20 Muslim Scientists Who Changed Modern Science Forever

Summary

The video challenges the idea that modern science was created solely in the West. It presents 20 Muslim scholars and inventors whose work, according to the video, contributed to medicine, mathematics, astronomy, engineering, optics, chemistry, and the study of society.

A recurring theme is that scientific progress depends on careful observation, testing, clear explanations, and sharing knowledge—not simply accepting inherited ideas.

The 20 scientists and their contributions

1. Ibn Zuhr (Avenzoar) — Advocated testing and observation in medicine. The video describes his practice of trying procedures on animals before treating people, his account of tracheotomy and feeding through a tube, and his claim that scabies was caused by mites. His guiding principle: check before treating.
2. Al-Farabi — Explained Aristotle’s logic, organized fields of knowledge in List of Sciences, and studied music mathematically, including why some notes sound harmonious.
3. Nasir al-Din al-Tusi — Helped establish the Maragha observatory and produced astronomical tables. His “Tusi couple” used two circular motions to generate a back-and-forth straight-line motion. The video notes that its relationship to Copernicus’s later work is debated.
4. Ibn Khaldun — In the Muqaddimah, analyzed how societies, economies, and states change. He wrote about specialization, the effects of excessive taxation, and asabiyya—the unity or group spirit that can help a state rise and, when weakened, decline.
5. The Banu Musa brothers — Muhammad, Ahmad, and Hasan wrote The Book of Ingenious Devices, describing roughly 100 mechanisms, including fountains, lamps, and devices using water, air, valves, and floats. One water-powered musician is presented as an early programmable machine.
6. Fathullah Shirazi — A Mughal-era polymath and adviser to Akbar who reportedly designed a multi-barrel cannon, equipment for cleaning cannon barrels, and practical machines for farming and construction. The video cautions that some details come from court accounts and should be treated carefully.
7. Abul-Wafa al-Buzjani — Developed and systematized trigonometric methods involving sine, tangent, secant, and cosecant, and produced accurate sine tables useful to astronomers.
8. Al-Razi (Rhazes) — Distinguished smallpox from measles through clinical observation and emphasized evaluating treatments. A story about choosing a hospital site by comparing how quickly meat spoiled illustrates his reliance on observation, though the narrator says the details may not all be certain.
9. Al-Battani — Made precise astronomical measurements, including the length of the year and the tilt of Earth’s axis, and corrected aspects of Ptolemy’s astronomy. His tables were translated into Latin and used by later European astronomers.
10. Ibn Sahl — Studied lenses and refraction and, according to the video, wrote down the rule later associated with Snell’s law. He calculated lens shapes capable of focusing light effectively.
11. Al-Biruni — Estimated Earth’s radius by measuring a mountain’s height and the angle of the horizon. The video gives his estimate as about 6,340 km, close to the modern value.
12. Al-Jazari — Described about 50 mechanical devices in an illustrated engineering book. Examples include the elephant clock, a boat with adjustable mechanical musicians, and mechanisms using gears, crankshafts, and camshafts.
13. Abbas ibn Farnas — Remembered for attempts at human flight using feathered garments or a flying machine. The narrator notes that accounts were recorded after his death, so some details may be uncertain.
14. Al-Kindi — Explained frequency analysis for breaking simple codes: count how often symbols occur and compare the most common ones with frequent letters in a language. He also wrote across many disciplines and supported the translation of Greek works into Arabic.
15. Ibn al-Nafis — Rejected Galen’s claim that blood passed through invisible holes in the heart’s septum. He described blood traveling from the right side of the heart to the lungs and then to the left—the pulmonary circulation. The video says his account was rediscovered in a manuscript in 1924.
16. Ibn Sina (Avicenna) — Wrote the influential Canon of Medicine, used in medical education for centuries. The video highlights his discussion of contagious disease and isolation, as well as principles for testing medicines.
17. Jabir ibn Hayyan (Geber) — Associated with experimental chemistry and laboratory techniques such as distillation, crystallization, evaporation, filtration, and sublimation. The narrator stresses that historians debate how much of the corpus attributed to Jabir was written by him personally, while crediting his broader school with emphasizing experiment and documentation.
18. Al-Zahrawi — Produced an illustrated surgical text showing more than 200 instruments and describing procedures, bleeding control, catgut sutures, and other techniques. He also emphasized that surgeons should be careful, patient, and attentive to pain.
19. Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen) — In The Book of Optics, argued that vision occurs when light enters the eye, rather than rays being emitted by the eye. He used experiments, including a dark room with a small aperture—the camera obscura—and is credited in the video with advancing a systematic experimental method.
20. Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi — Helped establish algebra through a systematic, step-by-step approach to solving equations. The video links the word algebra to al-jabr and algorithm to the Latinized form of his name. It also credits his writings with helping transmit the Hindu-Arabic numeral system, including zero, to Europe.

Methods and lessons emphasized

• Observe before accepting explanations. Ibn Zuhr and Al-Razi are presented as doctors who relied on examining patients and evidence rather than simply repeating authorities.
• Test procedures and treatments. Ibn Zuhr’s animal testing and Ibn Sina’s proposed checks for medicines illustrate the importance of evaluating whether an intervention works.
• Make experiments repeatable. Jabir’s associated laboratory tradition emphasized careful procedures and records so others could reproduce results.
• Use experiments to test ideas. Ibn al-Haytham’s approach, as summarized in the video, was:
  1. Ask a question.
  2. Form a hypothesis.
  3. Test it through an experiment.
  4. Check and verify the result.
  5. Repeat the test.
• Turn complex problems into clear procedures. Al-Khwarizmi’s organized steps for solving groups of equations exemplify this approach; the video connects it to modern algorithms.
• Build on and question earlier knowledge. Several scholars explained, revised, or challenged Greek authorities, while translation and scholarship helped preserve and circulate older works.
• Treat historical claims with care. The narrator flags uncertainty around some accounts of Fathullah Shirazi and Abbas ibn Farnas, the attribution of works associated with Jabir, and the route by which al-Tusi’s mathematics may have reached Copernicus.

Speakers and sources featured

• Speaker: One unnamed narrator; the subtitles do not identify a host, interviewee, or additional speaking voice.
• Scientists and scholars profiled: Ibn Zuhr; Al-Farabi; Nasir al-Din al-Tusi; Ibn Khaldun; the Banu Musa brothers—Muhammad, Ahmad, and Hasan; Fathullah Shirazi; Abul-Wafa al-Buzjani; Al-Razi; Al-Battani; Ibn Sahl; Al-Biruni; Al-Jazari; Abbas ibn Farnas; Al-Kindi; Ibn al-Nafis; Ibn Sina; Jabir ibn Hayyan; Al-Zahrawi; Ibn al-Haytham; and al-Khwarizmi.
• Other named figures or sources referenced in the narration: Aristotle, Ptolemy, Copernicus, Ibn Rushd (Averroes), Galen, Miguel Servetus, Realdo Colombo, William Harvey, Roger Bacon, Johannes Kepler, historian Roshdi Rashid, and physician Muhio al-Tatawi. These are mentioned as historical influences, comparators, or people connected to rediscovery—not as speakers in the video.