40 The Poetry of Physics and The Physics of Poetry
leather (Gibb 1963, p. 41). The Arabs borrowed this know-how from the
Chinese and eventually passed it on to the West.
The contribution of the Arabs to the overall development of modern
science was twofold. First, there are the advances and discoveries they
made totally on their own. And second, there is the role they played
in the preservation of and transmission to Europe of the scientific
accomplishments of ancient Greece, India, Persia, and China. The Arabs
built upon the base of Greek learning contained in the Syriac and Persian
literature both in translation and in the original Greek.
There were many significant advances in medicine, engineering,
mathematics such as algebra (actually an Arabic term) and the sciences
of chemistry and astronomy. They have been credited with laying the
foundations for an empirical approach to science with their contributions
to the formulation of the scientific method, which was exemplified by
and their experimental and quantitative approach to scientific inquiry.
According to the majority of the historians al-Haytham was
the pioneer of the modern scientific method. With his book
he changed the meaning of the term optics and established
experiments as the norm of proof in the field. His
investigations are based not on abstract theories, but on
experimental evidences and his experiments were systematic
and repeatable (Gorini 2003).Islamic scientists excelled at chemistry pioneering such procedures
as distillation, liquefaction, oxidization, crystallization, filtration and
purification leading to products like soap, shampoos, perfumes and more
importantly medicines. The term chemistry is a term that derives from
the Arabic alkimiya or alchemy where the prefix al means “the”. While
alchemy eventually came into disrepute in Europe, historians of science
recognize that alchemy as practiced by the Arabs laid the foundations for
modern chemistry.
Another area where Arabic science was extremely successful and
went far beyond the Greeks was medicine and pharmacology,
particularly in observation, diagnosis, and treatment with drugs. They
also excelled in surgery. “It was they who established the first apothecary
shops, founded the earliest school of pharmacy and produced the
pharmacopoeia” (Hitti 1964, p. 141). Important contributions were also
made in agriculture, magnetism, geography, optics, ophthalmology, and
astronomy.