1001 Islamic Inventions

pev writes "There's a new traveling exhibition in the UK entitled 1001 inventions. It contains some of the most interesting inventions from the past few thousand years. The common theme, however, is that they all came from the Islamic world and not the west. In some cases [the list is] quite surprising. For the lazy, the Independent newspaper in the UK printed their top 20 from the exhibition."

But...

Mohammed lived a few hundred years after Jesus, so the Islam can never be more than 1.5 thousand years old!

Re:But...

Actually Islam didn't start with Mohammed. This is a fairly common misconception. It actually started with Adam & Eve. Mohammed didn't 'found' Islam, he is merely the last Prophet and perfected it.

Re:But...

No, exactly not like that.

Islam, as its holy tracts, includes (some subset of*) the Hebrew and the Christian testaments. Mohammed added very little, volume-wise, to the corpus. Bugger all, in reality, as it was people 100-200 years after Mohammed who were the creative ones** in their compilation of FoaF-attested Suras.

FP.
[* Likewise, Judaism only accepts a subset of the books into its current version of the official list; and Christianity only accepts a _tiny_ subset - there are several dozen Gospels that have bubbled into and out of popularity over the last 2 millennia, not just 4, for example.]
[** Just like Christianity.]

Re:But...

Islam can never be more than 1.5 thousand years old!

Come on! A thousand years from now, Islam will clearly be more than 1.5 thousand years old ;^)

[I'm actually surprised no one beat me to it.]

Re:But...

No, Mohammed didn't create the religion, he's just the last prophet.

Similarly, Jesus didn't really create Christianity, he was Jewish. The Jews that became Christians decided that Jesus was the son of God as foretold in the old Testament, while the rest of the Jews decided that he was just another prophet and the true son of God hadn't come yet.

Christianity traces its roots to before Christ, just as Islam traces its roots to a time before Mohammed.

Uh, no...

Jews did not and do not believe a "son of God" is coming back. Some do believe in a messiah, but that's completely different.

Christians like to read a lot into the Old Testament that isn't there.

Re:But...

Jesus didn't really create Christianity

I would have to disagree with this. Jesus's teachings went beyond the messiah prophesied by Isiah, and he did start a new religion (you know those stories about new wine and old wine skins, and you know that whole this third cup is a new cup now thing).

rest of the Jews decided that he was just another prophet and the true son of God hadn't come yet.

This is very telling. One of the main reasons that Jesus was dismissed by many as the messiah is because of his claim to be the son of God. The prophesies of the messiah say nothing about it being God's son. The jews are waiting for the messiah, not for God's son.

Christianity traces its roots to before Christ, just as Islam traces its roots to a time before Mohammed.

Christianity traces its roots to Christ. Before Christ it is judaism, and it is not Christian history but Jewish history. Now Jewish history is important to Christianity, but labeling it as christian roots is a bit like labeling British history as American roots (which while is important to America there are many more influences then just the British).

Noticed also.

For one it is yet another misleading headline, briefly checking in TFA those inventions came later than Mahomet.

However it doesn't make sense to me to associate those inventions from Arabs, Persians, Ottomans, ... to some religion, especially as these articles do not seem to cover other culture and civilization aspects and influences at all.

It's just about a book with fancy colours illustrating inventions from parts of the world where Islam is the main religion now.

Re:Noticed also.

I agree.

I'm Muslim, but I'm certainly not an Arab. For some reason Muslims are always associated with Arabs. Most Muslims are NOT Arabs.

My ancestor civilization was associated with the invention of guns and paper money, but since they were not Arab, those inventions will not be listed as Muslims.

OTOH Arab inventions since before the time of Mohammed are listed. To really know Muslims, you have to travel to Indonesia, Pakistan, Iran, Central Asia, Africa and Turkey as well as Arabia.

Re:Noticed also.

Yup. Then these enlightened people promptly subject themselves to their own dark ages.

At least Xianity can blame the Germans.

The fact that those parts of the world were civilized 500 years ago doesn't tell you much about what to expect out of them now. Rather than publishing these sorts of stories in english language newspapers, perhaps Al-jazeera should be at this. Then perhaps modern Egyptians will be more prone to take up civil engineering.

Re:Noticed also.

