Why is history so Euro-centric? [In English]

[depe_3rd]

[lang=en]What's the reason that history usually only mentions European mathematicians, scientists, inventors, etc...even though the scientific method, writing systems, and most of mathematics were invented by non-Europeans?

Is history just a form of racism? Shouldn't history just be about actual past events?

Gw mengajak berdebat soal ini 1 vs 1. Dan yang posting di bawah gw ini, gw anggap sebagai 'lawan' dalam debat 1 vs 1 ini. [/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]meeeh...1 vs 1...)

Ok I'll take it...


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]Bujubuseet, I don't expect this
but it's ok.

Shoot[/lang]

 

[theater]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]cuz.. .. no one important inventors in indonesia..
most of people in europe like writing... perhaps...
wokokwokwowkwko

[/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]History as taught in Europe (or offshoots) tends to be Eurocentric. History taught in China tends to be Sinocentric. History taught in India would tend to focus on India. In America tends to Americacentric. Get the point? )

What's the reason that history usually only mentions European mathematicians, scientists, inventors, etc...even though the scientific method, writing systems, and most of mathematics were invented by non-Europeans?

I'm wholly comfortable that you are completely wrong on the first point. I have strong reservations about the second point. Would you like to justify your assertions?

Is history just a form of racism? Shouldn't history just be about actual past events?

Europe represents the cradle of civilization and the entire history of USA starts from Europe. The biggest scientist and eminent historical people WERE indeed in Europe.... Einstein, Hitler, Faraday, Stephen Hawking, Newton, Maria and Pierre, Huygens, Alexender The Great, Nobel, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Plato, Tesla, Pushkin....etc

Why do you say history isn't based on actual past events?


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]

cuz.. .. no one important inventors in indonesia..
most of people in europe like writing... perhaps...
wokokwokwowkwko

Europe represents the cradle of civilization and the entire history of USA starts from Europe. The biggest scientist and eminent historical people WERE indeed in Europe.... Einstein, Hitler, Faraday, Stephen Hawking, Newton, Maria and Pierre, Huygens, Alexender The Great, Nobel, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Plato, Tesla, Pushkin....etc

-dipi-

I'm wholly comfortable that you are completely wrong on the first point. I have strong reservations about the second point. Would you like to justify your assertions?

No, I am completely correct

al-Haytham, an Arab from Egypt, born in Iraq was the one who invented the modern day scientific method

His Book of Optics got translated into Latin in the 1200s and Roger Bacon read it. Roger Bacon cites Ibn al-Haytham by name in his texts, and Ibn al-Haytham texts detail the scientific method, as well many other things.

This is a confirmed historical fact, but al-Haytham is not really ever mentioned in history class at all, instead Roger Bacon, Galileo, and other Europeans are mentioned

The base 10 system, number zero, trigonometry, parts of calculus, and nearly everything in mathematics were invented by non-Europeans, mostly Arabs, Indians, and the Chinese. In my Number Theory class, a lot of the things come from non-Europeans, like the Egyptian fraction formula and Chinese Remainder theorem. Even the words algorithm and algebra come from Arabic.

Without the number zero and the base 10 system doing math is a lot more difficult.

Why do you say history isn't based on actual past events?

It is important to recognise that history is based upon our current interpretation of what we know of actual past events. That is quite different from saying it is based upon actual past events.

Anyway, When you say "biggest scientist and eminent historical people", this is a subjective interpretation based on your own cultural upbringing. Mao is much more important to the Chinese people than any of those figures are.

I could name a slew of important non-Europeans. It is perhaps valid to say most of the more important scientific discoveries have come out of the West in the last 400 years, it is nonsense to place writers, musicians, and philosophers on any pedestal. You grow up exposed to nothing but Western art so you assume other form of art simply doesn't exist. The artistic history of the rest of the world goes just as deep as anything Europe has produced. Sometimes deeper, with works like Gilgamesh and the Book of Songs predating any surviving Western writings.

If history wasn't Eurocentric then Ibn al-Haytham would be as famous as Newton or Galileo, he is not, and usually never listed nor mentioned when people mention the "greatest scientists"

If history wasn't Eurocentric then Zhu Shijie would be more famous than Blaise Pascal

If history wasn't Eurocentric then Aryabhata would be as famous as Archimedes

This is what I mean when I say history is Euro-centric, and not about actual past events, about "whites only" past events.

[/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]I'll quoting this: "If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants" - Isaac Newton.

even if the giants are non-european, most of the last inventions(1500 A.D-This Moment) had been invented by europeans, and that is what we remember. and considering the fact the you are learning about those non-europeans scientists, I won't say that history ingores those people.

When we were learned in high school, In the last year we learned about the Arabian Empire- inculding the scientists that you menthioned. So I guess it's depends on the education system and it's contents.

Many of the Arabian science is based on european science- for example, After the war between the Arabian Empire and the Byzantine Empire(around 830 A.D), many books translated into arbian from greek- those books, which transferred to Baghdad's library were the foundations of the Arbian Science. In addition, many of the arabian writings were based on the greek writings. And all this I know from my high school lessons.

