8627 Assignment 1
8627 Assignment 1
8627 Assignment 1
Roll No : CE-614625
QUESTION NO. 1
Q.1 In which way the Quran, Hadith and Modern Science are related to
each other? Argue with suitable examples.
Answer:
One of harmony and not of discord. A confrontation between a religious book and
the secular ideas proclaimed by science is perhaps, in the eyes of many people today,
something of a paradox. The majority of today’s scientists, with a small number of
exceptions of course, is indeed bound up in materialist theories, and has only indifference or
contempt for religious questions which they often consider to be founded on legend. In the
West moreover, when science and religion are discussed, people are quite willing to
mention Judaism and Christianity among the religions referred to, but they hardly ever think
of Islam. So many false judgments based on inaccurate ideas have indeed been made about
it, that today it is The relationship between the Quran and science is a priori a surprise,
especially when it turns out to be very difficult to form an exact notion of the reality of
Islam. As a prelude to any confrontation between the Islamic Revelation and science, it
would seem essential that an outline be given of a religion that is so little known in the
West.
The totally erroneous statements made about Islam in the West are sometimes the
result of ignorance, and sometimes of systematic denigration. The most serious of all the
untruths told about it are however those dealing with facts; for while mistaken opinions are
excusable, the presentation of facts running contrary to the reality is not. It is disturbing to
read blatant untruths in eminently respectable works written by authors who a priori are
highly qualified. The following is an example taken from the Universalism Encyclopedia
(Encyclopedia Universalism) vol. 6. Under the heading Gospels (Evangels) the author alludes
to the differences between the latter and the Quran: "The evangelists (. . .) do not (. . .), as in
the Quran, claim to transmit an autobiography that God miraculously dictated to the
Prophet". In fact, the Quran has nothing to do with an autobiography: it is a preaching; a
consultation of even the worst translation would have made that clear to the author. The
statement we have quoted is as far from reality as if one were to define a Gospel as an
account of an evangelist's life. The person responsible for this untruth about the Quran is a
professor at the Jesuit Faculty of Theology, Lyon! The fact that people utter such untruths
helps to give a false impression of the Quran and Islam.
There is hope today however because religions are no longer as inward-looking as they were
and many of them are seeking for mutual understanding. One must indeed be impressed by
a knowledge of the fact that an attempt is being made on the highest level of the hierarchy
by Roman Catholics to establish contact with Muslims; they are trying to fight
incomprehension and are doing their utmost to change the inaccurate views on Islam that
are so widely held.
Al-Qur’an, the main source of the Islamic faith, is a book believed by Muslims, to be of
completely Divine origin. Muslims also believe that it contains guidance for all mankind.
Since the message of the Qur’an is believed to be for all times, it should be relevant to every
age. Does the Qur’an pass this test? In this booklet, I intend to give an objective analysis of
the Muslim belief regarding the Divine origin of the Qur’an, in the light of established
scientific discoveries. There was a time, in the history of world civilization, when ‘miracles’,
or what was perceived to be a miracle, took precedence over human reason and logic. But
how do we define the term ‘miracle’? A miracle is anything that takes place out of the
normal course of life and for which humankind has no explanation. However, we must be
careful before we accept something as a miracle. An article in ‘The Times of India’ Mumbai,
in 1993 reported that ‘a saint’ by the name ‘Baba Pilot’ claimed to have stayed continuously
submerged under water in a tank for three consecutive days and nights. However, when
reporters wanted to examine the base of the tank of water where he claimed to have
performed this ‘miraculous’ feat, he refused to let them do so. He argued by asking as to
how one could examine the womb of a mother that gives birth to a child. The ‘Baba’ was
hiding something. It was a gimmick simply to gain publicity.
For many centuries, humankind was unable to study certain data contained in the
verses of the Qur’an because they did not possess sufficient scientific means. It is only today
that numerous verses of the Qur’an dealing with natural phenomena have become
comprehensible. A reading of old commentaries on the Qur’an, however knowledgeable
their authors may have been in their day, bears solemn witness to a total inability to grasp
the depth of meaning in such verses. I could even go so far as to say that, in the 20th
century, with its compartmentalization of ever-increasing knowledge, it is still not easy for
the average scientist to understand everything he reads in the Qur’an on such subjects,
without having recourse to specialized research. This means that to understand all such
verses of the Qur’an, one is nowadays required to have an absolutely encyclopedic
knowledge embracing many scientific disciplines.
I should like to stress, that I use the word science to mean knowledge which has been
soundly established. It does not include the theories which, for a time, help to explain a
phenomenon or a series of phenomena, only to be abandoned later on in favor of other
explanations. These newer explanations have become more plausible thanks to scientific
progress. I only intend to deal with comparisons between statements in the Qur’an and
scientific knowledge which are not likely to be subject to further discussion. Wherever I
introduce scientific facts which are not yet 100% established, I will make it quite clear.
