Middle East Quarterly
Winter 2010, pp. 69-74
Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy (b. 1950) is one of South Asia’s leading nuclear physicists and perhaps Pakistan’s preeminent intellectual. Bearer of a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology , he is chairman of the department of physics at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad where, as a high-energy physicist, he carries out research into quantum field theory and particle phenomenology. He has also been a visiting professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, and was visiting professor at MIT and Stanford. For some time, he has been a frequent contributor to Britain’s leading intellectual journal, Prospect. His extracurricular activities include a vocal opposition to the political philosophy of Islamism. He also writes about the self-enforced backwardness of the Muslim world in science, technology, trade, and education. His many articles and television documentaries have made a lasting impact on debate about education, Islam, and secularism in Pakistan. Denis MacEoin interviewed him by e-mail in October 2009.
Muslim Disengagement from Science
Middle East Quarterly: In 2007, you asked, “With well over a billion
Muslims and extensive material resources, why is the Islamic world disengaged from science and the process of creating new knowledge?”[1] How would you answer that question today? Has anything changed?
Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy: Sadly, little has changed. About seven centuries ago, after a spectacular Golden Age that lasted nearly four hundred years, Islam and science parted ways. Since then, they have never come together again. Muslim contributions to pure and applied sciences—measured in terms of discoveries, publications, patents, and processes—have been marginal for more than 700 years. A modest rebirth in the nineteenth century has been eclipsed by the current, startling flight from science and modernity. This retreat began in the last decades of the twentieth century and appears to be gaining speed across the Muslim world.
MEQ: What role do you think is played by the ulema in blocking new knowledge by imposing the rulings against innovation?
Hoodbhoy: The traditional ulema are indeed a problem, but they are not the biggest one; the biggest problem is Islamism, a radical and often militant interpretation of Islam that spills over from the theological domain into national and international politics. Whenever and wherever religious fundamentalism dominates, blind faith clouds objective and rational thinking. If such forces take hold in a society, they create a mindset unfavorable for critical inquiry, including scientific inquiry, with its need to question received wisdom.
MEQ: Have religious conservatism and anti-science attitudes among Muslims always been as strong as today? Or were Muslims more pro-science, say, a hundred years ago?
Hoodbhoy: In my childhood, the traditional ulema—who are so powerful today—were regarded as rather quaint objects and often ridiculed in private. Centuries ago the greatest poets of Persia, like Hafiz and Rumi, stripped away the mullahs’ religious pretensions and exposed their stupidity. Today, however, those same mullahs have taken control of the Iranian republic. The answer lies just as much in the domain of world politics as in theology. Khomeini developed the doctrine known as “guardianship of the clergy,” which gives the mullahs much wider powers than they generally exercised in the past. Instead of being simple religious leaders, they now became political leaders as well. This echoes the broader Islamic fusion of the spiritual and the temporal.
Scientists, Technologists, and Islamists
MEQ: Explaining the emergence of so many Muslim doctors, scientists, engineers, and other technologists as Islamists and, sometimes, as terrorists, Malise Ruthven suggests that a superficial understanding of science leads to a belief in authoritative texts and this slots in with a belief in the infallibility of the Qur’an.[2] What is your explanation?
Hoodbhoy: This question must be disaggregated and examined at many levels. It cannot be answered simply in terms of mere theology—the Bible contains elements of extreme violence and yet the vast majority of scientists who are believing Christians are also peaceful people. What brought about the global Islamist wave is a much more relevant question. It is, in some ways, the Muslim version of anti-colonialism and a reaction to the excesses of the West, combined with an excessive traditionalism.
But let me concentrate on the sociological aspects. To begin with, we need to separate the scientists from the technologists, meaning those who use science in a narrowly functional sense rather than as a means for understanding the natural world. I have never seen a first-rate Muslim scientist become an Islamist or a terrorist even when he or she is a strong believer. But second- and third-rate technologists are more susceptible. These are people who use science in some capacity but without any need to understand it very much—engineers, doctors, technicians, etc.—all of whom are more inclined towards radicalism. They have been trained to absorb facts without thinking, and this makes them more susceptible to the inducements of holy books and preachers.