There's a huge tract of scientific literature out there that credits a pan Greco-Chaldean (that's Greeks, Romans, Bactrians, ancient Persians, Indo-Greeks some of who may or may not have been Muslim; the Indo-Greeks of Gandhara, or Kandhahar, as the city is now known, were Buddhist, for instance) tradition with most of the astronomic contributions lately. For instance, it was the Greco-Chaldeans who introduced solar measurements into Indic astronomy, with the result that South Asians stopped following a five-year yuga-cycle, and instead started following the solar-yearly samvatsara instead.

As such, to account for Al Kharismi's genius and Omar Khayyam's literary talent to their religion is as short-sighted as saying Einstein was brilliant because he was a Jew. At their respective zeniths, Islamic centers of excellence such as Istanbul, Baghdad or Kabul weren't solely Muslim; they were uniquely multi-cultural unlike the west European centers of power then. Civilizational excellence knows no religion, only regional decay does.

Re:Those are Arabs, traditionally.

Not only is it possible that those statements you made are true, we have direct evidence, through DNA testing (voluntary of course) that showed common ancestery across vast swaths of populations. It does teeter on the edge of "dangerous" discussion, but it's true that if you go far back enough we're all related to each other somehow. Isaac and the rest of the people you mentioned have lived long enough ago for them to be true ancestors, so to speak.

What does it mean in the long run? In my opinion, not a whole lot. Other people's opinions may differ from mine.

Here's an example for the curious. [charleston.net]

Okay, I'll bite

"Party happy long time boom boom belt" is in the top 20, right?

Seventy-two, rather.

It's seventy-two houris [wikipedia.org], according to the Hadith (kinda like the Islamic Talmud--commentary that they take quite seriously, but it's not The Book). On the other hand, "houri" might mean "white raisin" or "juicy fruit". So it's really a hilarious toss-up.

Computer Science 101

Remember we owe the "Algorithm" to a dude who was writing 'programs' 800 years before Ada Loveleace and Alan Turing were about.

Re:Computer Science 101

Not quite. The dude in question was a talented mathematician, one of those responsible for introducing the concept of hindu-arabic numeration to the middle east and, later, to the west. But the attribution of a corruption of his name to the concept of algorithm is a historical accident. From wikipedia: "The word algorithm comes from the name of the 9th century Persian mathematician Abu Abdullah Muhammad bin Musa al-Khwarizmi. The word algorism originally referred only to the rules of performing arithmetic using Hindu-Arabic numerals but evolved via European Latin translation of al-Khwarizmi's name into algorithm by the 18th century. The word evolved to include all definite procedures for solving problems or performing tasks."

Nothing after 1300

Nothing on the list came from after 1300 CE/AD. What does that tell you?

Re:Nothing after 1300

The crusades did nothing to the islamic civilization, it was minor compared to other things. The crusades are highly exaggerated nowadays in their impact, back then they were even considered

so minor that a german/roman emperor could lease the holy land for a lifetime (and having a clash with the pope over this back then)

The main problem for the downfall of the arabic civilization might be the in islamic wars, which mainly was triggered by the turkish people slowly but surely taking over the islamic empire and in islamic wars between various countries.

The impact on the eastern roman empire was severe however, they sped up its downfall which was more or less unavoidable anyway.



In the end the islamic civilisation basically was fruitful due to knowledge inheritance of the occupied eastern roman empire parts, and being hilghly tolerant to christians and jews in the occupied areas. Culture could only thrive in this tolerant area.

Re:Nothing after 1300

>That the Crusades were rather effective at destroying a civilisation?

You do realize that they won the crusades, don't you? It is inconvenient for the "blame the West for everything" worldview, but my ancestors got their asses kicked.

The total failure of the Islamic world to produce any worthwhile contribution to human civilzation in the last 500 years is mostly a case of relative decline: what happens in Europe and America after 1500 is nothing short of amazing. Even if they didn't actually slow down their rate of cultural/technological production, they got blown out of the water by the competition. Still, it is striking how little that part of the world has been able to come up with in the last half-millenium.

You can't read an Arab magazine without seeing a list like this once a week. The fact that the British press is now getting into the act of praising 1000 year old inventions and ignoring the last thousand years of stagnation is telling.

Re:Nothing after 1300

Wake me when the radical Islamic world demonstrates...
-tolerance of others
-respect for others
-respect for human life

Look back only 300 years in Western civilization to see people being burned at the stake for being accused of not being a faithful Christian. Look back only 200 years ago to see people brutally enslaved by Western civilization with plenty of people twisting the Bible to support it. Look back only 100 years ago to see large portions of the globe carved up in the name of bring "Christendom" to the heathens. Look back only 50 years ago to see the end of a European purge of members of a particular faith. Look back only 20 years ago to see the end of a war between Catholics and Protestants that included terrorist violence.

