Talk:Ibn al-Haytham/Archive 4

Removing of sourced material
I added some sources which support the Persian ethnicity of Alhazen. These sources are: But the user:Kansas Bear removes them. Some of these sources are academic works of the historians, whose works are relevant to the topic of ethnicity. But the user:Kansas Bear says the historians must be specifically of Islamic studies, and uses this reason to delete the sourced material. I find this irrelevant, as any historian can comment on the topic and his work must be considered reliable and relevant to the topic. --Scienceis (talk) 07:34, 16 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Uh no.


 * "Some of these sources are academic works of the historians.
 * Actually, Understanding history, is a generalized book, which was written by historians with no specialization in Islam or Islamic studies.


 * Norman F Dessel, earned a B.S. in 1957, an M.S. in 1958, and a Ph.D. in Physics in August 1961.
 * Richard B Nehrich, chemist
 * Glenn I Voran, appears to have only written the above book and "Atomic light"
 * Kevin Killeen, Phd, early modern science and intellectual history, the uses of the Bible in the seventeenth century and poetics and rhetoric
 * Charles Carman, Professor in the Art History department at University at Buffalo (SUNY Buffalo).
 * Anthony Carpi, Professor of Environmental Toxicology
 * Anne E. Egger, Assistant Professor Geological Sciences and Science Education
 * R.J. Watt, Professor Psychology
 * Gérard René Lemaitre, Phd, French astronomer
 * Mukul Sarkar, Biomedical Engineering from University of Technology, Aachen, Germany in 2006 and Ph.D. degree in Electronic Instrumentation Engineering from the Technical University of Delft.
 * Albert Theuwissen, degree in electrical engineering from the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) in 1977.
 * Steven Laurys, MD, PhD, leads the Coma Science Group at the Cyclotron Research Center and Department of Neurology
 * Guilio Tononi, Professor, Department of Psychiatry.
 * None of these academics is qualified for Islamic history, nor should their work be used for Islamic history. Since user:Scienceis arrived, this has been the only article he has edited. Clearly this editor is here to input their opinion into this article using anything that repeats his opinion. Considering the Encyclopaedia of Islam states Alhazen to be Arab, numerous "new users" have tried to use the same inadequate sources to push their POV.
 * Whereas comparing Scienceis' "sources"
 * Encyclopaedia of Islam, Juan Vernet. ed. B.LEWIS, V. L. MENAGE, CH. PELLAT AND J. SCHACHT


 * Juan Vernet, historian of Arabic Science, produced books and articles such  as  his  early  studies  on  Ibn  al-Banna’  al-Marrakushi (1952),  his edition of the Geography of Ibn Sa'id al-Maghribi (1958), his survey of the knowledge transmitted through Spain in the Middle Ages, 1978.
 * Science, Medicine and Technology, Ahmad Dallal, The Oxford History of Islam, ed. John L. Esposito.


 * Ahmad Dallal, Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies at Georgetown University
 * John L. Esposito, Professor of Religion and International Affairs and of Islamic Studies at Georgetown University --Kansas Bear (talk) 18:26, 16 October 2016 (UTC)


 * So our difference is here:
 * I say any historian can comment on Alhazen's ethnicity
 * you say only the comments from the Islamic studies historians must be considered valid
 * I asked for Dispute resolution. Lets see how they can help us with this issue. --Scienceis (talk) 19:26, 16 October 2016 (UTC)


