Mehdi Sayagh Film Assignment: Niall Ferguson’s Civilization: Is the West History, Part 2: Science 1) What is the film’s main argument? What was the evidence used to make the argument? Do you find it convincing, why or why not? The film’s main argument is that science played a major role in the change of the global predominance from the East to the West, by focusing on the science enlightenment part and how science helped the Europeans to raise an empire. Indeed science has played a major role in the process of switching power from the east to the west, through the film; Ferguson highly described the differences between the Ottoman Empire and the Prussians leaded by Frederick the great, how Muslims got behind Europeans and all the problems that they faced through this period. As he said: “one real difference between the west …show more content…
In contrast Osman III was living a life of luxury in the Topkapi palace aside from the reality and the issues that the empire was facing. The west was focusing on education, culture, and tolerance; which were the spearhead of the public enlightenment, many manuscripts were published and the state encouraged science and innovation. Whereas for the Ottoman Empire, religion was the obstacle, religion was everywhere, in the political life especially and it limited the scientific researches and the publication of manuscripts. We can notice the real difference between the two phases of the empire, first when Ferguson showed us the first manuscript where it was a piece of art, and then the second one, which was a mess. The real progress for the West was the separation between religion and science, politics, and the state. Each entity has to run itself the best way