"Western civilization" has only been out of the grips of madness and poor civilization for a very short time itself. Give the Middle East a couple of centuries to sort themselves out too. I'm not saying that we should give up on holding them to a higher standard but that we should be a little more honest about how much effort it took us to get here and to be careful about our own recent backsliding.

Those inventions aren't Islamic

Those inventions were created by people, not by Islam. Islam is merely a religion, and hence useless and incapable of anything at except stroking peoples emotions (for good or bad).

Those are human inventions.

Re:Those inventions aren't Islamic

Islam is merely a religion

Islam is not *merely* a religion; it is a combined religion, culture, and political system, in a way that western religions are not. The Bible has been translated into hundreds of languages - the Koran is *inherently* an Arabic document, and - it is argued -can not be translated, but only glossed in other languages. Christianity and Judaism speak to morality and salvation, but do not specify the political system. Islam does, and specifies crimes, punishments, etc.

From time to time other Western religions have taken control of the apparatus of governments, and resulted in theocracy. In Islam, this is not an abberation - it is a key tenet of the politico-religious philosophy.

Re:Those inventions aren't Islamic

> Christianity and Judaism speak to morality and salvation, but do not specify
> the political system. Islam does, and specifies crimes, punishments, etc.

I beg your pardon? I guess you haven't read the Bible much, especially the Old Testament. It does very much outline the framework of a political and social system, complete with excruciating detail regarding crimes and their punishment. That we choose not to structure our societies according to those rules ANYMORE is an entirely different matter. Christianity and Islam are a lot similar than you would like to think, and were even more so before the Reformation. Islam merely haven't had their Martin Luther (yet).

Re:Those inventions aren't Islamic

Your thesis is interesting.

Unfortunately, the nations with the most muslims are not places where arabic is spoken. India is number one, Indonesia is number two, and Pakistan is number three.

#'s 1002 and #1003

Flying carpet

Magic Lamp

(rimshot)

Islamic?

I don't know why the word "Islamic" is attached to this article.

Just like terrorism isn't "Islamic", these inventions aren't necessarily Islamic either.

The religion of the inventor had nothing to do with these inventions.

Lots of innovation (a long time ago)

Arab/Muslim societies produced some fantastic engineering in their day, much of which is described in the dry but quite informative A History of Engineering in Classical and Medieval Times [amazon.com].

For reasons that I don't understand, the Christian and Muslim worlds seem to have flip-flopped regarding the dominance of religion vs. rational thought somewhere in the past 200-500 years. Of course this is a great over-simplification, but it's worth remembering that there was a time when the Arab world was the center of learning and enlightenment in the non-eastern-Asian world (I phrase it like that b/c I don't want to flamebait the Indians or Chinese).

Re:Lots of innovation (a long time ago)

The reason is the relative age differences in each religion; Islam right now is about the same relative age of Christianity during the Dark Ages. Teachings have strayed far from what the prophet Mohammad wrote, and the various formal organizations have placed their word above that of the Koran and prophet. Much was the same in the case of the Catholic church, at the same point in Christianity's relative age, until Martin Luther worked to change that by denouncing the Church's "interpretive" teachings, returning to a more Biblical viewpoint, aiding the understanding of the common man with the small catechism, and those of the clergy with the large catechism.

And unfortunately I think the fallout of this is becoming all too appearent. The Koran records Mohammad as stating:

Only argue with the People of the Book in the kindest way - except in the case of those of them who do wrong - saying, 'We have Faith in what has been sent down to us and what was sent down to you. Our God and your God are one and we submit to Him. (Surat al-`Ankabut; 29:46).

Islam at various points in history was actually much more tolerant than Christianity during its day. Mohammad did indeed show tolerance to Christians and Jews, and for a while even Jews were shown acceptance, reversing a long conflict that began over land before Islam existed. Saladin during the Crusades was not only a brilliant commander, but a very reasonable and tolerant guy, and those kind of values actually spurred the rise of chivalry in Europe.

Unfortunately it seems the "people of the book" are still a long ways off from following it, but the British have done good work here and it is exactly these type of things that can help reverse the dehumanization of our fellow man that has taken place lately. Hopefully as Islam ages, they will abandon many of the precepts created by man as was the case during the great schism in Christianity, but it is a two-way street, and more Christians will also have to think more like Jesus and Tom Fox than we have been. I think that within each religion of the "people of the book" lies a path to peace, the question is how many more deaths it will take before we can all find it.

