Letters to the Editor
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A fine interview. Congratulations.
This interview goes a long way to fill a gap in media portrayal of the Muslim world. It creates a picture of intellectual life, especially in Turkey, with limitations and struggles, but with reality. Mr. Edis is sophisticated and well-informed on the history of science--not something that comes automatically with a background in physics. And it's a pleasure to run across a journalist who knows that Newton was interested in alchemy.
The only problem I have is with the blurb: the Golden Age of Mesopotamia was golden, and Edis seems to say so in the article. What he says is that it wasn't in the modern sense scientific. That doesn't mean that it wasn't a golden age of intellectual ferment, a time of great human creativity.