Despite the association of Islam with terrorism in American media, Islam has been beneficial through major advancements in the field of astronomy during and just after the Golden Age of Islam. This is shown through Al-Battani’s discovery of Earth’s planetary characteristics, Ibn Al-Haytham’s calculation of the thickness of the Earth’s atmosphere through optical measurement, and Ibn Al-Haytham and Nasir al-Din al-Tusi’s massive revisions to the Ptolemaic model of the universe.
The Golden Age of Islam was, simply put, a period of intellectual enlightenment for the Middle East. Occurring from approximately 750 A.D. to 1258 A.D., the Golden Age of Islam gave rise to an influx of knowledge from areas such as Persia, Syria, India, and Greece that …show more content…
Prior to Ibn Al-Haytham, the accepted principle for optics originated from the Greeks and stated that the eye gives off light itself to produce images of objects . However, Al-Haytham considered situations in the real world that simply didn’t agree with the Greek findings, such as why objects like the moon can’t be illuminated from great distances. Al-Haytham formulated that the eye is instead a receptor of light, and that light is dispersed and diffused in geometric patterns. This is one of the fascinating things about the Golden Age of Islam. It created scholars who were unwilling to simply accept new principles as the truth. Al-Haytham separated the intertwined branches of optics, but needed to experiment to prove his theory. This idea of experimentation to prove theory allowed for the scholars of the Golden Age of Islam to present claims which other scholars could easily reproduce to see the same results. He created experiments which demonstrated the reflection of light through the use of a darkroom with slits in an intermediate wall. Although he did not discover the rule for the relationship between refraction of light rays, his thinking was very similar to that of Snell. With this proof and the observation that the sky still illuminated after the sun had set, Al-Haytham was able to calculate the thickness of the atmosphere to 40 kilometers, inferring that the light rays were being deflected from the sun through the atmosphere. The Golden Age of Islam allowed for these discoveries through the critique of other scholars’ work. Al-Haytham’s contributions were generally focused towards optics, but through more open access to information Al-Haytham was able to scrutinize the work of Ptolemy to help develop an improved
The Golden Age of Islam was, simply put, a period of intellectual enlightenment for the Middle East. Occurring from approximately 750 A.D. to 1258 A.D., the Golden Age of Islam gave rise to an influx of knowledge from areas such as Persia, Syria, India, and Greece that …show more content…
Prior to Ibn Al-Haytham, the accepted principle for optics originated from the Greeks and stated that the eye gives off light itself to produce images of objects . However, Al-Haytham considered situations in the real world that simply didn’t agree with the Greek findings, such as why objects like the moon can’t be illuminated from great distances. Al-Haytham formulated that the eye is instead a receptor of light, and that light is dispersed and diffused in geometric patterns. This is one of the fascinating things about the Golden Age of Islam. It created scholars who were unwilling to simply accept new principles as the truth. Al-Haytham separated the intertwined branches of optics, but needed to experiment to prove his theory. This idea of experimentation to prove theory allowed for the scholars of the Golden Age of Islam to present claims which other scholars could easily reproduce to see the same results. He created experiments which demonstrated the reflection of light through the use of a darkroom with slits in an intermediate wall. Although he did not discover the rule for the relationship between refraction of light rays, his thinking was very similar to that of Snell. With this proof and the observation that the sky still illuminated after the sun had set, Al-Haytham was able to calculate the thickness of the atmosphere to 40 kilometers, inferring that the light rays were being deflected from the sun through the atmosphere. The Golden Age of Islam allowed for these discoveries through the critique of other scholars’ work. Al-Haytham’s contributions were generally focused towards optics, but through more open access to information Al-Haytham was able to scrutinize the work of Ptolemy to help develop an improved