Scientific Information within the Koran

[the_Baron]

Has anyone realized how much accurate information, in layman's terms, is contained in this Book?

Modern microbiology and physics is proving much of what was said back in the 7th century, prior to any sort of knowledge in these areas.

This is making me begin to consider the Divine nature of the revelations.

Any thoughts?

[TummyDragon]

I think it's possible that there is a devine source, but I actually believe that there were simply insanely intelligent people who seemed to have a greater understanding than those around them. In the modern day, often we don't give enough credit to the true brilliance of the "Einstein's" of past eras. Areas such as the Middle East, Asia, Central America... all of these had advanced understanding of mathematics (for their day) which led to some masterpieces of archetectural design. And, we have a tendency to make the erroneous assumption that "these people were too stupid to have accomplished this on their own, so there must have be a devine influence."

If we look throughout references such as these, they never truly indicate a single piece of information that wasn't available during the period in question. There isn't a single anachronistic reference which couldn't be attributed to someone putting in the time to figure it out to the best of his ability with the knowledge and curiosity he possessed at that time.

Could there have been a devine influence? well sure, anything is *possible*, but I think the most accurate explanation is usually the simplest one. They were simply more advanced in areas of knowledge than we tend to give them credit for.

[gila67]

I've got no comments on the Koran specifically, not having read it, but I do know that Islamic science and medicine was a lot more advanced than many people may realize.

[Haltickling]

Any examples, Baron? I've read the Qur'an, too, but without finding any scientific info. Probably a different translation...

[the_Baron]

Hal -

there are varying verses which speak about the development and creation of man - the arabic words refer to stages of development which adequately describe the process of embyotic development of a fetus.

in other instances, some verses refer to the universe expanding - something we now know to be true. it also speaks of the formation of the heavens and earth from one original mass - a simple term for the way the big bang is explained.

[Oddjob0226]

A lot of these 'scientific truths' are explored here -

http://www.geocities.com/freethoughtmecca/home.htm

Follow the links wherever it says "Read the essay". This all sounds like theory and conjecture that just ended up being right, like hitting the physics lottery... reading whet it says about atmosphere, for example, shows the errors.