Why Islam does not clash with modern science, or does it?

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Abdelrahman
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Why Islam does not clash with modern science, or does it?

Post #1

Post by Abdelrahman »

Peace be unto all of you! Believers and Non-Believers alike!

As a Muslim, we put huge regard on scripture not clashing with modern science. We believe that if God created the scripture then it should not contain errors in it when referencing the natural world and what we've come to understand about it.

"Then do they not reflect upon the Qur'an? If it had been from [any] other than Allah, they would have found within it much contradiction." - The Holy Quran (4:82)

Many Christian/Atheist debates exist out there, but I am saddened to see that no atheists debate Muslim scholars who read and write Arabic fluently. When debates are organized between people who don't understand arabic or science it goes no where.

Arabic is my mother tongue. I also speak English at home so I'd say im fluent in both. I am a science university graduate and I love the topic of religion and science.

In Islam, we don't have 'blind faith'. I am not allowed to believe something blindly, I must have reasons. Real reasons. That is why we believe God allowed the prophets to perform miracles - so as to give people a sign. And since we believe the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) to be the last prophet, his sign and lasting miracle is the Qur'an. The Qur'an is meant to be a 'sign' to the end of time and I invite all members to reflect on its verses.

I am looking to debate someone on whether or not Islamic scriptural references to the natural world clash with modern scientific understanding!

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Post #91

Post by DrNoGods »

[Replying to post 90 by Abdelrahman]
What you are doing is giving us your opinion, and in a debate environment I'm sorry to say such statements hold no weight whatsoever without backing them up.


I don't think you understand how this works. YOU are the one who has made fantastic claims that vague passages from a 1400 year old book demonstrate knowledge of modern scientific concepts or theories, and therefore have some kind of divine input. So it is YOUR responsibility to show that those claims are valid, and I am challenging your explanations and attempts to do that because they don't support your claims.

Nothing you have presented shows that these passages ... any of them ... are clear enough to mean what you are claiming they mean. Saying that mountains will move like clouds in no way connects that movement to crustal plate movements, so this passage cannot be connected to knowledge of that subject (ie. tectonic plate theory). Saying that springs arise from rainwater in no way supports a claim that the writer understands the entire water cycle, and probably the worst one is the claim that the term "joined entity" (or its variations) suggests that there was knowledge of a Big Bang like origin of the universe (especially given a 9+ billion year gap between this "joined together" entity and Earth even appearing).

I don't need to comment any more than I already have. These passages are simply too vague and nonspecific to support the claims you are making from them, and I keep repeating this because it is my whole point. The passages themselves are the evidence for this, if you want evidence. Just read them without your religious bias hat on and it is obvious that these passages are generic, poetic-like statements that don't come close to justifying a claim that they are ahead of their time and therefore divinely inspired. It is as simple as that.
I’ve posted evidence for these modern scientific concepts and you have not supported any of your statements with any whatsoever.
I've only made one simple point, over and over. The passages are too vague and nonspecific to allow the interpretations you are making. My support for this is the passages themselves, and their obvious lack of anything within them that suggests knowledge of future scientific principles. Only selective interpretation and extrapolation well beyond what is actually written can lead to the wild claims you are making.
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Post #92

Post by Abdelrahman »

I don't think you understand how this works. YOU are the one who has made fantastic claims.... So it is YOUR responsibility to show that those claims are valid, and I am challenging your explanations and attempts to do that because they don't support your claims.
Atheists think that the onus is on the believers to provide evidence, and I agree, and have done just that with my 13 references. However that does not excuse you from providing evidence to back your claims of the opposite. You have claimed that the words are vague due to them carrying multiple meaning in ENGLISH and that we are selectively interpreting them while not backing this idea up with an iota of evidence.

You spent a good 75% of this debate challenging that ‘pass’ can mean many different things and thus it is too vague. I responded to each and every one of your claims with evidence backing up that it does in fact mean movement of the entire mountain.

It is you who has not provided a dot of evidence backing your claim that it can mean many different things. Now you change your stance (proving that I made my point) and state that alright it means movement but so what?

Your entire argument has been based on the premise that if ‘pass’ means 5 things in English it must also do so in Arabic and thus it is vague. I have proved with 13 references that Arabic is different and all you have done is ignore and move on.
Nothing you have presented shows that these passages ... any of them ... are clear enough to mean what you are claiming they mean....year gap between this "joined together" entity and Earth even appearing).
And now you finally admit that ‘pass’ does mean movement, but then you ask so what? So what if it means movement, it doesn’t refer to the details of plate tectonics, it doesn’t give you seismic activity graphs and outline subduction, right?