 * So your problem is you don't care what sources you use as long as they say what you want(ie. disruptive editing). I am also amazed at how you figured out how to post a 3rr warning, which you ignored my previous comments on this talk page over this very issue, which you also ignored(ie. trolling)! This is starting to look like a block user, back socking to push a POV using inferior sources.
 * "I say any historian can comment on Alhazen's ethnicity
 * Which shows how desperate you are to push Persian as his ethnicity when zero Islamic historians support this. Which you continue to conveniently ignore.
 * "you say only the comments from the Islamic studies historians must be considered valid
 * I am saying a historian with an academic background in this particular area should be considered. Not some Brits that have written a generalized history. --Kansas Bear (talk) 21:59, 16 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I do care which source I'm using. One of my key sources is: which is:
 * An academic and reliable source
 * A source written by historians
 * Supports Alhazen was Persian
 * But when I add this source to the article, you keep on removing them. You are trying to keep your version of the article intact. It also seems that you dont read my comments. Once I told you that he was NOT born to an Arab family, because neither of sources that are listed support the idea that he was "born" to an "Arab family". These sources only say he was an Arab scientist, but not birth to an Arab "family". When I remove these unsourced material, you keep on reverting me. I added another part to the article which says that some of his works have been translated into Persian, and the source of this edit was encyclopedia of Islam. Again you reverted me. You should consider other editors as well, and not to ignore them. --Scienceis (talk) 08:20, 17 October 2016 (UTC)


 * And just exactly who are John Child, Tim Hodge, Paul Shuter and David Taylor? Simply repeating the same tired claim proves nothing, especially when these particular individuals have no expertise in this area. The burden of proof is on you. Prove who these authors are, what their area of expertise is, or drop the stick.
 * "because neither of sources that are listed support the idea that he was "born" to an "Arab family"."
 * This falls under citing the sky is blue, I have a source written and edited by academics working in the field of Islamic history/science stating he was Arab, stands to reason he was born into an Arab family.
 * "You should consider other editors as well, and not to ignore them."
 * You should try finding reliable sources written by historians in Islamic studies, not professors of pyschology, geology, astronomy, environmental toxicology or geological sciences!
 * "I added another part to the article which says that some of his works have been translated into Persian, and the source of this edit was encyclopedia of Islam"
 * You mean the source, Encyclopaedia of Islam you continue to ignore? The source stating he was Arab? You have a bit of a problem with hypocrisy there. FYI, that is called cherry-picking a source, taking what you agree with and ignoring/suppressing what you disagree with.
 * "Once I told you that he was NOT born to an Arab family, because neither of sources that are listed support the idea that he was "born" to an "Arab family"."
 * And I explained in detail why your sources are not reliable for this article's history/ethnicity and you ignored that. --Kansas Bear (talk) 17:54, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Wow! you rock! --Aṭlas (talk) 20:13, 17 October 2016 (UTC)


 * John Child, Tim Hodge, Paul Shuter and David Taylor are the authors of the book "Understanding history" by Heinemann Educational in Oxford. What we know is that their work is a reliable source for wikipedia, and their work is about history, which makes it relevant for ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * Paul Shuter is the author of following books:
 * John Child is the author of following book which shows he has been active in the field of Islamic studies:
 * Some of the works of David Taylor are:
 * Tim Hidge has also published:
 * There are many other sources which support Alhazen is Persian. Even in a book related to history of Islam, this can be found. For instance you can see the following book which is related to history of Islam and calls Alhazen a Persian:
 * This book is the translation of the book:
 * So even the books about Islamic studies support Persian ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * John Child is the author of following book which shows he has been active in the field of Islamic studies:
 * Some of the works of David Taylor are:
 * Tim Hidge has also published:
 * There are many other sources which support Alhazen is Persian. Even in a book related to history of Islam, this can be found. For instance you can see the following book which is related to history of Islam and calls Alhazen a Persian:
 * This book is the translation of the book:
 * So even the books about Islamic studies support Persian ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Tim Hidge has also published:
 * There are many other sources which support Alhazen is Persian. Even in a book related to history of Islam, this can be found. For instance you can see the following book which is related to history of Islam and calls Alhazen a Persian:
 * This book is the translation of the book:
 * So even the books about Islamic studies support Persian ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Tim Hidge has also published:
 * There are many other sources which support Alhazen is Persian. Even in a book related to history of Islam, this can be found. For instance you can see the following book which is related to history of Islam and calls Alhazen a Persian:
 * This book is the translation of the book:
 * So even the books about Islamic studies support Persian ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Tim Hidge has also published:
 * There are many other sources which support Alhazen is Persian. Even in a book related to history of Islam, this can be found. For instance you can see the following book which is related to history of Islam and calls Alhazen a Persian:
 * This book is the translation of the book:
 * So even the books about Islamic studies support Persian ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * This book is the translation of the book:
 * So even the books about Islamic studies support Persian ethnicity of Alhazen.
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * --Scienceis (talk) 09:37, 18 October 2016 (UTC)


