July 11, 2008
The world’s top public intellectual
Tom Nuttall in Prospect:
When Prospect and Foreign Policy drew up our list of the world’s top 100 public intellectuals a few weeks ago, none of us expected a Turkish Sufi cleric, barely known in the west, to sweep to victory. Nor did we expect every name in the top ten would be from a Muslim background. (Noam Chomsky, who won the last poll in 2005, led the west in 11th place this time.)
The early running this year was made by Mario Vargas Llosa, the Peruvian novelist, and Garry Kasparov, the chess grandmaster turned anti-Putin dissident. At one point Al Gore was on course to add the top intellectual gong to his Nobel peace prize and Oscar. But then, about a week into the process, Fethullah Gülen rocketed to the top of the list overnight—and stayed there. Something had clearly happened: votes were pouring in for Gülen at a staggering rate, and continued to do so for the duration of the poll. Initially we were convinced that a tech-savvy member of the Fethullahçi—the collective noun for Gülen’s millions of worldwide followers—had hacked into the system and set about auto-voting for his hero. We would identify the culprit, discount his votes, normal business would be resumed and Chomsky would grind his way to another victory.
The truth turned out to be more interesting.
Posted by Abbas Raza at 05:39 AM | Permalink
Comments
From Does God Exist?
By Fethullah Gülen
"Before doing so, it is worth reflecting upon the historical fact that, since the very beginning of human life, the overwhelming majority of humanity has believed in God's existence. This alone is enough to establish God's existence."
[FP]
And to establish than the Sun revolves around the Earth or than the Earth is flat or than there was a week creation of life and the Universe...?
"Unbelievers cannot claim intellectual superiority over believers, for the latter contain many innovative scientists, scholars, researchers and, most importantly, saints and Prophets (the experts in this field)."
[FP]
The existence of God is then a matter of poll results or a testimony of authority?
"Also, people usually confuse the non-acceptance of something's existence with the acceptance of its non-existence. While the former is only a negation or a rejection, the latter is a judgment needing proof. No one has ever proven, and cannot prove, God's non-existence. In contrast, countless arguments prove His existence."
[FP]
Bullshit!
Posted by: Fernando Peregrín | Jul 11, 2008 7:36:36 AM
From Does God Exist?
By Fethullah Gülen
"Before doing so, it is worth reflecting upon the historical fact that, since the very beginning of human life, the overwhelming majority of humanity has believed in God's existence. This alone is enough to establish God's existence."
[FP]
And to establish than the Sun revolves around the Earth or than the Earth is flat or than there was a week creation of life and the Universe...?
"Unbelievers cannot claim intellectual superiority over believers, for the latter contain many innovative scientists, scholars, researchers and, most importantly, saints and Prophets (the experts in this field)."
[FP]
The existence of God is then a matter of poll results or a testimony of authority?
"Also, people usually confuse the non-acceptance of something's existence with the acceptance of its non-existence. While the former is only a negation or a rejection, the latter is a judgment needing proof. No one has ever proven, and cannot prove, God's non-existence. In contrast, countless arguments prove His existence."
[FP]
Bullshit!
Posted by: Fernando Peregrín | Jul 11, 2008 7:38:42 AM
Now Femando, you can't say such things, as this is a respected "intellectual", and besides, The Psychopathic Sky Daddy will get mad and bring you floods or drought.
I think the only way to solve this is to borrow Mohammed's Flying Horse and ask the Talking Snake if this is true.
What century are we living in?
Posted by: Dave Ranning | Jul 11, 2008 8:13:19 AM
I'm glad we choose our "top intellectuals" by the same process that we choose our "American Idols". According to my online poll, the top three most important English-language texts are:
1) V!4grA
2) The Sad Tale of Dead Nigerian Prince Mbeki
3) Girls Who Want to Meet You: Click for Pictures
Posted by: Xerxes | Jul 11, 2008 9:06:41 AM
Fernando;
You're being a bit harsh there on the final Gülen quote. A close reading of the logic in his argument (in those parts where there is logic, of course) implies that he is assigning the same truth value (and maybe even ontological status) to God as one would Bigfoot, the Area 51 aliens and several of the more outlandish conspiracy theories. For a man of faith this a big admission.
Xerxes;
Nice concept, pitch it to the networks. "American Intellectual"; I can so see it. Better yet pitch it to the BBC and then have the American networks get into a bidding war to make their own copy of the English version. But who would make up the panel of judges?
Posted by: Pete Chapman | Jul 11, 2008 10:20:42 AM
Fethullah Gulen is only an illiterate cult leader (is not even a primary school graduate but he graduates from primary school taking exams from outside ?!!!) waiting to return to Turkey at the proper time if secular western modern Turks lose the battle against these islamist fanatics one day, just like Homeyni of Iran.
Whatever he says, or writes or preaches to the west is very different and are all lies becase the videos at you tube and google inturkish, in his own native mother tongue tell all the turth about this fanatic illiterate cult leader. Ask any secular modern Turkish people and they will tell you the truth about him and his cult and their fanatic sheria dereams for Turkey.
So he may call himself even Einstein of moslem world and/or Turkey. By the way what makes you believe he is what he says he is because the most prominent characteristics of these fanatic Islamist are "takiyye" which means you may lie whenever it serves your own purpose!
So how does this happen ??? An intellectual??? Please get real and think about it!
Posted by: remy | Jul 21, 2008 1:11:57 AM
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