What you seem to forget is the very statement that mountains move in their entirety is decades ahead of its time. As simple as a statement it is to us today, such an idea is decades ahead of its time – what makes it even more special is that God challenges disbelievers in Him that this very statement is a reason to believe. Showing the incentive of providing such a ‘sign’.

God doesn’t spell out tectonic plate movement, you’re right. But the very very simple statement that mountains move, is hundreds of years ahead of its time.

Same with the rain water verse. You are right, stating that springs arose from rainwater does not describe the water cycle in its intricacies and details. But the very statement, is one the great Leonardo got wrong hundreds of years later. Aristotle got wrong. Bartholomew of England (whom people associate the first encyclopedia’s to) got it wrong.

It is one of the simplest things in the water cycle and yet it took another couple decades for science to prove it. To us today, such a statement is so simple even a student in junior school can tell you this. But 1400 years ago it’s an advanced idea that desert Bedouins could not have guessed, its hundreds of years before the West discovered the very same simple statement – that spring water originates from rain water.

You need to understand what we are saying here. These verses are not scientifically detailed and intricate with numbers and lab results. As simple as they sound to you, these ideas were not discovered for another couple of hundred years by the West.

In addition, the very statement that all planetary bodies and Earth originate from a common source and that said source is described as a ‘smoke’ – as simple as it sounds to you is more than a thousand years ahead of its time. It’s interesting to note how far you have went to prove that the universe was not once a hot gas cloud – without evidence.

This very statement, along with all the rest, as simple as they are today – are miraculous advances in understanding at the time. To guess such things is to state that Leonardo could not have guessed the same things. To state that Aristotle could have just looked at the sky and deduced the same things, then why didn’t he?
and I keep repeating this because it is my whole point. The passages themselves are the evidence for this, if you want evidence. Just read them without your religious bias hat on and it is obvious that these passages are generic, poetic-like statements that don't come close to justifying a claim that they are ahead of their time and therefore divinely inspired. It is as simple as that.
You need to understand scientific history to understand why such a simple statement is ahead of its time by hundreds of years. I’ve referenced great Western thinkers that got this very simple statement wrong hundreds of years later.
I've only made one simple point, over and over. The passages are too vague and nonspecific to allow the interpretations you are making....
Again to summarize as I outlined in the debate history above. You spent the good half of this debate arguing that ‘pass’ is vague and can mean other things (a claim you have not backed up with evidence), after a good 8 pages of thread you have not addressed any of my references arguing otherwise, and now you state alright It means move but so what? Meaning my argument was effectively made.

Now you state so what? So what it says move, or that springs originate from rain water – it’s not the entire water cycle and you’re right. I agree. It doesn’t outline the entire water cycle. But all scientific theories began somewhere, began with a very simple observation. Newton developed his theories from a simple apple falling on his head.

The very infancy of the water cycle, the very simple statement made, hadn’t had been discovered for another 700 years. It is simple to us now, but such a statement, is advanced to the people of the past – no man can guess such things - as simple as they sound today.

You need to take off your goggles of modernity and realize that at one point in history, such simple statements were advanced scientific ideas. And to think that a group of desert bedouins got it right but the great thinkers of the West got it wrong hundreds of years later is pretty remarkable.

I've posted references of modern western scientists that agree that these statements are ahead of their time in each of their respective fields, and brunumbs posted resource, also admits these very simple statements are 'out of place'.

I’m glad that after 13 references you finally agree that ‘pass’ means movement. It was tiring but well worth it :) Although I urge you to back up your claims with evidence more.

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Post #93

Post by DrNoGods »

[Replying to post 92 by Abdelrahman]
However that does not excuse you from providing evidence to back your claims of the opposite.


As I've said many times, my evidence is the passages themselves. They don't imply what you are claiming they do (ie. knowledge of scientific principles or theories that were only learned much later).
What you seem to forget is the very statement that mountains move in their entirety is decades ahead of its time.


Not when it is made equating the mountain's movement as passing like clouds. It is a poetic, generic statement with no mechanism described, and could easily mean (as I've pointed out before) that Allah moves the mountains just as he "sends down" rain. There is no way to equate this vague description to some knowledge of tectonic plate theory. It simply isn't there, yet you keep insisting that this passage indicates some knowledge that mountains move due to the reasons we understand today, when there is no reference to that mechanism anywhere in the passage and no way to force it to be there apart from wishful thinking. Allah could be responsible for the movement because he feels like it and that would be just as compatible with the passage as your claim that it suggests knowledge of crustal plate movement.
You spent a good 75% of this debate challenging that ‘pass’ can mean many different things and thus it is too vague.


