Why is so much of the Islamic world backward and ignorant?

I'll get right to the point. Why is the Islamic world so backward and ignorant? A thousand years ago, we hear, Arab culture put Europe in the shade, with great achievements in mathematics, astronomy, and architecture. Now it all seems to have boiled down to sadists and fanatics. I know this is a lot to explain in here, but give it a whiz: Where did our Muslim brothers go wrong?

 

They rejected their search for truth in science and became locked in stagnant theocratic thinking. They created plutocratic/autocratic government. And eventually, they were dominated by foreign powers after embroiling themselves in tribalism, that destroyed their national unity, given they rejected egalitarianism and multi-culturalism.

Sort of like if a country tried to introduce "creation science" in schools....believed that only the rich should rule.....and tried to eschew new cultures and embraced bigotry and xenophobia.

Oh and throw in the idea that women were property and their sexuality should be controlled by religious dogma imposed as governmental and cultural policy.

 

Why did the West advance while Muslims became locked in stagnant theocratic thinking? What was the thing that makes the West advance and cause Muslims to be locked in stagnant theocratic thinking?

What kind of negative affects can this kind of idea have? How can it prevent a nation from advancing and developing? I know, it's not nice. But I'd like to know a little more specific information on that.

 

Most, if not all, of the Arab intellectual advances were done by their Jewish collaborators. When the Jews left the Arabs fell into decline.

 

Cite, please?

 

The rebellion by the youth of the Islamic world is already happening in many middle east countries. The burkah is just not going to remain in fashion. There's only basic black. And eventually women will throw off the chains of repression. The more they see how badly their countries are being left in the dust of the stone age, the more they will demand to live in the modern world. If their leaders and clergy continue to obstruct their advancement, they will be steamrolled, much like the Catholic church was during the renaissance. This is very evident in Egypt and Syria right now. And it's going to be like trying to stop an avalanche that's already started.

 

If I remember correctly, some historians point out seven problems that part of the world has had to deal with. I can't remember all of them, and since I can't find a source, it's probably not general, but it could give some ideas. The points I do remember are

Oil
Religion
Peoples
Communism
Colonialism
Tribes

Most other areas of the world have to deal with maybe two or three of those, and those who do, usually don't fare well.

 

I remember you now....

 

Don't forget that the Jews helped the North African muslim Moors conquer Spain and fought side by side with them for the next 780 years against the Christians.

But as far as the Arabs were concerned the Jews provided their brainpower. The majority of Arabs were ignorant desert tribesmen. The Jews were more educated and sophisticated. http://www.hebrewhistory.info/factpapers/fp043-1_preislam.htm

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/Sephardim.html

http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/1990_1999/1998/7/Jews%20and%20Arabs-%20The%20Cultural%20Heritage

Don't confuse the Arabs with all of the other groups who assumed leadership of the muslim world. The Arabs were in charge for just a short period of time.

 

If muslim women wanted to advance their status they would kill all of their baby boys to end their oppression by men. Once the men saw that the women would kill the boys they would stop oppressing them.

 

Perhaps your view is too narrow. What about United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait? Those countries are hardly like Iran, Syria or Somalia.

 

Being invaded by the Mongols tends to have adverse effects on your rate of technological advancement.

EDIT: Additionally, I think it's unfair to call it Arab culture. Although the Caliphates were run by Arabs, most of the Islamic Golden Age advancements in maths came from Persian Muslims.

 

Europe imperalizing in the 1800's. The question on how the Middle East should respond was led by either the modernizers or the religious groups. Modernizers wanted to use European techniques, while religious groups thought that they should use the Koran and it's teachings. When they finally decolonized, it left a bitter taste of western ideas. Plus the experience with Israel, and western states supporting it make it hard to adopt the ideas that can improve the middle east.

 

A large portion of the populations of North Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, and South East Asia are impoverished, which usually isn't helpful for educating people. Additionally, those areas are usually not extremely well industrialized, and those areas that are industrialized usually are only industrialized like Europe circa 1850: most people working in industrialized areas are menial laborers in hazardous conditions.

That's fairly accurate; the various caliphates ruling the Middle East, North Africa, and the Iberian peninsula were more wealthy and more advanced than any European power that wasn't the Byzantine Empire until, oh, 1650, with the decline of the Ottoman Empire. The various Islamic powers declined to invade Europe and conquer it on the basis of it was a poor backwater and all the wealth was more concentrated in India, SE Asia, and China, so it was more economical to trade and/or try to conquer those regions. Europe, in contrast, was very poor and generally not worth the cost it would take to conquer.

Way to generalize over a billion people. The main issue arises from how Europe (and Europe-derived nations such as the US or Canada) has treated the various Muslim-majority nations in the past 250 years, with Britain dismantling the Mughal Empire in India and continuing on to this day with things like the US explicitly supporting the royalty of Saudi Arabia. For a sort of microcosm view, we can look at Algeria, which was a colonial outpost of France from the early 1800s until the 1960s; during 20th century, though, native Algerians wanted equal political rights to ethnic French people and demanded to be made into a proper part of France as France's oldest colony. The Pieds Noirs, the French colonialists in Algeria, did not want political or social equality with native Algerians and started a terrorist campaign against the native Algerians, which evolved into a large scale terrorist war between the two sides. The French government collapsed and had to be reformed over this issue. At large, though, pretty much every nation with a Muslim majority was conquered and colonized by European powers (largely Britain and France, who were jackasses), with the exception of Turkey, which managed to never have a foreign power rule over it. Oddly enough, Turkey's one of the most well adjusted of Muslim nations in the world.

European colonialism.