MEQ: Has this been happening with Pakistan’s home-trained scientists?
Hoodbhoy: Our best physics students in Islamabad are often the most open-minded and the least religious. They have enough social strength to keep themselves at a certain distance from the crowd. Among my colleagues, something similar takes place; the weakest ones professionally are the ones who demonstrate the greatest outward religiosity. I see a strong correlation between levels of professional competence and susceptibility to extremist philosophies.
MEQ: Is the situation the same in India?
Hoodbhoy: Yes, there, too, I find anti-science attitudes rare among scientists but rather common within the technological and professional classes, both Hindu and Muslim. The latter type of people pray for rain, attribute earthquakes to the wrath of God, think supplications to heaven will cure the sick, seek holy waters that will absolve sin, look to the stars for a propitious time to marry, sacrifice black goats in the hope that the life of a loved one will be spared, recite certain religious verses as a cure for insanity, think airliners can be prevented from crashing by a special prayer, and believe that mysterious supernatural beings stalk the earth. Their illogic boggles the mind.
MEQ: Does the fact that Indians and Pakistanis have both constructed nuclear weapons indicate that science now is firmly implanted on South Asian soil?
Hoodbhoy: To an extent, yes, but the battle against irrationality has a long way to go. For example, India’s 1998 nuclear tests were preceded by serious concern over the safety of cattle at the Pokharan test site for religious reasons. Former Indian foreign minister Jaswant Singh wrote, “For the team at the test site—which included President Kalam, then the head of the Defence Research and Development Organization—possible death or injury to cattle was just not acceptable.”
The Prohibition of Debate
MEQ: It seems that Muslims today are hampered by a culture that refuses to take on board the prerequisites for scientific and other intellectual progress—the Enlightenment insistence on freedom of speech and thought to enable open discourse and free debate. Even in the West since the Rushdie affair, Islamists seek to use the law to prohibit debate about Islam. Do you see a way to put an end to this pattern?
Hoodbhoy: On the scale of human history, the Enlightenment is a very recent phenomenon, barely four hundred years old. One must be hopeful that Muslims will catch up. The real question is how to shake off the dead hand of tradition. The answer lies in doing away with an educational system that discourages questioning and stresses obedience. Reform in the Muslim world will have to begin here. At the core of this problem, lies the tyranny that teachers exert over their students. In Urdu, we say that the teacher is not just a teacher—he is also your father. But in our culture, fathers are considered all-wise, which means that teachers cannot be questioned.
MEQ: Is this kind of education a source of authoritarianism?
Hoodbhoy: It is both a source and an inevitable consequence of authoritarianism. Instead of experiencing science as a process of questioning to achieve understanding, students sit under the watchful eyes of despots while they memorize arbitrary sets of rules and an endless number of facts. X is true and Y is false because that’s what the textbook says. I grind my teeth whenever a student in my university class gives me this argument.
MEQ: How can countries like Pakistan develop a scientific mindset?
Hoodbhoy: College and university come much too late; change must begin at the primary and secondary school level. Good scientific pedagogy requires the deliberate inculcation of a spirit of healthy questioning in the classroom. Correct attitudes start developing naturally when students encounter questions that engage their mind rather than their memory. For this, it is important to begin with tangible things. One does not need a Ph.D. in cognitive studies to know that young people learn best when they deal with objects that can be understood by visual, auditory, tactile, and kinesthetic means. As their experience grows, students learn to understand abstract concepts, to manipulate symbols, to reason logically, to solve theorems, and to generalize. These abilities are destroyed, or left woefully undeveloped, by teaching through rote memorization.
MEQ: What, then, should normal practice consist of?
Hoodbhoy: Teachers posing such questions as: How do we know? What is important to measure? How can we check the correctness of our measurements? What is the evidence? How are we to make sense out of our results? Is there a counter explanation, or perhaps a simpler one? The aim should be to get students into the habit of posing such questions and framing answers.
Religion Trumps Science
MEQ: You have said, “No Muslim leader has publicly called for separating science from religion.”[3] Do you detect any real movement by Muslim secularists and scientists to reverse this trend?