That was probably 10%, but is irrelevant. I granted that very early on and it is a minor point that you want to harp on for some reason. It doesn't matter that pass means lateral movement in Arabic (or whatever the Arabic word is), without reference to a mechanism for the movement it could easily be simply that Allah decided to make mountains move because he is thought to be a god. That mechanism is perfectly compatible with the vague passage from the Qur'an.
But the very statement, is one the great Leonardo got wrong hundreds of years later. Aristotle got wrong. Bartholomew of England (whom people associate the first encyclopedia’s to) got it wrong.


It doesn't matter who got it wrong before it was understood. People do this all the time where some great scientist of the past got something wrong and they point it out as if it were relevant. It isn't. Newton believed in the Christian god, but that has no bearing whatsoever on whether or not he was right on that. Calculus has no dependence on Newton's religious beliefs.
To guess such things is to state that Leonardo could not have guessed the same things. To state that Aristotle could have just looked at the sky and deduced the same things, then why didn’t he?


It is irrelevant what Da Vinci thought, or what Aristotle thought. It is what they could prove scientifically that mattered, and they didn't happen to be around when certain things were discovered, or when the Qur'an was written (one was long dead, the other not yet born). What's the point of bringing up these guys in the context of whether 1400 year old passages from the Qur'an are vague or not? Their views on any of this are completely irrelevant to the discussion.
I’ve referenced great Western thinkers that got this very simple statement wrong hundreds of years later.


And it is just as utterly irrelevant. Whether these Western thinkers got it wrong hundreds of years later has no bearing whatsoever on whether the passages from the Qur'an under discussion imply knowledge of modern science and were therefore divinely inspired. Why you keep bringing this up is beyond me, but you've done it repeatedly. It doesn't matter what Da Vinci thought about any of this!
You spent the good half of this debate arguing that ‘pass’ is vague and can mean other things (a claim you have not backed up with evidence.


Very little time was spent on the meaning of the word "pass", most of the time has been spent with the one, simple point that the passages are all too vague to conclude what you are concluding. How many times do I have to repeat this exact same thing? No need for you to keep running off on tangents about the meaning of the word pass as if the whole discussion was about that. It was a minor point with not much time spent on it, and you are blowing it out of proportion for some reason.
You need to take off your goggles of modernity and realize that at one point in history, such simple statements were advanced scientific ideas. And to think that a group of desert bedouins got it right but the great thinkers of the West got it wrong hundreds of years later is pretty remarkable.


But these simple desert bedouins didn't get it right! That is the point. They made vague statements that you are interpreting wrongly and reading far too much into than is justifiable from the passages themselves. And, again, it is irrelevant what Da Vinci or anyone else thought centuries later. Do you somehow think that because Da Vinci got something wrong that this makes the vague Qur'an statement right? There is no connection between these at all.
Although I urge you to back up your claims with evidence more.


I am not the one making claims ... you are. I am challenging your claims by pointing out that the passages you are deriving them from are too vague and nonspecific to allow the conclusions you are making. There is no evidence to provide for this other than the passages themselves. Anyone can read them and conclude that they don't imply the meanings that you are claiming. They are not specific enough, and far from it, and that is the point.
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Post #94

Post by brunumb »

[Replying to post 92 by Abdelrahman]
You need to take off your goggles of modernity and realize that at one point in history, such simple statements were advanced scientific ideas. And to think that a group of desert bedouins got it right but the great thinkers of the West got it wrong hundreds of years later is pretty remarkable.
It's funny that when Wegener proposed his theory of continental drift back in 1912 no scientists familiar with the Qur'an supported him by quoting the passages you have presented. It took another 20 years for his theory to make any headway and still no Middle Eastern support. But all that aside, the suggestion that mountains move sideways is not really an accurate description of what happens. Tectonic plates, containing the continents, move sideways and where they collide mountain ranges are pushed up. The Qur'an makes no mention of actual land masses moving sideways does it?
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Post #95

Post by Abdelrahman »

Just to note, I am not quoting your entire passages so that my posts don't get too long. But I will address every point made in each passage without quoting it all.
As I've said many times, my evidence is the passages themselves. They don't imply what you are claiming they do (ie. knowledge of scientific principles or theories that were only learned much later).
When you are trying to claim that a word is vague since it carries 5 meanings in English and so it must do so in Arabic – you must back up that claim with evidence.

The statement that the sentence is not scientific does not require evidence, obviously. Unless we are debating the science itself then you need to provide evidence (like when you state that the universe was not once a hot gas connected altogether – this needs evidence).