 

The ignorance in which the world's populations are embroiled is only differentiated by the scarcity and the threat of scarcity with which the various population are subjected to. Those who understand that the most positive conditions under which human beings could be subjected to are only found in those who understand the possibilities of science applied to the human social scheme. Religions are only byproducts of scarcity or the threat of scarcity. It can only be the methods of science whereby it is possible to break the chains of ignorance and poverty. Gods and devils are obvious crude and barbaric and can only be sustained in practice through force and deprivation. It has always been the case that when religion is questioned force has been used to control and create fear. Do not think it cannot be or will not be the case in the West. The Future is not yet upon us.

There are answers and solutions to the problems that confront mankind but they cannot nor will not be found in convention. The examples.....any examples that one can use to demonstrate progress and increases in the sociology of mankind are still crude and primitive compared to what is possible. The Arab world is a blatant and obvious example of barbarism but when compared to the other religions it remains equal in it's intensity of ignorance. Arabs are kept in their place by force of military, police and lack of restraint. Christians, Jews are kept in their place, depending on their economic status in the same manner. They are all equally ignorant and equally subject to the possibility of the same forms of degradation.

 

The wisdom of Gawd, SHEESH!

 

Ahh yes... Because mass infanticide has solved so many problems before...

Smh...

Fun fact time though: before Islam, the Arab pagans, if they had a daughter, would actually bury the baby alive. A practice that Islam put an end to.

 

Apologists for Islam always, ALWAYS, blame someone other than Muslims. They are using Mohammad as a role model on this as he always blamed others for any problems he had.

 

That's so they could have SEX with her when she was six ("thighing", and full blown sex at the ripe age of nine - just like Mohammad did.)

"Muhammad placed his penis between the thighs of Aisha and he massaged it to orgasm since he could not have sexual intercourse with her until she was nine. " Read all the disgusting details about one of the most disgusting people in world history at: http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Qur'an,_Hadith_and_Scholars:Aisha#.22Thighing.22_Aisha

Modern Secular Humanism offers an alternative to all the immorality of religions.

 

"Why is so much of the Islamic world backward and ignorant? "....because it's run by people who actually believe a self-serving man who says he's the greatest role model of all time (his Qur'an says that, in chapter 33 I think), yet he was guilty of all of the following:
1. Had suicidal tendencies.
2. Was a murderer of innocents. http://wikiislam.net/wiki/List_of_Killings_Ordered_or_Supported_by_Muhammad
3. Was a torturer.
4. Was a pedophile.
5. Hated 50% of all humanity. Mohammad said, "Is not the evidence of two women equal to the witness of one man?" They replied in the affirmative. He said, "This is the deficiency in her intelligence. Isn't it true that a woman can neither pray nor fast during her menses?" The women replied in the affirmative. He said, "This is the deficiency in her religion." http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Women#Women_are_Deficient_in_Intelligence
6. Hated Jews/Christians.
7. Hated every non-Muslim.
8. Was a robber.
9. Was a warlord.
10. Was immoral.
11. Like to dress up in women's clothing (so he was likely gay or at least bi) http://www.answeringmuslims.com/2012/10/why-did-muhammad-wear-womens-clothing.html
12. Is the cause of many many problems in the world today.
13. Really just wanted Muslims to kill and plunder for him so that he could get some of the war booty, as spelled out in Qur'an 8:41. Islam is just a get-rich-quick scheme of a 7th century uneducated, illiterate charlatan. You've been fooled, Muslims. Modern secular humanism was not created to fool you, however.

 

Kranes, if their belief system was REALLY from the all-knowing, all-powerful entity that they claim, then that entity (because Muslims pray to him) would have, over time, magically helped the Muslims (and/or hurt the non-Muslims) enough so that after a whopping 1400 years that they would not be so inferior in the modern world! Clearly.
In other words, they pray to an impotent god.
Allah is just an imaginary friend of a desert madman who used it to gain fame, fortune, and lots and lots of sex with 11 wives (even though he forbade anybody else having more than FOUR wives - world's biggest hypocrite.) Sex-addict, probably. Sex with a nine-year-old girl likely proves that, as well.

"Muhammad's wars and raids not only fed his coffers, they also swelled his harem."
More about this atrocious man: http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Critical_Analysis:_Muhammad’s_Wives

 

But it's extremely effective.

 

Why do you think Africa is the way it is today? Because of good old fashion imperialism. Europeans didn't try to modernize the land they conquered, they just took the resources. Because of the export based economies depending heavily on the demand of the world, profits come and go just like that.

 

We are talking about the middle east -not africa.

 

As I've noted in other threads the slow decline appears to be a result of the triumph of the Ash'ari school over the more rationalist Muʿtazilah school of Islamic thought. This started in about the 11th century and began a gradual death in logic and reason as part of Islamic life. The interesting thing is that the reactionary Wahhabi movement in Saudi Arabia is strongly influenced by the Ash'ari school. Of great interest is the Ash'ari belief in occasionalism which presumes that cause and effect of connected events is only an illusion and that the will of God (Allah) is responsible for every event. This kind of sticks a knife in any scientific inquiry involving experimentation. Lest any Christian feel smug the Fundamentalist Christian that discards evolutionary evidence and logic and says things happen because "it is Gods will." are very similar to the Ash'ari school of thinking.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_schools_and_branches
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mu%27tazili
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash%27ari
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occasionalism
There were many other reasons of course, but burdened with this poisonous legacy the Muslim world couldn't compete with the Western world, even though it had the talent and resources to do so. Compare to what happened in Shinto Japan, a nation with far fewer resources.