Hoodbhoy: Nothing of this kind is visible in Pakistan, but I see this happening in Iran, the most intellectually advanced country of the Muslim world, a country that boasts an educational system that actually works. Ayatollah Khomeini was quite content to keep science and Islam separate—unlike Pakistan’s leaders who have made numerous absurd attempts to marry the two. Khomeini once remarked that there is no such thing as Islamic mathematics. Nor did he take a position against Darwinism. In fact, Iran is one of the rare Muslim countries where the theory of evolution is taught. This may be because Shi’ites, as in Iran, have a different take on evolution than Sunnis and are generally less socially conservative as well. Shi’i women may wear the chador or hijab [head covering] but never a burqa [full body covering]. I’ve seen women taxi drivers in Tehran but never in New York City. Moreover, Iran is a front-runner in stem-cell research—something which George W. Bush and his administration had sought to ban from the United States.
MEQ: How far have madrasas in Pakistan, especially the Deobandi schools, made intellectual progress hard or impossible for society as a whole?
Hoodbhoy: The Deobandi-Salafi-Wahhabi axis of unreason does not seem capable of accommodating the premises of science—causality, an absence of divine intervention, and scientific method. Ever since Khwaja Nizam-ul-Mulk of Persia established madrasas in the eleventh century, these schools have stuck to their pre-scientific curriculum. However, they became dangerous when the Saudis used their petro-dollars in the 1970s to export Wahhabism across the world. Thousands of new madrasas were established in Pakistan by the United States, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia to provide fodder for the great joint, global jihad against the Soviets. The CIA provided madrasas with millions of Qur’ans, as well as tens of millions of textbooks published in America designed to create a jihadist mindset among young Afghans resident in Pakistan.[4] These madrasas eventually became nurseries for the Taliban.
MEQ: Have no attempts been made to reform the madrasas?
Hoodbhoy: Following the 9/11 attacks, General Pervez Musharraf was prodded by the Americans to initiate a madrasa reform project aimed at broadening the madrasa curriculum to include the teaching of English, science, mathematics, and computers. Huge sums were spent but to no avail. These misogynist bastions of anti-modernism and militancy cannot be reformed. The Pakistani state literally cowers before them. They have the power to bring every Pakistani city to a halt. On the other hand, in East Africa, India, or Bangladesh, one sees that madrasas can be quite different. While conservative, they do permit teaching of secular subjects. Some even have small minorities of non-Muslims, which would be unheard of in a Pakistani madrasa.
MEQ: You point out the emergence of low-quality scientific periodicals in Iran and elsewhere, in which scientists publish articles of a poor standard. Also, most Muslim countries tolerate outright plagiarism in Ph.D. theses and published books.[5] What do you suppose is responsible for such self-defeating behavior that clearly acknowledges the superiority of properly assessed articles and dissertations yet accepts the second- and third-rate?
Hoodbhoy: I call this “paper pollution.” The rapid increase in substandard publications and plagiarism is the consequence of giving large incentives for publishing research papers. Some contain worthwhile research but most do not. I consider certain ambitious individuals in government to be at fault for allowing, and even deliberately encouraging, poor quality theses and books fit for nothing but the waste basket. This problem can be handled using the current administrative machinery; just remove these incentives and punish plagiarism with sufficient severity.
Open War between Muslims
MEQ: You have said, “Here [at Quaid-i-Azam University], as in other Pakistani public universities, films, drama, and music are frowned on.”[6] This is also seen in numerous Muslim schools in the United Kingdom, where even chess was banned and compared to “dipping one’s hand in the blood of swine.”[7] These attitudes prevent talented young Muslims from achieving success as actors, directors, dancers, musicians, composers, artists, and writers. Your thoughts on changing this situation?
Hoodbhoy: There is open war between those Muslims who stand for a liberal, moderate version of the faith and those who insist on literalism. The unresolved tension between traditional and modern modes of thought and social behavior is now playing itself out in ever more violent ways. Most Pakistanis, while Muslims, want their daughters to be properly educated; Islamic extremists, however, are determined to stop them. On most campuses, religious vigilantes enforce their version of Islam on the university community by forcing girls into the veil, destroying musical instruments, forbidding men and women from being together, and putting a damper on cultural expression.
