientifically and see how it goes ...   We should not let the only benefit we get from this ancient book be in its denial. 

I expected these calculations in the Noor sureh

Is Noor=32?

But first, the light had to be invented and controled under the turbins before its speed could be measured.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4XzceCrkFE&feature=player_embedded

Pillars of creation destroy all perverted logic!

Hi this is a very good article, very thought provoking.