Abdus Salam
Last night I saw the first in a new BBC series of
nature programmes called Life. Narrated by David Attenborough, the TV show was
a dazzling example of photography and painstaking research. We were treated to
the sight of a dozen killer whales hunting seals in the Arctic; a mother
octopus who starves to death while tending her eggs; and sundry other animals,
birds and fish exhibiting the most extraordinary behaviour in their struggle to
survive.
This endless struggle to survive and procreate was also the subject of a recent
series about Charles Darwin. Written and presented by Richard Dawkins, the
biologist and campaigner for
And finally, I watched hypnotised as a programme on the Hubble telescope filled
our TV screen with stunning images of distant stars, nebulae and galaxies.
Captured by the orbiting telescope, objects whose light has been travelling for
thousands of years appeared in dazzling colours and forms.
All three TV programmes served as reminders of man’s insignificance when
measured on the universal scale of time and distance. Although the universe was
created around 14 billion years ago, it is still expanding. Life emerged
hundreds of millions ago on our planet, and is still evolving.
Cern, the European nuclear research centre on the border of
Given the cutting edge nature of the research at Cern, it was disconcerting to
learn that a scientist had been arrested on the charges of corresponding with
AQIM, the North African arm of Al Qaeda. Of Algerian origin, Adlene Hicheur was
corresponding with the terrorist group by email, and apparently had been trying
to identify possible targets.
Even though his research did not equip him to cause any serious damage,
Hicheur, if found guilty, is clearly on the same ideological wavelength as
Osama bin Laden. Somehow, I have naively assumed that scientists are above the
siren call of religious extremism. After all, how can you explore the earliest
moments of the creation of the universe, and simultaneously accept the
literalist interpretation of the event given by many religious texts, and
blindly accepted by extremists?
Pervez Hoodbhoy, in his eminently lucid book Muslims and Science, gave examples of Pakistani nuclear scientists
who engaged in research into the supernatural. In a conference on miracles in
Islam organised in
Now I do not question anybody’s right to follow his own line of research, no
matter how eccentric. However, if scientists are conducting research at
institutions funded by taxpayers, we do have the right to expect some more
meaningful output. And when retired nuclear scientists are found to be close to
Al Qaeda, as at least two from our scientific establishment were after 9/11,
eyebrows will be raised around the world.
As we have learned to our cost, many doors have been shut to Muslims after
9/11. Visas, never easy to obtain before that world-changing event, are harder
to come by than ever before. Log on to visa requirements for most Western (and
many Muslim) states, and you will see that applicants from over two dozen
Muslim countries now have their applications processed through sundry databases
in the countries they wish to visit. All this causes endless delays.
Many Western universities no longer admit Muslim students to nuclear or
biological research centres. They have seen post-graduate students from their
departments returning home and getting involved in weapons research and
development. And after AQ Khan’s alleged theft of plans for uranium enrichment
equipment from his Dutch laboratory, how many Muslim scientists would get jobs
at similar nuclear establishments?
Understandably, many Muslims who do not subscribe to extremist philosophy feel
bitter at being rejected because of the actions of a handful. But after
Hicheur’s arrest, how can you blame Westerners for being suspicious? After all,
he was a French national who had studied at some of the finest institutions in
The danger is that through the misguided actions of Hicheur and a few
scientists like him, the Muslim world will find itself cut off from the
mainstream of scientific research. Already, we are trailing far behind the rest
of the world in the sciences, as we are in so much else. For decades, virtually
no original research has been conducted in Muslim nations. And when we
miraculously produce a Nobel-Prize winner like Dr Abdus Salam, we drive him
away by our bigotry.
Our excuse for our backwardness in the sciences is the poverty that is endemic
in so many Muslim countries. But this is not true for several oil-rich states.
The reality is that there is not a single world-class research institution in
any Islamic country. Instead of squabbling over the fine points of dogma, if we
could devote some of our energy to acquiring knowledge, we would all be far
better off today.
I have no doubt that Hichuer is a hero to many Muslims who remain mired in a
permanent sense of paranoia and past grievances, real and imagined. When I
mentioned AQ Khan’s nuclear proliferation activities in a recent article, I was
attacked by several readers for not appreciating his efforts to make
Two video
clips about Abdus Salam winning Nobel Prize
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86Vh9zsXNH0&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT4YKd35DJQ&NR=1