So history does not ignore them- your country does. )


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]That's partially true, but I'm not talking about recent history, I'm talking when learning history prior to 400 years ago before Europeans took over

I'm not saying Europeans shouldn't be in history, I'm saying history should just be about the actual past events, independent of any race or nationality. If Europeans really discovered something first then it should be known, but if non-Europeans discovered something first then it should be known. This is just history, the actual past events. Not "European history" or whatever.

Also Ibn al-Haytham broke away from Greek philosophers and questioned them. He was the first true scientist who used the scientific method nearly 1.000 years ago, he claimed that light is made up of particles, travels in straight lines, and wrote over 200 books.

So what's the reason that Ibn al-Haytham isn't as famous as European scientists? I'm sure if Ibn al-Haytham had been a white European he would've been at least as famous as Francis Bacon[/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]al-Haytham melulu sih? )
Opo boso enggres'e melulu iki? )

I do not deny the work done by Ibn al-Haytham. The problem was communication. His work, unlike that of Copernicus and those who followed Copernicus, was not spread widely in Europe. Sure, a few scholars would have known of it. But only a few. The work of Galileo (inspired by Copernicus) and those who followed him in using empirical methods, was widely communicated to the scholars of Europe, and led to a flourishing of academic study using the scientific method. Great work was done by Arabic scholars even before Ibn al-Haytham. It was not their fault that their work was not as widely disseminated as it deserved.

Galileo preceded Bacon and Kepler, and they are much more likely to have been inspired by Galileo than Ibn al-Haytham. Even though Copernicus preceded him, and inspired him, Galileo was the first of the modern scientists, using the experimental method. However, after Galileo, a burgeoning number of western scientists followed, using empirical methods and uncovering discoveries at an ever increasing rate.

Ibn al-Haytham was definitely the first to use something approaching the modern scientific method. But he lived almost 600 years before Galileo ignited the scientific revolution. If his influence was so great, then why was there no scientific advance over that time?


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]

al-Haytham melulu sih? )
Opo boso enggres'e melulu iki? )

Solely

I do not deny the work done by Ibn al-Haytham. The problem was communication. His work, unlike that of Copernicus and those who followed Copernicus, was not spread widely in Europe. Sure, a few scholars would have known of it. But only a few. The work of Galileo (inspired by Copernicus) and those who followed him in using empirical methods, was widely communicated to the scholars of Europe, and led to a flourishing of academic study using the scientific method. Great work was done by Arabic scholars even before Ibn al-Haytham. It was not their fault that their work was not as widely disseminated as it deserved.

Galileo preceded Bacon and Kepler, and they are much more likely to have been inspired by Galileo than Ibn al-Haytham. Even though Copernicus preceded him, and inspired him, Galileo was the first of the modern scientists, using the experimental method. However, after Galileo, a burgeoning number of western scientists followed, using empirical methods and uncovering discoveries at an ever increasing rate.


-dipi-

WRONG!!!
I quote this from wiki

Roger Bacon was born in 1214
Galileo was born in 1564
Kepler was born in 1571

Ibn al-Haytham's Book of Optics was translated to Latin the 1200s, Roger Bacon cites Ibn al-Haytham by name in his texts, and Roger Bacon is known as one of the first European empiricists. Kepler cites Ibn al-Haytham in his books related to optics, and Galileo had read lots of Kepler's books. The only reason you insist that Galileo is the "real" founder of the scientific method is because you insist on using racism instead of historical evidence to determine what history is.

Nearly all modern historians agree that Ibn al-Haytham is the founder of the scientific method.

Ibn al-Haytham was definitely the first to use something approaching the modern scientific method. But he lived almost 600 years before Galileo ignited the scientific revolution. If his influence was so great, then why was there no scientific advance over that time?

He didn't have much influence over Arabs, the Arabs didn't seem to care that much about what Ibn al-Haytham did. <3D<3D<3D[/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]

Solely

Okay, kok al-Haytam solely seeh?? )

WRONG!!!


Ibn al-Haytham's Book of Optics was translated to Latin the 1200s, Roger Bacon cites Ibn al-Haytham by name in his texts, and Roger Bacon is known as one of the first European empiricists. Kepler cites Ibn al-Haytham in his books related to optics, and Galileo had read lots of Kepler's books. The only reason you insist that Galileo is the "real" founder of the scientific method is because you insist on using racism instead of historical evidence to determine what history is.

Nearly all modern historians agree that Ibn al-Haytham is the founder of the scientific method.

He didn't have much influence over Arabs, the Arabs didn't seem to care that much about what Ibn al-Haytham did. <3D<3D<3D

Ok, I admit I made a mistake with Roger Bacon's chronology.
It makes no difference. Let me quote Stephen Hawking :

"Galileo, perhaps more than any other single person, was responsible for the birth of modern science."