 * You conclude from the ethnicity of Alhazen, the ethnicity of his family, and you consider that it "falls under citing the sky is blue", whereas this is not true. This is original research because Alhzen is different from his family. In this way I can also add "Alhazen was born to a Persian family" because sources support "Alhazen is a Persian scientist". --Scienceis (talk) 10:04, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

I still do not see anything that proves who the authors are. I see a google search for names and publications, which have proven they have no expertise in the field of Islamic studies, thank you. The Rise of Islam by Distinguished Visiting Professor University of Hong Kong Chair of Commerce John Child,
 * John Child:
 * John Child that wrote "Rise of Islam", he is not a reliable source either.
 * Do you mean this John Dunn? Another failed google book search?


 * "For instance you can see the following book which is related to history of Islam and calls Alhazen a Persian"
 * Wow. The perfect example of POV pushing.


 * "You conclude from the ethnicity of Alhazen, the ethnicity of his family, and you consider that it "falls under citing the sky is blue", whereas this is not true. This is original research because Alhzen is different from his family."
 * Uh no. The Encyclopaedia of Islam, states he is Arab. So, unless someone can change their ethnicity with a snap of their fingers......
 * You conclude that some historians with NO background in Islamic studies should be used to write Islamic history, simply because you want Persian listed, despite NO historians in the field of Islamic studies stating this. How pathetic is that?
 * See, you have no idea who those authors are, you just have what they published, which has shown their field. You have no idea who John Child is/was, his area of expertise, or if he just wrote books for children . In short you are just desperate to push your POV, while ignoring academic sources that prove you wrong. --Kansas Bear (talk) 18:53, 18 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia does not require us to digg into every detail of the authors of a book. When the requirements of reliability and relevancy was fulfilled, thats all we need.
 * There are also sources in other languages like French, German, etc, which say Alhazen was Persian. Here is a list of some of them:




 * I dont say all these sources are high quality sources and perfect, but they show the extent of considering Alhazen as Persian. --Scienceis (talk) 19:52, 18 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Regarding the list of publications by Child, Hodge, Shuter, and Taylor provided above. I note that many of their works are published by Heinemann Educational; Heinemann's web page describes them as:
 * "Heinemann is the UK's most trusted education partner and publishes resources for Primary and Secondary schools, FE colleges and training providers."
 * Considering this fact and the broad topic range of the authors' works and the general nature of their titles, it seems we are dealing with authors of introductory textbooks for the school market; hardly the kind of works we would look at for scholarly research into Islamic history. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 20:13, 18 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Identifying reliable sources says: "When available, academic and peer-reviewed publications, scholarly monographs, and textbooks are usually the most reliable sources." It does not specify which type of textbook, just says textbooks. No original research says: "Many introductory undergraduate-level textbooks are regarded as tertiary sources because they sum up multiple secondary sources." So college textbooks are also considered as tertiary sources. --Scienceis (talk) 23:14, 19 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Judging from Scienceis latest addition of more unreliable sources, I do not believe he knows what a reliable source is.


