Tuesday, March 14, 2006

How Islamic Inventors Changed the World

How Islamic Inventors Changed the World
(The Independent)
From coffee to cheques and the three-course meal, the Muslim world has given us many innovations that we take for granted in daily life. As a new exhibition opens, Paul Vallely nominates 20 of the most influential, and identifies the men of genius behind them.

1. The story goes that an Arab named Khalid was tending his goats in the Kaffa region of southern Ethiopia, when he noticed his animals became livelier after eating a certain berry. He boiled the berries to make the first coffee.

Let’s also celebrate the Christian theory of evolution, the Jewish theory of relativity, and the Hindu theory of stellar mass limits.

The article has gone behind a subscription wall (damn you tarrying Blogger bots), but mail me for a PDF.

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