MEQ: Do the Taliban play a role in this arena?
Hoodbhoy: Yes, as of early 2009, they had already blown up 354 schools[8] and they issued a decree that no girls in Pakistan may be educated after February 15, 2009. In their view, all females must stay at home. In October, educational institutions across Pakistan shut down after a suicide bomber blew himself up after walking into the girls’ cafeteria of the International Islamic University [in Islamabad] while, simultaneously, another bomber targeted male students.[9]
MEQ: Islamists bombed an Islamic university?
Hoodbhoy: Indeed, this episode sent shock waves across the country because the International Islamic University is a conservative institution where most women dress in burqas and very few wear normal clothes. But even this does not placate the extremists.
Muslims are at war with other Muslims. If the radicals win, or can at least terrify the moderates into following their restrictions, then there will be no personal and intellectual freedom and hence no thinking, ideas, innovations, discoveries, or progress. Our real challenge is not better equipment or faster Internet connectivity but our need to break with mental enslavement, to change attitudes, and to win our precious freedom.
[1] Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy, “Science and the Islamic World—The Quest for Rapprochement,” Physics Today, Aug. 2007, p. 1.
[2] Malise Ruthven, A Fury for God: The Islamist Attack on America (London: Granta Books, 2002), pp. 117-21.
[3] Hoodbhoy, “Science and the Islamic World,” p. 2.
[4] Joe Stephens and David B. Ottaway, “The ABCs of Jihad in Afghanistan—Courtesy, USA,” The Washington Post, Mar. 23, 2002.
[5] Hazem Zohny, “Iran urged to stamp out plagiarism,” SciDevNet (London), Oct. 26, 2009; “Iran’s Science Minister Accused of Plagiarism,” Payvand Iran News (Mountain View, Calif.), Sept. 24, 2009.
[6] Hoodbhoy, “Science and the Islamic World,” p. 6.
[7] Denis MacEoin, Music, Chess and Other Sins (London: Civitas, 2009), p. 101.
[8] The Guardian (London), Jan. 20, 2009.
[9] Dawn (Karachi), Oct. 21, 2009.
Mansoor Khalid
February 19, 2010
I strongly vote in favor of the debate. Religion and science should never be mixed. Religion is source for spiritual satisfaction of humans while science serves to improve human life through its inventions and understandings. Both should not be looked from one eye.
Justin
March 17, 2010
The title of the article is wrong, what does the author mean by saying “Islam and Science Have Parted Ways”
What do religion and science have to do with each other. As a scietist Mr. Hoodboy should know that religion and science are mutually exlusive. While the former makes claims that it has never been able to prove, the later makes assertions after providing thorough proof and investigation.
The premise of somehow religion and science being mixed is an insult to the scientific fraternity worlwide. Maybe the author should have rephrased the title of his article to make it look more literary to the thinking person.
Abhilash MV
March 23, 2010
“Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.” Albert Einstein
Ibn- Buttuta
April 22, 2010
Last hope: Pervez Hoodhboy!
Haqeer
May 31, 2010
Chwalaen na maro. Aqal ki baat kiya karo.
accessorize
August 19, 2010
I am in favor of the landlord’s point of view, great merit. By the way, the recent sevral years, many things are very popular, we might as well enjoy their beauty .