 * "Wikipedia does not require us to digg into every detail of the authors of a book."
 * Really?
 * Here you go,

' Any of the three can affect reliability. Reliable sources may be published materials with a reliable publication process, authors who are regarded as authoritative in relation to the subject, or both. ' These qualifications should be demonstrable to other people." --Kansas Bear (talk) 04:19, 19 October 2016 (UTC)
 * "The word "source" when citing sources on Wikipedia has three related meanings:
 * The piece of work itself (the article, book)
 * The creator of the work (the writer, journalist)
 * The publisher of the work (for example, Random House or Cambridge University Press)

Here is a list of sources that call Alhazen as Persian:
 * 1) Melcher, D. (2011). Visual stability. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B: Biological Sciences, 366(1564), 468-475.
 * 2) Burr, D. C., & Morrone, M. C. (2011). Spatiotopic coding and remapping in humans. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 366(1564), 504-515.
 * 3) Powell, Susan. "Math 646 Book Report March 28, 2011 Non-Euclidean Geometry." Book Report (2011).
 * 4) Aaen-Stockdale, Craig. "Ibn al-Haytham and psychophysics." Perception 37.4 (2008): 636-638.
 * 5) Melcher, David, and Carol L. Colby. "Trans-saccadic perception." Trends in cognitive sciences 12.12 (2008): 466-473.
 * 6) Leontiadis, Stefanie. The architecture of public open urban spaces. How to define a syntax in the contemporary urban environment. Diss. Italy, 2012.
 * 7) Burr, David. "Eye movements: keeping vision stable." Current Biology 14.5 (2004): R195-R197.
 * 8) Corradi, Massimo. "A short history of the rainbow." Lettera Matematica: March 2016, Volume 4, Issue 1, pp 49–57
 * 9) Olson, M. J. (2015). The Camera Obscura and the Nature of the Soul: On a Tension between the Mechanics of Sensation and the Metaphysics of the Soul. Intellectual History Review, 25(3), 279-291.
 * 10) Gori, S., Giora, E., & Agostini, T. (2010). Measuring the Breathing Light Illusion by means of induced simultaneous contrast. Perception, 39(1), 5-12.
 * 11) Watt, Roger J. Visual processing: Computational, psychophysical, and cognitive research. Psychology Press, 1990.
 * 12) Gori, Simone, Enrico Giora, and Tiziano Agostini. "THE STRENGTH OF A VISUAL ILLUSION MEASURED BY A RELATED ILLUSORY PHENOMENON." Proceedings of Fechner Day 26.1 (2010): 191-196.
 * Ye, J., & Yu, J. (2014). Ray geometry in non-pinhole cameras: a survey. The Visual Computer, 30(1), 93-112.
 * 1) Vojniković, B., & Tamajo, E. (2013). Horopters–Definition and Construction. Collegium antropologicum, 37(1), 9-12.
 * 2) Burr, D. C., & Morrone, M. C. (2010). Vision: keeping the world still when the eyes move. Current Biology, 20(10), R442-R444.
 * 3) Brown, Elliot, Ben Hattenbach, and Ian Washburn. "From Camera Obscura To Camera Futura: How Patents Shaped Two Centuries of Photographic Innovation and Competition." J. Pat. & Trademark Off. Soc'y 98 (2016): 406-557.
 * 4) Kardjilova, K., Popov, P., Lyutskanov, V., Pulov, V., & Mihova, M. (2010). An educational physics laboratory experiment for directly measuring the speed of light. ATI Applied Technologies & Innovations, 1, 29-32.
 * 5) Morrone, C., & Burr, D. (2008). Visual stability during saccadic eye movements. Gazzaniga et al., editors. The Cognitive Neurosciences,.
 * 6) Farzinnia, Arsham. "Above And Beyond The Standard Model: On Phenomenology Of Lee-Wick Theory And Massive Vector Color-Octet." arXiv preprint arXiv:1210.8061 (2012).