There are also some very rare examples of statements in the Qur’an which have not,
as yet, been confirmed by modern science. I shall refer to these by pointing out that all the
evidence available today leads scientists to regard them as being highly probable. An
example of this is the statement in the Qur’an that life has an aquatic origin (“And I created
every living thing out of water” Qur’an, 21:30 ).These scientific considerations should not,
however, make us forget that the Qur’an remains a religious book par excellence and that it
cannot be expected to have a scientific purpose per se. In the Qur’an, whenever humans are
invited to reflect upon the wonders of creation and the numerous natural phenomena, they
can easily see that the obvious intention is to stress Divine Omnipotence. The fact that, in
these reflections, we can find allusions to data connected with scientific knowledge is surely
another of God’s gifts whose value must shine out in an age where scientifically based
atheism seeks to gain control of society at the expense of the belief in God. But the Qur’an
does not need unusual characteristics like this to make its supernatural nature felt. Scientific
statements such as these are only one specific aspect of the Islamic revelation which the
Bible does not share.
Reference:
AIOU Course book 8627 ‘’Foundation of Science Education’’.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_education
www.scribd.com
www.google.com
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/
288567624_The_scientific_foundations_of_teaching_and_learning
QUESTION NO. 2
Ibn Hazm, (994-1064 C.E) was a Muslim litterateur, historian, jurist, and theologian of
Islamic Spain. One of the leading exponents of the Zahiri (literalist) school of jurisprudence,
he produced some 400 works, covering jurisprudence, logic, history, ethics, comparative
religion, and theology, and The Ring of the Dove, on the art of love.
Al-Zarqali (Arzachel) (1028-1087 C.E); an astronomer who invented astrolabe (an
instrument used to make astronomical measurements). Al-Ghazali (Algazel) (1058-1111 C.E);
was a scholar of sociology, theology & philosophy.
Ibn Zuhr (Avenzoar) (1091-1161 C.E); was a scientist and expert in surgery &
medicine. Ibn Rushd (Averroes) (1128- 1198 C.E); excelled in philosophy, law, medicine,
astronomy & theology. Nasir Al-Din Al-Tusi (1201-1274 C.E); was the scholar of astronomy
and Non Euclidean geometry.
Geber (flourished in 14th century Spain) is author of several books that were among
the most influential works on alchemy and metallurgy during the 14th and 15th centuries. A
number of Arabic scientific works credited to Jabir were translated into Latin during the
11th to 13th centuries. Thus, when an author who was probably a practicing Spanish
alchemist began to write in about 1310. Four works by Geber are known: Summa
perfectionism magisterii (The Sum of Perfection or the Perfect Magistery, 1678), Liber
fornacum (Book of Furnaces, 1678), De investigatione perfectionis (The Investigation of
Perfection, 1678), and De invention veritatis (The Invention of Verity, 1678). They are the
clearest expression of alchemical theory and the most important set of laboratory directions
to appear before the 16th century. Accordingly, they were widely read and extremely
influential in a field where mysticism, secrecy, and obscurity were the usual rule. Geber’s
rational approach, however, did much to give alchemy a firm and respectable position in
Europe. His practical directions for laboratory procedures were so clear that it is obvious he
was familiar with many chemical operations. He described the purification of chemical
compounds, the preparation of acids (such as nitric and sulfuric), and the construction and
use of laboratory apparatus, especially furnaces. Geber’s works on chemistry were not
equaled in their field until the 16th century with the appearance of the writings of the
Italian chemist Vannoccio Biringuccio, the German mineralogist Georgius Agricola, and the
German alchemist Lazarus Ercker.
Muhammad Ibn Abdullah (Ibn Battuta) (1304-1369 C.E); was a world traveler, he
traveled 75,000 mile voyage from Morocco to China and back. Ibn Khaldun (1332-1395 C.E)
was an expert on sociology, philosophy of history and political science.
Tipu, Sultan of Mysore (1783-1799 C.E) in the south of India, was the innovator of
the world’s first war rocket. Two of his rockets, captured by the British at Srirangapatana,
are displayed in the Woolwich Museum of Artillery in London. The rocket motor casing was
made of steel with multiple nozzles. The rocket, 50mm in diameter and 250mm long, had a
range performance of 900 meters to 1.5 km. Turkish scientist Hazarfen Ahmet Celebi took
off from Galata tower and flew over the Bosphorus, two hundred years before a comparable
development elsewhere. Fifty years later Logari Hasan Celebi, another member of the Celebi
family, sent the first manned rocket into upper atmosphere, using 150 okka (about 300
pounds) of gunpowder as the firing fuel.
Reference
AIOU Course book 8627 ‘’Foundation of Science Education’’.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_education
www.scribd.com
www.google.com
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/
288567624_The_scientific_foundations_of_teaching_and_learning
QUESTION NO.3
Q.3 Do you agree that Science and Philosophy a reinter-reliant? If yes, How? If
otherwise, why? Give cogent response.
