Sheharyar Ilyas

Technologist. Views expressed are my own.

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@asayerdaudzai انالله ونااليه راجعون

[Demis Hassabis @demishassabis]

https://t.co/PTeDiv1b6L

[Ihtesham Ali @ihteshamali]

An Arab scholar in 1011 was placed under house arrest in Cairo for 10 years. He used the time to invent the scientific method, prove how vision actually works, and write a 7-volume book that Newton studied 600 years later.

I read about him last night and could not stop thinking about it.

His name was Ibn al-Haytham. The book is called the "Book of Optics."

The textbook story names Bacon, Galileo, and Descartes as the founders of modern science. All three of them came 600 years after Ibn al-Haytham. All three of them studied his work directly or through Latin translations. The man who actually invented the scientific method was working alone in a single room in Cairo while Europe was still in the Dark Ages.

Here is the story almost nobody tells you.

He was born in Basra around 965 CE. By his 40s he had a reputation across the Arab world as one of the most original minds alive. Then he made the mistake that almost killed him. He claimed publicly that he could regulate the flooding of the Nile. The mad caliph al-Hakim of Cairo summoned him to Egypt to do it.

Ibn al-Haytham took one look at the river and realized the project was impossible with the technology of his era. The caliph had executed dozens of scholars for less. So he faked madness. The caliph believed him and put him under house arrest in his own home in Cairo for the next 10 years.

Most people would have lost their actual mind. He used the time to invent science.

Before him, knowledge worked one way. You quoted authority. If Aristotle had said it, it was true. If Galen had written it, it was correct. The role of a scholar was to memorize and defend the ancient Greeks. I

Ibn al-Haytham broke this completely. He wrote a sentence in the Book of Optics that quietly destroyed 1,400 years of intellectual culture. "The seeker after truth," he said, "is not the one who follows his natural disposition to trust the writings of the ancients. The seeker after truth is the one who suspects them, questions them, and submits only to argument and experiment."

That single sentence is the foundation of modern science. He wrote it 600 years before the European Renaissance.

The second thing he did was build the actual machinery of experimentation.

He insisted that no claim about the physical world was acceptable until it had been verified by an experiment anyone could repeat. He gave detailed instructions for every experiment in his book. He told his readers, in writing, not to take his word for any of it. Build the equipment. Run the tests yourself. Verify or destroy my claims with your own eyes.

The third thing he did was use the method to overturn one of the most settled questions in physics.

The Greeks had taught for centuries that vision worked because the eye emitted invisible rays. Ibn al-Haytham proved them wrong with a darkened room, a small hole, and a wall. The first camera obscura. He showed that light from the outside world enters the eye, the exact opposite of what every Greek thinker had taught.

Two hundred years later his book was translated into Latin in Spain. Roger Bacon cited him. Kepler cited him. Galileo's work on the telescope was built on his optics. Newton's foundational work on light rested on his framework.

Walk into any physics department today. Ask who founded the scientific method. Almost nobody will say Ibn al-Haytham.

The man who invented the way humanity actually knows things did the work under house arrest, with no funding, no laboratory, and a paranoid caliph next door waiting for an excuse to kill him.

He did it anyway. Most of the world is still pretending it was someone else's idea.

[Gergely Orosz @GergelyOrosz]

Sucks for an AI agent to delete the prod DB - with no way to back it up - and risk the complete rental business.

But the blame sits with the dev who decided to delegate decision making to the AI agent, and then not review actions, just YOLO it.

Time for a blameful postmortem...

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@Junaid_Sahi Whether they vote or not, they are ruled by PPP for the last 4 decades with little interruptions.
What has changed for them ? In fat what has changed for any other town or city in Sindh that can be positioned as a model
For province or country ?

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@ideaspromax 23 year of expat life, never been asked.

[Tim Hall ∞🐵+∞⌨️ @oraclebase]

Oracle AI Database 26ai On-Prem Announced

https://t.co/yIbChqnCeX

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@asmashirazi Biggest Ponzi scheme of modern times

[SiliconANGLE @SiliconANGLE]

Oracle Database@AWS launches into general availability with new features https://t.co/xa6zKQYMwG

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@DPerwani Hope the Sanity prevails. Unlike Indian right wingers, most of the Pakistanis don’t see Indians as enemies . Some of my close friends are Indian Hindus, it’s a shame that we are fighting.

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@MikeRStephens It has become a quick way to become rich for clever folks who are selling a false dream of freedom and future to Gullible masses. In the process they want more and more people to believe to keep it running for as long as they could, classic Ponzi scheme

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@shamshergondal Bilkul Sahi Farmaya.

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@SSEHBAI1 This happened across the board because of rupee depreciation. Everyone who bought between 2018-2021 is in a big loss in dollar values

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@ShehryarReal Sach hay Bro.

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@ESPNcricinfo Stunning

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@Huk06 Not an expert, Gulf is very cut throat and unless you get hold of some of the big guys (who only wants to work with platinum providers) it will be hard to make money. Many Europe companies outsource to Portugal for low cost and there isn’t any organic business there. Houston!

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@essel1 It will take a generational effort to erase the brainwashing of 80s era. I happily accepts and eat sweets from my Hindu friends. Majority of Muslims in Pakistan are descendent of Hindu converts. Let’s not disrespect our ancestors. A bit more education will help.

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@ShehryarReal That’s so sad. Allah sehat ata farmaye

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@DublinAirport @etihad @sherjeelilyas

[Sheharyar Ilyas @Sheharyar79]

@YousufNazar The elite has been busy Islamizing with extremism ideologies over the decades. Thanks to Sind with its Sufi and liberal roots that it is still fighting on. State will will do anything to convert Sind and Baluchistan’s liberal mindset, as it feels more threatened by them.