 * 7) Chakrabarti, S. (1998). Ground based spectroscopic studies of sunlit airglow and aurora. Journal of atmospheric and solar-terrestrial physics, 60(14), 1403-1423.
 * 8) Melcher, D. A. V. I. D., and M. C. Morrone. "Trans-saccadic memory: Building a stable world from glance to glance." Eye movement research: A window on mind and brain (2007): 213-236.
 * 9) Melcher, David. "Visual stability." Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B: Biological Sciences 366.1564 (2011): 468-475.
 * 10) BURR, D. C., & MORRONE, M. C. 93 Visual Perception during Saccades.
 * 11) Hughes, M. W. (2013). A HISTORY OF EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY. The Routledge International Companion to Educational Psychology, 1943(1999), 3.
 * 12) Desbiens, J. (2013). Content metamorphosis in synthetic holography. In Journal of Physics: Conference Series (Vol. 415, No. 1, p. 012008). IOP Publishing.
 * 13) Morrone, M. C. 66 Interaction between Eye Movements and Vision: Perception during Saccades.
 * 14) Vulpetti, G., Johnson, L., & Matloff, G. L. (2015). The Solar Sail Option: From the Oceans to Space. In Solar Sails (pp. 45-58). Springer New York.
 * 15) Melcher, D. (2011). Introduction: Visual stability. Philosophical Transactions: Biological Sciences, 468-475.
 * 16) Catapano, G., & Verkerke, G. J. (2012). Artiﬁcial Organs. Handbook of Research on Biomedical Engineering Education and Advanced Bioengineering Learning: Interdisciplinary Concepts: Interdisciplinary Concepts, 2, 60.
 * 17) Melcher, D., & Morrone, M. C. (2015). Nonretinotopic visual processing in the brain. Visual neuroscience, 32, E017.
 * 18) Streffen, Isabella Sarah Espie. "I spy with my military eye: strategies of military vision and their use in fine art practice." (2013).
 * 19) Del Centina, A. (2016). On Kepler’s system of conics in Astronomiae pars optica. Archive for History of Exact Sciences, 1-23.
 * 20) Yrjönsuuri, M. (2014). Seeing Distance. In Active Perception in the History of Philosophy (pp. 187-206). Springer International Publishing.
 * 21) Normanno, Davide, Thomas van Zanten, and María F. García-Parajo. "Near-Field Optical Microscopy: Insight on the Nanometer-Scale Organization of the Cell Membrane." Nanoscopy and Multidimensional Optical Fluorescence Microscopy (2010): 1.
 * 22) Francl, M. (2015). The enlightenment of chemistry. Nature chemistry, 7(10), 761-762.
 * 23) Vojniković, B., & Tamajo, E. (2013). Horopters–Definition and Construction. Collegium antropologicum, 37(1), 9-12.
 * 24) Paolini, W. (2013). Introducing the Astronomical Eyepiece. In Choosing and Using Astronomical Eyepieces (pp. 3-32). Springer New York.
 * 25) Varvoglis, H. (2014). From Classical Era to the Renaissance. In History and Evolution of Concepts in Physics (pp. 21-26). Springer International Publishing.
 * 26) Gabrieli, F. (1970). Knowledge and Attainments in the Mediterranean. Diogenes, 18(71), 59-64.
 * 27) Masic, I., Dilic, M., Solakovic, E., Rustempasic, N., & Ridjanovic, Z. (January 01, 2008). Why historians of medicine called Ibn al-Nafis second Avicenna?. Medicinski Arhiv, 62, 4, 244-9.
 * 28) Baker, David. "The Caliph's Captive." The Optician, Jun 18 2010: 29-30.
 * 29) Manfroid, Jean. "L’origine du télescope (I)." Ciel (Le) 75 (2013): 22-32. (French)
 * 30) Vuillemin, J. C. (2005). L'œil de Galilée pour les yeux de Chimène. Poétique, (2), 153-168. (French)
 * 31) Ribot, Vincent. "Contribution à l'étude de la vie et l'œuvre relative à l'élevage d'Olivier de Serres." PhD diss., 2009. (French)
 * 32) Júnior, Francisco de Assis Scannavino. "Instrumento Eletro-Optico para o Estudo do Sistema de Inibicao da Acomodacao Ocular" PhD diss., Universidade de São Paulo, 2003. (Spanish)