This is the consensus opinion of those who study the history of science. I am not deriding the work of the arabs, who did excellent work. As I have said repeatedly, the problem was communication. Their writings were not widely disseminated in Europe, and the early European scientists, like Galileo, operated largely in ignorance of the work of those arab scientists. Indeed, much of the early scientific work in Europe involved painstakingly repeating what had already been discovered by those arabs. eg. Newton's work on optics. The early European scientists would not have repeated that work if they knew of the arab results.

If we want to argue possible origins of science, we can go right back to the ancient Greeks. Aristotle did excellent empirical work in zoology. Eratosthenes actually calculated the circumference of the world (he knew it to be a sphere) to amazing accuracy. However, they did not inspire later scientists to carry out proper scientific work. Indeed, the reverence for Aristotle probably inhibited further scientific progress.

However, if we want to look at the origins of modern science, the first one to use its methods was Galileo. He was probably the most influential, driving his successors to using the methods of modern science. The work of arabs was, as I said, excellent, but did not drive ongoing development, due to lousy communication.


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[Second_Sister]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

-anak tengah-

 

[Second_Sister]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]Well... not Galileo exclusively, you must take into account context, it was the time, the people not the person.[/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]

Well... not Galileo exclusively, you must take into account context, it was the time, the people not the person.

You are correct. However, Galileo appears to be the first to apply fully the modern concept of empiricism. Copernicus preceded Galileo, and his influence was massive. However, Copernicus did no empirical studies, and hence could not be considered a 'scientist' in the modern sense. Leonardo da Vinci also preceded Galileo, and Leonardo did, indeed, carry out a small amount of empirical research. However, his importance was in other arenas. Galileo was the primary pioneer of the modern scientific method, even if he was influenced by others (mainly Copernicus). For this reason, it is convenient to designate the life of Galileo as the start of the modern era in science.


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]

Okay, kok al-Haytam solely seeh?? )

Ok, I admit I made a mistake with Roger Bacon's chronology.
It makes no difference. Let me quote Stephen Hawking :

This is the consensus opinion of those who study the history of science. I am not deriding the work of the arabs, who did excellent work. As I have said repeatedly, the problem was communication. Their writings were not widely disseminated in Europe, and the early European scientists, like Galileo, operated largely in ignorance of the work of those arab scientists. Indeed, much of the early scientific work in Europe involved painstakingly repeating what had already been discovered by those arabs. eg. Newton's work on optics. The early European scientists would not have repeated that work if they knew of the arab results.

If we want to argue possible origins of science, we can go right back to the ancient Greeks. Aristotle did excellent empirical work in zoology. Eratosthenes actually calculated the circumference of the world (he knew it to be a sphere) to amazing accuracy. However, they did not inspire later scientists to carry out proper scientific work. Indeed, the reverence for Aristotle probably inhibited further scientific progress.

However, if we want to look at the origins of modern science, the first one to use its methods was Galileo. He was probably the most influential, driving his successors to using the methods of modern science. The work of arabs was, as I said, excellent, but did not drive ongoing development, due to lousy communication.


-dipi-

Galileo's work in telescopes and optics only came out much after Kepler's books on optics were released, which were based off Ibn al-Haytham's earlier work.

Historical evidence clearly points towards Alhazen being the originator of modern science.[/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]like a circle, huh??? )

Ok, I'll take another POV then.....

• Where did the first man to calculated the circumpherence of the world come from?
• Where did the first man who's ship to circle around the world come from?
• Where did the first global(and evil) world empire, whose armies occupied other people's lands on all inhabited continents and on which the sun never set come from?
• Where was the airplane invented? And where did the frist man to fly around the world come from?
• Where did the engineers that started the Panama canal and Suez canal come from?
• Were did the first and second World wars that killed or affected people around the world start from?
• The first man to Orbit the world(Yuri gagarin)?

Are we being sexist by covering more breakthroughs made by men thoughout history, or is it that we cover what was, and that old societites happen to be sexist?

If you study the pre-1000 BC history, how much book material do you have about Europe's history compared to Egypt and messopotamian civilizations? Is that anti-European racism that there happens to be a lot to cover in the near east regions but not much to new stuff to go with in Europe during the same time period?

This being said, history is also written by the victor, and/or a local people, according to political considerations of a given time.

If the Axis would have won WW2 we would know all about the jewish declaration of war against Germany in the early 30s, how the US strangled Japan in economic warfare, be comemorating the evil bombing of Drezden and denouce the detention of japanese in US concetration camps, etc, etc, basically some of the same events would be cover differently and some events would be covered while they are not today, while others would not be covered while they are today.


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]weeksss!!

Time out! [/lang]

 

[Dipi76]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

[lang=en]give up?


-dipi-[/lang]

 

[depe_3rd]

Re: Debate in English: Why is history so Euro-centric?

 

[Dipi76]

[lang=en]beuuh....
just like that?
Ok then....)


-dipi-[/lang]