As you probably have heard, LIGO recently detected gravitational waves, confirming the sole remaining prediction of Einstein’s general theory of relativity. My kufi goes off to the folks involved.

He made scientific predictions… and they weren’t even buried under 5 levels of vague metaphors, in the middle of a story about a cow!

There’s a reason that humanity didn’t make this discovery in the Islamic State, Saudi Arabia, or any other theocratic state. Science and religion will only be compatible up until science begins to contradict religion. At that point, religion gets its knickers in a knot.

Ever heard of the Islamic Golden Age? It was during medieval times, when scientific discoveries were taking place in the Muslim world, significantly more than anywhere else. Apologists will point to this as definitive proof that Islam is fundamentally pro-science. I disagree; Islamic doctrine tolerates science at best, and is laughably anti-science at worst.

Only a matter time before gravitational waves are “predicted” in the Quran.

Just take a look at Saudi Arabia, a nation that strictly adheres to Sharia, and uses the Quran as its constitution – witchcraft is illegal… Witchcraft. Even today, 400 years after the Salem Witch Trials, and almost 20 years after Harry Potter captivated an entire generation, Saudi Arabia is still punishing those who they believe are using witchcraft. Hermione, can you hide my wand?

I wish witchcraft was real.

Let’s set the record straight on the Golden Age. On a macro level, scientific advancement and innovation are correlated most highly with economic prosperity. A stable and prosperous economy creates very fertile conditions for innovative thinking and collaboration. That’s exactly what happened throughout human history – from the agricultural revolution to Ancient Rome, and beyond. No matter which way you look at it, economics is the most important factor contributing to science in Islam’s Golden Age. The caliphs even paid their top minds salaries comparable to those of today’s pro athletes – if that doesn’t scream out “economics” (or more colloquially “I’M RICH BIATCH!”), then I don’t know what does.

Hands-down, the funniest Muslim.

Islam didn’t stifle science during the Golden Age – there was no reason to. Developments from the era were benign to the faith. They didn’t question, or disagree with fundamental aspects of the religion. Look at the major discoveries at the time: spotting Andromeda, development of algebra, frequency analysis, and of course one of the first recorded uses of the scientific method by Al Haytham. None of these are trivial, and they should be recognized as positive contributions coming from within a caliphate (boy, did that feel weird to type).

“Once Europe lived in a dark age, and Islam carried the torch of learning. Now we Muslims live in a dark age” – Mahmud Tarzi, 1865-1933.

The flame got too hot for Islam’s frigid grip. The issue isn’t that Islamic doctrines and values have been misinterpreted, or have regressed since those days. It’s that they stayed exactly the same.

Imagine if Charles Darwin was studying camels in Ottoman Empire, and not finches in the Galapagos Islands. Would he have even made it out alive if he publicized his views on evolution in humans? Wouldn’t it have been blasphemous to preach the idea that humans and other animals share common ancestry? Doesn’t that teaching go firmly against the Adam and Hawwa (Eve) story? ISIS certainly thinks so; they banned the teaching of evolution in their schools. A 2013 Pew study showed that belief in evolution hovers around only 30% in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan.

Nowadays, the Muslim world is plagued by anti-scientific beliefs. Aside from the obviously nutty beliefs, like witchcraft and jinns, the past half-century has seen senior Muslim clerics claiming that the Sun revolves around the Earth, forbidding travel to Mars, and blaming earthquakes on scantily-clad women. Worse yet, they back their conclusions up with credible interpretations of Islamic scripture. A thousand years ago, a lot of the stuff being peddled by today’s Muslim clerics wouldn’t raise any eyebrows.

So why isn’t ISIS on the cutting edge (heh, get it?) of science in 2016? It’s not because they’re evil, uneducated, or inherently a bunch of dumdums. It’s the same reason that Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt, UAE, Oman, and the rest of the world’s devoutly Muslim nations aren’t either – science has outgrown Islam.

This post is critical of Islam, and its clerics. By no means am I attempting to paint Muslims as unintellectual, or inherently less intelligent. I am, however, making the argument that certain generally agreed-upon Islamic values, when practiced in 2016, are antithetical to several findings of modern science.