sameer
September 9, 2010
Someone who is religious is by definition an extremist, according to Mr Pervaiz. Mr Pervaiz is really an open minded and tolerant person, who does not mind someone practicing his religion
radians
July 5, 2011
Mr amir ali, im a student of a madrassah…and recently i have completed the A’levels in physics and mathematics, its a deobandi school of thought and i mean, what the heck are you even talking about? all of this utter nonsense is never even heard of in this madrassah that i go to. fundamentalist(oh yeah whatever that connotation means to you) muslim, PHd professors from lums etc come and give lectures on the existence of God(i have even seen atheist professors sitting there and asking questions in a descent manner and debates go forth), i myself am always engaging into the philosophical questions and no-one asks me to shut the heck up, they encourage it so that doubts can be cleared and i get extremely reasonable, logical and rational answers from these guys!…let me ask you this before you even begin to reply, do you really believe in God sir? because i highly doubt after tracking you over for 3 years now!…jesus christ!…and dont you come back and say that a personal God, who intervenes is irrational somehow, shall i expose the bias and hypocrisy in the scientific community itself? have you ever studied the philosophy of science before making those fundamentalist assertions? are you familiar with names such as Karl Popper and the raven’s paradox sir? ofcourse you are…give me a coherent definition of what your so called truthful theoretical science is, and maybe then we can discuss whether that’s a valid source of metaphysical even physical knowledge or not let alone the only one!!
i’d just say this, go to a madrassah and study in it for some time before saying all that idiotic non-sense about it…and yh, i’ve been both an agnostic and an atheist before reverting back to islam, and yes im a so called “fundamentalist” and im proud and there are many like me and this is evolving, so stay tight with your wishful thinking and plans, we will never let people like dawkins or you to define whats good and bad for us, islamic civilization will rise with all its glory again inshAllah and it will rule the wrold in peace and justice again as it has done before!
salam!
Salim
December 4, 2011
The harsh and barbaric language you are using instead of constituting an argument is self evident and one doesnt need to go to a madreseh. you appear to be a perfect example of the indoctrination caused by miss-using intellect to refute intellect lol
An Indian Observer
August 10, 2011
First of all to all the Pakistani nationalists out there, ad hominem attacks prove that you are the one with the weaker argument. If the argument is founded on a rational, objective based on evidence format than proving your opponent does not conform to social norms does nothing to his argument.
Secondly Pervaiz’s quote here….
“Yes, there, too, I find anti-science attitudes rare among scientists but rather common within the technological and professional classes, both Hindu and Muslim. The latter type of people pray for rain, attribute earthquakes to the wrath of God, think supplications to heaven will cure the sick, seek holy waters that will absolve sin, look to the stars for a propitious time to marry, sacrifice black goats in the hope that the life of a loved one will be spared, recite certain religious verses as a cure for insanity, think airliners can be prevented from crashing by a special prayer, and believe that mysterious supernatural beings stalk the earth. Their illogic boggles the mind”
This statement implies that Dr. Hoodbhoy doesn’t believe in a providential god. A god that intervenes in nature. He may still be a believer in a deistic god, but clearly doubts the ability of humans to enlist providential help from the supernatural in the physical world. That being said, this does not prove that Dr. Hoodbhoy is a bad person, or he is less of a Pakistani. Indeed he has rejected tenure at top colleges and continues to study in Pakistan working for what he sees as desirable social reform. People have to realize that all the citizens of your country have something to say, that is what frames national debate- not rigid conformity.
Why did I bring up Hoodbhoy’s religious inclinations? As a scientist his religious inclinations are of no relevance. But as a social activist working to reform Pakistan the question comes that does imparting a scientific education to the public mean encouraging anti-Islamic thought? We must not conflate anti-Islamic thought with anti-mullah sentiment, or even with anti-dogmatism in the broad sense of the word. Is he encouraging children to abandon religion or desiring coming between parents and children like Richard Dawkins? No he is not, he is encouraging having a scientific mind in the education system and not one based on memorization, dogma and cheating. That leads to stagnation and not innovation. He is referring to the intellectual and developmental stagnation on many fronts that come from a malfunctioning and politicized education system.