Anything in the last 30 years???

I looked over the sites, and i find something intresting: The complete lack of any modern innovations. This project has completely backfired, instead of trying to promote Islamic society, it has proven the harsh reality that the middle-east is centeries behind the developed world.

From TFA

The windmill was invented in 634 for a Persian caliph

The moslems only attacked Persia in 638. It seems to me that at least one of these inventions have nothing to do with Islam.

Not very well researched either...

From TFA: By the 9th century, many Muslim scholars took it for granted that the Earth was a sphere. The proof, said astronomer Ibn Hazm, "is that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth". It was 500 years before that realisation dawned on Galileo.

The fact that the Earth was round (contrary to popular belief) was not big news in the 9th century. The ancient Greeks knew very well that the Earth was a sphere, and they too had calculated the circumference with surprising accuracy several centuries B.C. (not to mention before Mohammed). Also Galileo wasn't controversial because he claimed the Earth was round - it was because he claimed that the Earth revolved around the sun, and not vice versa. Sigh.

The earth is round! (and the greeks knew it)

At #18, the Guardian notes that by the 9th century Muslim astronomers knew the Earth was round and had measured the circumference. The writer conveniently omits to mention that more than a thousand years before, the greek philosopher Eratosthenese [wikipedia.org] has already done that. Certainly Muslim astronomy of the 9th century was far more advanced than European astronomy of the same time, but this article smacks to me of an attempt to say "everything was invented by a Islam". This is strengthed by #14 where they say "the zero was invented in India, but we use arabic numerals". I submit that the shape of the numerals is not very important, while the decimal notation and especially the concept of zero are the major invention here.

This is not an Islamic discovery

From their list:
18) By the 9th century, many Muslim scholars took it for granted that the Earth was a sphere. The proof, said astronomer Ibn Hazm, "is that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth". It was 500 years before that realisation dawned on Galileo. The calculations of Muslim astronomers were so accurate that in the 9th century they reckoned the Earth's circumference to be 40,253.4km - less than 200km out. The scholar al-Idrisi took a globe depicting the world to the court of King Roger of Sicily in 1139.

But as I understand it, the Egyptian Eratosthenes had discovered this same thing 11 centuries earlier:
http://outreach.as.utexas.edu/marykay/assignments/ eratos1.html [utexas.edu]

Galileo was responsible for many great discoveries, but I've never seen anyone claim that he discovered the Earth was round. Many argue that a round world was common knowledge in Europe, despite what their maps might make us believe.

"qamara" obscura

I'm very doubtful of the claim that the term "camera obscura" comes from an Arabic word "qamara", since it is a Latin phrase meaning "dark chamber", and the Latin word comes from the Greek "kamara".

Correction on several inaccuracies

I read the "Top 20" article and found the following inaccuracies that warrant clarification:

3 A form of chess was played in ancient India but the game was developed into the form we know it today in Persia. From there it spread westward to Europe - where it was introduced by the Moors in Spain in the 10th century - and eastward as far as Japan. The word rook comes from the Persian rukh, which means chariot.

The Indian game mentioned is Pachisi [wikipedia.org], precursor to the Americanized Parcheesi [wikipedia.org] "Royal Game of India"

14 The system of numbering in use all round the world is probably Indian in origin but the style of the numerals is Arabic and first appears in print in the work of the Muslim mathematicians al-Khwarizmi and al-Kindi around 825...Algorithms and much of the theory of trigonometry came from the Muslim world.

The system of numbering commonly called "Arabic Numerals" is now deprecated, and in fact, reads Hindu Arabic Numerals [wikipedia.org] as the article alludes to. Trigonometry was first discovered much earlier (by nearly 1000 years) by the Indians [wikipedia.org],Egyptians, & Greeks. Arab scholars recognized it as a distinct branch 2000 years later.

I note a trend: the Arabs, perhaps because of their geographic location at the crossroads of the East and West, are bound to discover many new and exciting ideas and teaching from their neighbors. They were in pretty good company (Greco-Roman thoughts to the West, Indian thoughts to the East) so they are bound to pick up something.

Vaccination claim for Islam is WRONG!

" Children in Turkey were vaccinated with cowpox to fight the deadly smallpox at least 50 years before the West discovered it."

