Monthly Archives: June 2013

Thought for the Day 06/18/2013

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These lines are written by Noor Salik:

Thinkers Forum USA Affiliates!

Yesterday EDITORIAL BOARD posted two postings on WWW.ThinkersForumUSABlog.Org

(1) “Turkey’s False Nostalgia” by Edhem Eldem

(2) Islam at War – with Itself

 

Both of these postings are critically important.

Let us see how many people will comment on these.

Based on my past few years of experience,  very few people will comment on it.

I may be wrong but we will see.

I read both postings. I also wrote brief comments. I will write few more as well.

Islam at War – with Itself is written by Murtaza Haider – most probably a Pakistani journalist, writer or a professor.

Turkey’s False Nostalgia” is written by Edhem Eldem – a renowned Turkish Historian teaching at some Turkish University.

 

In the last 500 years we can easily see what is happening in the Muslim world and what is happening in Europe.

During this period, Western (not Eastern) Europe saw Renaissance.

In Muslim world there were 3 Islamic Empires:

(i)            Ottoman/Turkish Empire in Turkish speaking and Arabic speaking Islam

(ii)          Safvid (If name is incorrect it can be corrected) in Persian speaking Iran

(iii)        Mughal Empire in India (Northern India only)

We can easily compare what Muslims did in last 500 years and what Western European did in the last 500 years.

Europe got Freedom from Dogma, in Math they developed Analytic Geometry and developed/discovered Calculus.

All modern/advanced mathematics is based on and because of Calculus.

All modern technology and Physics are because of Mathematical developments.

In Philosophy major names are: Descartes, Leibnitz, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Bertrand Russell etc. etc.

 

In Muslim world you tell me what Turks did?

Iranian created great poetry and Mysticism. (Iqbal’s PhD dissertation)

Mughal Empire: Taj Mahal; Some Forts; Some Mughlai recipes, Qawali /Mushaera – Fatawa-e-Alamgiri (You tell me more if you know)

Muslim world (especially Muslim Intellectuals) are still in the firm clutches of Dogma.

Western educated mind is guided by REASON/LOGIC.

The problem is Muslim Intellectuals not masses.

Masses (east/west/north/south) do not live by REASON/LOGIC – they live by dogma, religious belief systems, and music/sport/gossip.

All societies are governed by their intellectual elites.

This will and can continue …….. if you respond.

Noor Salik

 

 

 

 

Islam at War – with Itself

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Shared by Zafar Khizer

Islam at War – with Itself

From Aleppo in Syria to Quetta in Balochistan, Muslims are engaged in the slaughter of other Muslims. The numbers are enormous: over 93,000 killed in the Syrian civil war and over 48,000 dead in Pakistan. Millions have perished in similar intra-Muslim conflicts in the past four decades. Many wonder if the belief in Islam was sufficient to bind Muslims in peace with each other.

Since the end of the Second World War, the world has moved in two distinct directions. The West, mostly Christian, has tried to minimize the intra-European conflict and has largely been successful with some exceptions. The Muslim world, on the other hand, has fallen into one violent conflict after another, involving mostly Muslims. Several intra-Muslim conflicts continue to simmer as proxy wars. In the 80s, the Iran-Iraq war alone left millions dead. More recently, a car bomb in Iraq on Sunday killed another 39 in the sectarian warfare between the Shias and Sunnis that killed at least 1,045 in May 2013.

As the violence amongst Muslims increases, most Muslims prefer denial or look for scapegoats. Those in denial believe no such violence exists and the entire issue is made up by the western-controlled media. Others blame it on scapegoats – Indians and Americans are the most frequently blamed. The overwhelming evidence, however, suggests that the sectarian and tribal divisions amongst Muslims and justifying violence in the name of religion are the primary causes of why Islam is at war with itself.

Muslim societies have thus evolved into places where revenge is confused with justice, forgiveness with weakness, and peace with cowardice. These are the places where unholy men wage holy wars against unarmed civilians, pitching Muslims against other Muslims.

For more details please click on the link

http://dawn.com/news/1018849/islam-at-war-with-itself

 

 

“Turkey’s False Nostalgia” By Edhem Eldem

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Turkey’s past has little to offer in terms of democratic inspiration. Ironically, there is hardly any difference between the nostalgia for Ataturk-era secularism and the A.K.P.’s glorification of the Ottoman imperial past. Both rest on the reinvention of an imagined golden age — the former with a secularist emphasis, and the latter with a focus on Islamic identity. And both look back fondly on authoritarian regimes, which makes them all the less credible as political models for a democratic present and future.

The current protest movement isn’t about the past; it is about today and tomorrow. It started because a new generation wanted to defend Gezi Park, a public green space, against the violent, abusive manner in which the government sought to sacrifice it to the gods of neo-liberalism and neo-Ottomanism with a plan to build a replica of Ottoman barracks, a shopping mall and apartments.

The real challenge for the protesters, therefore, is to ensure that this movement is not hijacked by a Kemalist backlash that seeks to reduce Turkey’s complex social problems to a simplistic dichotomy between Islam and secularism.

What Mr. Erdogan is currently undermining and destroying isn’t an imagined golden age of a secular and democratic Turkey, which never really existed, but rather the “état de grâce” that followed his party’s first electoral victory in 2002. For five or six years, the A.K.P. used democracy as its only defense against the authoritarian ways of the old guard — the coalition formed by the secular political parties and the army, long considered the guarantor of secularism. Click link below for Full article;

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/17/opinion/turkeys-false-nostalgia.html?ref=opinion

Posted By F. Sheikh

Purpose & Universe

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A great video lecture by Sean Carroll, an author and theoretical physicist, at 2013 American Humanist Association Conference.  Richard Dawkins is in the Audience. Concluding last ten minutes of lecture and Q & A period is wonderful. The speaker is a great teacher, engaging and keeps you focused during the long 77 minutes. It is one of those lectures you enjoy listening, regardless one’s personal view points. Worth watching both by theists and atheists. ( F. Sheikh )

Sean Carroll’s Summary;The idea of a “purpose” or “reason why” has a strong hold on the human imagination, and has a special resonance when we think about the universe itself. However, modern science has gradually eroded the role of purpose in our best understanding of nature. This represents an important step forward in human understanding, as we can see how apparently purposeful features of reality arise through undirected laws of nature. But it represents a challenge for questions of morality and meaning. I will argue that purposes can be created or emergent even when they are not fundamental, and that this perspective has important consequences for how we live our lives. Click link below to watch video;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jar-Wzy1gsI

Posted By F. Sheikh