No for those who oppose him, you must marshal a democratic response to him. Not one based on defaming him and his ilk in order to counter his proposals or encouraging violence. Can you see eye to eye the education system needs reform, do you agree on any points of a system of education that suffers from post Zia Islamisization? I personally think that he is wrong and ridiculous to think that our current state is completely due to bad education and a less scientific spirit. He refuses to accept the current condition of the world fuel radicalization with all the Western interventions, and that the government has been corrupt, viewed as illegitimate. He doesn’t even want to recognize that a religious line is taking hold because of popular perception that such a government would actually have a backbone (control its borders) and be less corrupt. Instead he dismisses this society’s inclinations for an Islamist government as simple mullah brainwashing due to bad education, completely unaware that political Islamism is making a comeback in the Middle east, in Egypt the Brotherhood has accepted democracy and is the best organized party, in Gaza Hamas won and remains popular because of the fact it is seen as being loyal to resistance and less corrupt, the Turkish governing party has its roots in an Islamist past and is trumpeting individual freedom over state sanctioned secularism challenging Turkey’s military and secular elite, many Libyan rebels are from the former Islamic opposition repressed by Gadhafi, and of course the Saudis and Yemeni governments are dealing with Al Qaida led insurgency that challenges their rule as being ‘un-Islamic’ and ‘oppressive’.
The point is that Islamism can transcend the Deobandi banning brigade as seen in the Turkish government which has become a country with very close ties to Israel to being one acting more independently and as a regional power and still committed to the European Union.
LPJ
December 6, 2011
You said exactly what I wanted to say! (Though I do disagree with Mr. Hoodbhoy’s implication that to believe in a providential God is to be “un-scientific”.) Just one thing, not all Pakistani nationalists retaliate the way many people are doing here, that too is a generalization. Cheers 🙂
Imtiaz Mahmood
December 3, 2011
For 64 years, defacto god was army which has great track record of failures. Secular uninterruped democracy as proposed by Hoodbuoy has far beeter success rate.
For religions, however much they formally concerned the worship of some other/more than human god; de-facto involved obeying the word of some “holy” man or other: Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Paul, Mohammed, Buddha, Joseph Smith, a Pope, etc. Men were typically proxy gods.
It was this theist template, and a mankind already conditioned to venerate leaders as effectively gods on earth, that facilitated the rise to (and retention of) power by the likes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc.
ilmanafasih
December 4, 2011
Kudos once again to Dr Hoodbhoy, one one the very few voices of sanity in Pakistan, and perhaps one of a handful who knows clearly what he’s talking about.
Zubair Mangrio
December 5, 2011
A very in-depth analysis made by Hoodbhoy. He depicted a very true picture of state of affairs. Its a must read.
Zubair Mangrio
December 5, 2011
Indeed a very realistic approach is depicted by Hoodbhoy.
kyrani99
May 5, 2012
“the Bible contains elements of extreme violence and yet the vast majority of scientists who are believing Christians are also peaceful people.” BUT less than 10% of scientists believe in God! And of the other 90% they contribute to this http://kyrani99.wordpress.com/ and while not obvious violence, it’s deadly and spreading fast around the world.
Science needs a fresh approach in order for a paradigm shift to bring onto new ground. The Islamic world maybe could assist in that process. The efforts in the West are attempting to make religion irrelevant or to mathematically model God, both of which are wanting approaches. New, fresh thinking is needed.
Bhaskar Sur
September 26, 2012
I do not know if Prof Hoodhoy is aware of the work of the Indian revolutionary philosopher M.N. Roy who in his Historical Role of Islam,written in early 30s,when he was in jail,expressed similar views .Roy wanted to dispel negative ideas regarding Islam,prevailing even among prgressive Hindus of the time as well as to remind his Muslim readers about Islams rich contribution to scince in the Middle Ages when Europe had lost her Greaco-Roman heritage of humanistic learning.He also noted how the decline of the rational thinking led to the degeneration Islamic civilisation almost everywhere in the world.In his view the only way toregenerate Islamic societies is to revive the lost spirit of enquiry and developing ascientific attitude.Roy contribution has largely been ignored because ofuncomprpmising attitude to obscurantist Gandhi and later,towards Commnism which he came to regard as organised irrationalism.His book is available on the net.
Atif Desai
December 25, 2013
Zaida inglish na jhaar eminem ki alaud!!!
pinterest
September 16, 2014
Most Facebook users are teenagers who do not have a lot of money to spend.
Google+ is a social networking site that has a range of different features that you can use to connect with patients and other healthcare professionals.
I make boards of animals, quotes, or color combinations.