This is just plain WRONG! The practice of deliberately infecting people with SMALLPOX (not cowpox) from a mild case to make them immune (variolation) was a process developed sometime around the 10th century in China and/or India. It involved taking pus from the pox of someone suffering from smallpox, or the scabs from the pox, and inoculating healthy people with it. Usually a mild case of smallpox developed, giving lifelong immunity afterwards. The first written account of variolation describes a Buddhist nun practicing around 1022 to 1063 AD. She would grind up scabs taken from a person infected with smallpox into a powder, and then blow it into the nostrils of a non-immune person. Another method, more common, involves rubbing the pus from the pox into a scratch in the skin of the non-immune person.

By the 1700's, variolation was common practice in China, India, and Turkey, where it was carried to England by a diplomat's wife. In the late 1700's European physicians used this and other methods of variolation, but reported "devastating" results in some cases. Overall, 2% to 3% of people who were variolated died of smallpox, but this practice decreased the total number of smallpox fatalities by 10-fold. However, a variolated patient could transmit genuine smallpox and could even start an epidemic!

Jenner, on the other hand, was the first to use cowpox (vaccinia virus) instead of live smallpox ... hence the name of "vaccination".

Re:Yeah yeah yeah

This letter that was sent in response to HPs CEO in late September of 2001 would disagree with this, and it has a lot of sources to back it up. Check it out here http://www.ninevehsoft.com/fiorina.htm [ninevehsoft.com]

Re:Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Quote

http://home.c2i.net/greaker/comenius/9899/indiannu merals/india.html [c2i.net]
Numbers is a poor example.
Credit where credit is due.

Re:Shouldn't these be called...

No, chess was developed by the Persians. Don't call Persians Arabs if you want to make any friends in Iran.

Re:Shouldn't these be called...

Not Arabic because lots of these inventions are Persian, Indian, Chinese etc.

These inventions were created by intelligent, open minded people who happened to be Muslim and weren't living under oppresion of crazed power hungry lunatics who consider technology to be the tool of satan.

I lived in Pakistan for a few years and all the so called "muslim scholars" of today are uneducated trash who happened to brain-wash enough poverty stricken people in order to get power. These morons are the face of Islam these days and that's sad.

Hopefully, the few remaining educated sane muslims will be able to over turn this growing trend.

Re:Discrimination

"The truth, of course, is that the vast majority of all historical accomplishments were achieved by straight, white, Christian males"

The vast majority of all historical accomplishments? You even use terms like "the truth" and "of course", making it sound ridiculously assumptious.

If I was to believe such a claim, I would require proof. European and American history is Eurocentric, so we know far more about European history than we do of Chinese, Arabian, Japanese, Indian, African or native american history. The Chinese and Japanese have for instance an extremely rich history full of accomplisments, lots of which are not well known by westeners. The same goes for most other civilisations.

Also, just because the white, christian male conquered large parts of the world, does not mean we were culturally superiour. We just happened to better at killing than them.

Re:Discrimination

As a fellow straight white male, I salute you. It's like reverse racism... rather than putting another race down, it's now appropriate to glorify one's own by celebrating "holidays". It still accomplishes the same purpose... one is viewed as exalted over the other(s). Pride in one's race/orientation/wtf-ever is still racism, no matter how you cut it. Whether you're a limey white or the darkest black, it doesn't matter at all... it's about what you do with the time you're given to live. Geez, everybody, just be "human" and get over yourselves.

Re:Discrimination

but I wonder if I'll live to see the day when it's considered "acceptable" to be proud of straight, male, caucasian heritage. That's not to say I think there's anything to be proud of, but rather that it's interesting how we have all these parades, celebrations, "history" months, and special exhibits for the accomplishments of all the various configurations of gender, race, and religion, except straight, white, Christian male.

Did I wake up in some parallel universe today where there's a stigma attached to being straight or Christian? Last time I looked, there was still stigma attached to homosexuality, and bisexuality is mostly ignored or assumed not to exist. Atheists are often thought of as immoral, and given none of the protections and exceptions that religious people - yes, including Christians - get.

There may be no "parades" and so on, but that's because your types are celebrated, or even forced upon us, all the time anyway. In the UK, even though I went to a state school, we had to celebrate your religion every morning. In most countries, same sex couples are not permitted to have legal recognition for their relationship. Perhaps there'd be less parades if they were allowed to celebrate in the same way that heterosexuals can?

The truth, of course, is that the vast majority of all historical accomplishments were achieved by straight, white, Christian males.