ANSWER:
IT is a branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and
implications of science. The central questions of this study concern what qualifies as science,
the reliability of scientific theories, and the ultimate purpose of science. This discipline
overlaps with metaphysics, ontology, and epistemology, for example, when it explores the
relationship between science and truth. There is no consensus among philosophers about
many of the central problems concerned with the philosophy of science, including whether
science can reveal the truth about unobservable things and whether scientific reasoning can
be justified at all. In addition to these general questions about science as a whole,
philosophers of science consider problems that apply to particular sciences (such as biology
or physics). Some philosophers of science also use contemporary results in science to reach
conclusions about philosophy itself.
While philosophical thought pertaining to science dates back at least to the time of
Aristotle, philosophy of science emerged as a distinct discipline only in the middle of the
20th century in the wake of the logical positivism movement, which aimed to formulate
criteria for ensuring all philosophical statements' meaningfulness and objectively assessing
them. Thomas Kuhn's landmark 1962 book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions was also
formative, challenging the view of scientific progress as steady, cumulative acquisition of
knowledge based on a fixed method of systematic experimentation and instead arguing that
any progress is relative to a "paradigm," the set of questions, concepts, and practices that
define a scientific discipline in a particular historical period. Karl Popper and Charles Sanders
Pierce moved on from positivism to establish a modern set of standards for scientific
methodology.
Subsequently, the coherentist approach to science, in which a theory is validated if it
makes sense of observations as part of a coherent whole, became prominent due to W. V.
Quine and others. Some thinkers such as Stephen Jay Gould seek to ground science in
axiomatic assumptions, such as the uniformity of nature. A vocal minority of philosophers,
and Paul Feyerabend (1924–1994) in particular, argue that there is no such thing as the
"scientific method", so all approaches to science should be allowed, including explicitly
supernatural ones. Another approach to thinking about science involves studying how
knowledge is created from a sociological perspective, an approach represented by scholars
like David Bloor and Barry Barnes. Finally, a tradition in continental philosophy approaches
science from the perspective of a rigorous analysis of human experience.
Philosophies of the particular sciences range from questions about the nature of time raised
by Einstein's general relativity, to the implications of economics for public policy. A central
theme is whether one scientific discipline can be reduced to the terms of another. That is,
can chemistry be reduced to physics, or can sociology be reduced to individual psychology?
The general questions of philosophy of science also arise with greater specificity in some
particular sciences. For instance, the question of the validity of scientific reasoning is seen in
a different guise in the foundations of statistics. The question of what counts as science and
what should be excluded arises as a life-or-death matter in the philosophy of medicine.
Additionally, the philosophies of biology, of psychology, and of the social sciences explore
whether the scientific studies of human nature can achieve objectivity or are inevitably
shaped by values and by social relations.
When you hear the term science, it is typically associated with the term technology
“especially when the two are talked about as subjects in school. Although these two terms
are often interchanged, there is actually a sparse difference between the two. Perhaps the
best way to differentiate science and technology, is to have a quick definition of each term.
Science is a systematic knowledge base, where a series of steps is followed in order to
reliably predict the type of outcome. It can be broadly defined as the study of things with
branches like biology, chemistry, physics and psychology.
Technology, on the other hand, is more of an applied science. It is where tools and
knowledge are used for the study of a particular science. For example, the science of energy
can have technology as its application. In the case of energy as a subject in science, solar
panels can be used for a variety of technologies, an example of which are solar-powered
lights. If the goal of science is the pursuit of knowledge for science’s sake, technology aims
to create systems to meet the needs of people. Science has a quest of explaining something,
while technology is leaning more towards developing a use for something. Science focuses
more on analysis, generalizations and the creation of theories ‘“ while with technology, it
focuses more on analysis and synthesis of design. Science is controlled by experimentation,
while technology also involves design, invention and production. If science is all about
theories, technology is all about processes. Finally, in order for you to excel in science, you
need to have experimental and logical skills. Meanwhile, technology requires a myriad of
skills including design, construction, testing, quality assurance and problem-solving.
Science from the Latin scientia (knowledge) is a system of acquiring knowledge
based on the scientific method, as well as the organized body of knowledge gained through
such research. Science as defined here is sometimes termed pure science to differentiate it
from applied science, which is the application of scientific research to specific human needs.
Technology is a broad concept that deals with a species' usage and knowledge of tools and
crafts, and how it affects a species' ability to control and adapt to its environment. In human
society, it is a consequence of science and engineering, although several technological
advances predate the two concepts. Science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge. This
system uses observation and experimentation to describe and explain natural phenomena.
The term science also refers to the organized body of knowledge people have gained using
that system. Fields of science are commonly classified along two major lines: 1. Natural
sciences, which study natural phenomena (including biological life), 2. Social sciences, which
study human behavior and societies. These groupings are empirical sciences, which means
the knowledge must be based on observable phenomena and capable of being tested for its
validity by other researchers working under the same conditions.
Reference
AIOU Course book 8627 ‘’Foundation of Science Education’’.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_education
www.scribd.com
www.google.com
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/
288567624_The_scientific_foundations_of_teaching_and_learning
QUESTION NO.4