So you see I am only asking you for evidence for any claims you make that can be proven. If you look up at the debate history I’ve posted, I’ve detailed all the moments you made ‘claims’ that can be and need to be backed up with evidence.
Not when....
Again, Muslims believe Allah set the whole process up. He started the universe to run its course and is aware of all things. He is responsible for how nature has been set up, so trying to claim that He is physically moving the mountain with His hands directly is incorrect. He is behind it all, that’s what is meant.
That was probably 10%....
The debate history is just 4 posts above. 12 out of our 27 total posts have been on ‘pass’ alone. That’s not 10% but closer to 45%. Add in all the times you’ve debated the meaning of the words ‘joined entity’ and ‘expansion’ and ‘then’ that’s about 60% of this debate spent claiming that these words mean multiple things without backing up any of your claims with evidence.

It is not a minor point clearly. You’re entire argument has been based on you claiming these words contain multiple meanings in English thus they are unclear in meaning – vague. It can mean so many different things so we can’t say it means spring water emerges from rain water.

Again, when we say Allah does things, Muslims don’t believe in a large white bearded man looking down from heaven like Zeus. Allah is beyond any physical constraints and the laws of physics in our universe. He started the entire process and up keeps it as He wishes. But to state that the verse means God is moving the mountain with his direct hands is not true, He is the one who is behind the entire system.

So you see, the very statement, no matter how you try and bend it, as simple as it is….is decades ahead of its time.
It doesn't matter who got it...
Actually it matters a lot since you claimed that such an observation is ‘simple’ and can be made by anyone just by looking up at the sky and observing rain water. You said anyone can make that observation and that it isn’t significant. I agree Newton’s work has no bearing on his religious beliefs but I am not debating Leonardo’s religious beliefs - I am talking of the science, his field.

I referenced great Western thinkers to ask, if it is so simple, then how come they couldn’t make the same ‘simple’ observation in their fields? I am not talking about what they believed religiously.. I am talking about their scientific work. How is an illiterate man 1400 years ago better prepared to make such an observation better than Leonardo, Aristotle and Bartholomew whom are all significant contributors in their respective fields?

These are thinkers who would have understood the natural sciences of the world better than the Arab Bedouins surely?

It is like a man today from a remote tribal island stating something about the natural world, that today’s modern scientists got wrong, and only in a couple of hundred years do we discover the significance of their statements.

To state that such statements are ‘simple’ and can be made by anyone is to challenge Leonardo, Aristotle and Bartholomew as men who couldn’t make the same very simple statements by just ‘looking up at the sky’.
It is irrelevant what...
Again, it is because you made the claim that such an observation is ‘simple’ and that ‘anyone’ can make it. I am challenging your claim with the question, then why didn’t Leonardo, Aristotle and Bartholomew just look up and deduce the same conclusion?

It is simple fact that although the statement is simple to us today, it was an advanced idea in the past and had not been discovered for another couple hundred years.
Very little time was spent...
Because you spent 45% (near half) of this debate just on the meaning of the word ‘pass’. And it took this long because you never once debated my references or posted any of your own backing your claim that ‘pass’ can mean other things!

It’s pretty ridiculous when you say that very little time was spent on this when the history of our debate is 4 posts above for anyone to see. You entire argument has been based off meanings being unclear, only now you change your stance.

I do not wish to spend any time on it anymore since I’ve proven beyond a doubt now what it means and you’ve admitted it. But do not say that you did not waste a good half of this debate giving us your opinion on what ‘pass’ means without any evidence whatsoever – debate is all about backing up your claims up. When I ask for evidence it is for things like this. Your alternative translations for ‘pass’ or any other word you want to debate the meaning of.

When you say the passages themselves are enough then don’t debate the meaning of the words and tell me that ‘pass’ means 12 things in English and so it must also in Arabic – if you’re going to make such statements back those kind of statements up with evidence. I hope it's clear now what I mean by provide evidence.
But these simple desert bedouins didn't get it right! ...
“Have you not seen that Allah sent down water from the sky, then made it penetrate into the earth (and gush forth) in the form of springs?� – The Holy Qur’an [39:21]
So simple. Yet hundreds of years before its time. This Ayah (verse/sign) above is as clear as day. And it is scientifically on point.

The verse says rain water gushes forth from the earth in the form of springs. I am not reading any deeper into it or interpreting it any different to what it is saying. It is as clear as day. If you want to propose an alternative interpretation to a very clear statement in English then go ahead, but back it up.