Emphasis on the word historical. The number of Christian scientific developments is far less in the last century.

Having said that - I agree that it's silly to start rating which-group-of-people-did-what (although you yourself fall into this trap with the above paragraph). But for the most part, things like "parades" are not about this anyway, they're about raising awareness against discrimination. I disagree with your claim that it's not acceptable to be proud of straight, male, caucasion or Christian heritage.

while straight white males stand at the sidelines with their mouths shut, lest they be considered racist, sexist, homophobic, or just generally discriminatory.

No one is stopping you from celebrating achievments of straight white males. The problem is that you seem to want to also say "...and we're better than all the rest".

Re:Discrimination

The truth, of course, is that the vast majority of all historical accomplishments were achieved by straight, white, Christian males.

You can't overlook the reasons behind this. Being straight, white, Christian, and male has nothing to do with inventions. The reason for this is that "straight" (I'd question the validity of this), white, Christians were the financial/military leaders over the past 200 years. Do you expect a black man to have been able to invent the ligthbulb from his slave quarters? Do you think a Pagan could have gotten funding from a catholic society to do medical research without being burned at stake? Do you think women had the educational opportunities to go forth in a male dominated society and been accepted as credible scientists? Do you think Leonardo DaVinci could have really come out of the closet?

The truth is that African-Americans were enslaved and oppressed, Africans themselves were plagued with civil wars and apartheid, the jews were being eradicated in a hollocaust, the Japanese were getting a-bombed, the middle-east was still being bombarded with countless "cruisaides", women were raped, beaten and sent to the kitchen, and the straight, white, aryan, Christian males were sitting on top of their pile of money with guns drawn reaping all the benefits of being the "master race".

Now I know you're not a bigot, I just think you're disreguarding the fact that you are indeed a majority in every way. You might ask why there's black history classes, but no white history classes... because the "history" that you had in school is white history.

If you wanna be proud of anything, be proud of the fact that you are part of a race, sexuality, gender, and religion that has not been publicly ridiculed, tortured, eradicated, and had their ass kicked six ways from sunday for the past x-hundred years.

And not that I think its relevant, but I'm also a straight, white, Christian male.

Re:Discrimination

"If you wanna be proud of anything, be proud of the fact that you are part of a race, sexuality, gender, and religion that has not been publicly ridiculed, tortured, eradicated, and had their ass kicked six ways from sunday for the past x-hundred years."

Yeah, tell that to the Irish, and the Italians, and the Poles, and the Dutch, and the Scots etc, etc. Being straight, white, Christian, and male is no proof against discrimination. Being straight, "white", agnostic and male myself, I can vouch for the fact that it's not a guarantor of wealth, either.

Re:Discrimination

Whoops, I overstated this.

Yes, you did, and even in your latest post, you're still overstating it -- and providing the answer to the question in your original post. The reason that people who aren't straight, white, Christian males feel the need to celebrate the accomplishements of $DEMOGRAPHIC_GROUP is because although straight, white, Christian males have accomplished a hell of a lot, they haven't accomplished as large a proportion of everything as a lot of people (like you) seem to think they have; and those who are not swCm's feel justifiably aggrieved at having their accomplishments downplayed (or, in many cases, having the credit stolen outright.) Really, it's a matter of a pendulum swing; give it some time, and things will settle down. In a perfect world, we'd give everyone credit for their accomplishments without even noting their sexual preference, race, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, age, veteran status, height, weight, hair color, absence or presence of hair, musical tastes, et bloody cetera ... but we're a long way from that right now.

Re:Obl: Star Trek Russia quote

You have not experienced these inventions until you have seen them in the original Klingon.

Re:It's sad . . .

What, like ending up with leaders who claim that God told them to go to War with other countries?

Yes, but in the United States we can vote him out because a U.S. President is limited to two four-year terms. Contrast that with those in power in most of the Middle East and Africa, not to mention several places in Asia, Cuba and S. America. How long was Saddam in power? How many countries in Asia, the M.E. and Africa have had peaceful transitions of governments?

At least with G.W. Bush you know he'll be gone after 2008.

  -Charles

Re:It's sad . . .

Cheney's not so bad. He'll always shoot straight with you. Or straight at you, as the case may be.

Re:It's sad . . .

You are pretty out of touch to compare relgious fundamentalism in the US with islamic fundamentalism...When was the last time someone had their throat slit for Jesus?

It was just a few years ago that abortion clinics and doctors were being firebombed and shot in order to protect the sanctity of human life.