This very very very simple statement was not discovered for another 700 years at least. It is not the entirety of the Water cycle. It is not a geographical journal. It is a very simple statement to us today, but 1400 years ago, it was advanced. And to state that a man just guessed this along with everything else in the Qur’an, is not logical.
I am not the one making claims ...
Again, the first half of your argument has been that ‘pass’ or any of the words we’ve debated, can mean 8 things in English and thus they mean 8 things in Arabic and we are cherry picking the interpretation as we see fit. This is a claim. This claim must be backed up with evidence since it is not true.

Anytime you make a claim like the one above you must provide evidence. Not all your statements require evidence, but most of your claims that these words have alternative meanings must be backed up.

Now you have finally agreed that they mean what we claim, which is great. Now we can actually debate the significance of such simple statements and why we believe they are miraculous to be mentioned 1400 years ago. Now the debate actually starts.

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Post #96

Post by DrNoGods »

[Replying to post 95 by Abdelrahman]
Again, the first half of your argument has been that ‘pass’ or any of the words we’ve debated, can mean 8 things in English and thus they mean 8 things in Arabic and we are cherry picking the interpretation as we see fit. This is a claim. This claim must be backed up with evidence since it is not true.


Why are you so focused on the word pass and what it means? That was a tiny part of the discussion and hardly any time was spent on it. Yet you keep bringing up that one point as if it were the basis of the entire discussion. Why you are so infatuated with that word is beyond me. But forget it and pick one of the other passages ... they all have the same problem.

The main point I have been making since the start is that these passages from the Qur'an are in general far too vague to draw the conclusions you are making. There is no evidence to present for that from my side ... the passages speak for themselves as they have no specifics to allow the wild claims you are making.

You're simply doing the exact same thing people do with Nostradamus when they try to claim he could predict the future. Would you buy those arguments? They are identical to yours in terms of methodology ... reading far too much into vague phrases to make them mean something that doesn't follow from the text itself. Selective interpretation based on a bias ... in your case that bias is that the Qur'an is some kind of holy book with divine inspiration.
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Re:

Post #97

Post by AhmedGamalSEO »

[Replying to Abdelrahman in post #85]

But Have you read this article about who wrote the Quran and learn the arguments there?
https://explore-islam.com/the-real-author-of-the-quran/

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Re: Re:

Post #98

Post by JoeyKnothead »

AhmedGamalSEO wrote: Tue May 23, 2023 6:47 am [Replying to Abdelrahman in post #85]
But Have you read this article about who wrote the Quran and learn the arguments there?
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Re: Why Islam does not clash with modern science, or does it

Post #99

Post by Clownboat »

mms20102 wrote: Mon Apr 13, 2020 8:28 am [Replying to post 25 by DrNoGods]

Again since you are not an Arabic speaker you will not understand translating and understanding the text. We can translate the meanings, but one passage can have more than one meaning and its all correlated, that's the main idea.
It is not logical that a God would create a message for all, but then require pastors, priests, Imams or theologians to then interpret said message.
We have lots of evidence that humans have written holy books/religious promotional material. What we don't have is any evidence for any of the god concepts humans have invented.

Cart before the horse.
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Re:

Post #100

Post by Clownboat »

brunumb wrote: Mon Apr 20, 2020 12:50 am [Replying to post 92 by Abdelrahman]
You need to take off your goggles of modernity and realize that at one point in history, such simple statements were advanced scientific ideas. And to think that a group of desert bedouins got it right but the great thinkers of the West got it wrong hundreds of years later is pretty remarkable.
It's funny that when Wegener proposed his theory of continental drift back in 1912 no scientists familiar with the Qur'an supported him by quoting the passages you have presented. It took another 20 years for his theory to make any headway and still no Middle Eastern support. But all that aside, the suggestion that mountains move sideways is not really an accurate description of what happens. Tectonic plates, containing the continents, move sideways and where they collide mountain ranges are pushed up. The Qur'an makes no mention of actual land masses moving sideways does it?
When there is no evidence for the god concepts, the desperation to make the holy books seem like they are special is the best that can be done. That is all that is happening here it seems. If only one religion stood out from the rest, but alas, the tactics to justify the gods are the same.

We have seen this from both Christians and Muslims on this board. Both are using the same reasoning and arriving at the same conclusion that their holy book is special. Those without a religious bias are free to observe this. Those with a religious bias are forced to assume their reasoning is special and are employing special pleading.

There are countless websites and books devoted to decoding divine mysteries by deploying creative math on Bible verses. Therefore the God of the Bible is the one true God!
Come on now, this would be a silly conclusion surely, but it's the best that can be done because no god concept can be shown to be more than a human invention. Therefore the religious promotional material becomes the god/idol.

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