 * 33) Bernard, Lane. "Visionary science of human eye." Australian, The: Newspaper Source. JAN 17, 2007.
 * 34) Theirault, Richard, and Inhwan Chang. "Milling Tool With Rotatable Cutting Disks." U.S. Patent No. 20,160,059,326. 3 Mar. 2016.
 * 35) Corradi, Massimo. "DELL’ARCOBALENO." (2016). http://www.academia.edu/download/44855741/LM96_17-25_Corradi.pdf (Italian)
 * 36) DE ASSISTIR, A. FABULOSA MÁQUINA. "Cláudio Ribeiro da Cunha." https://tede.pucsp.br/bitstream/handle/18249/1/Claudio%20Ribeiro%20da%20Cunha.pdf
 * 37) Ahmed Khan, Sameen. "Medieval Islamic Achievements in Optics." http://prometeo.sif.it/papers/online/sag/031/01-02/pdf/06-percorsi.pdf
 * And many more sources. --Scienceis (talk) 23:14, 19 October 2016 (UTC)
 * 1) Corradi, Massimo. "A short history of the rainbow." Lettera Matematica: March 2016, Volume 4, Issue 1, pp 49–57
 * 2) Olson, M. J. (2015). The Camera Obscura and the Nature of the Soul: On a Tension between the Mechanics of Sensation and the Metaphysics of the Soul. Intellectual History Review, 25(3), 279-291.
 * 3) Gori, S., Giora, E., & Agostini, T. (2010). Measuring the Breathing Light Illusion by means of induced simultaneous contrast. Perception, 39(1), 5-12.
 * 4) Watt, Roger J. Visual processing: Computational, psychophysical, and cognitive research. Psychology Press, 1990.
 * 5) Gori, Simone, Enrico Giora, and Tiziano Agostini. "THE STRENGTH OF A VISUAL ILLUSION MEASURED BY A RELATED ILLUSORY PHENOMENON." Proceedings of Fechner Day 26.1 (2010): 191-196.
 * Ye, J., & Yu, J. (2014). Ray geometry in non-pinhole cameras: a survey. The Visual Computer, 30(1), 93-112.
 * 1) Vojniković, B., & Tamajo, E. (2013). Horopters–Definition and Construction. Collegium antropologicum, 37(1), 9-12.
 * 2) Burr, D. C., & Morrone, M. C. (2010). Vision: keeping the world still when the eyes move. Current Biology, 20(10), R442-R444.
 * 3) Brown, Elliot, Ben Hattenbach, and Ian Washburn. "From Camera Obscura To Camera Futura: How Patents Shaped Two Centuries of Photographic Innovation and Competition." J. Pat. & Trademark Off. Soc'y 98 (2016): 406-557.
 * 4) Kardjilova, K., Popov, P., Lyutskanov, V., Pulov, V., & Mihova, M. (2010). An educational physics laboratory experiment for directly measuring the speed of light. ATI Applied Technologies & Innovations, 1, 29-32.
 * 5) Morrone, C., & Burr, D. (2008). Visual stability during saccadic eye movements. Gazzaniga et al., editors. The Cognitive Neurosciences,.
 * 6) Farzinnia, Arsham. "Above And Beyond The Standard Model: On Phenomenology Of Lee-Wick Theory And Massive Vector Color-Octet." arXiv preprint arXiv:1210.8061 (2012).
 * 7) Chakrabarti, S. (1998). Ground based spectroscopic studies of sunlit airglow and aurora. Journal of atmospheric and solar-terrestrial physics, 60(14), 1403-1423.
 * 8) Melcher, D. A. V. I. D., and M. C. Morrone. "Trans-saccadic memory: Building a stable world from glance to glance." Eye movement research: A window on mind and brain (2007): 213-236.
 * 9) Melcher, David. "Visual stability." Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B: Biological Sciences 366.1564 (2011): 468-475.
 * 10) BURR, D. C., & MORRONE, M. C. 93 Visual Perception during Saccades.
 * 11) Hughes, M. W. (2013). A HISTORY OF EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY. The Routledge International Companion to Educational Psychology, 1943(1999), 3.
 * 12) Desbiens, J. (2013). Content metamorphosis in synthetic holography. In Journal of Physics: Conference Series (Vol. 415, No. 1, p. 012008). IOP Publishing.
 * 13) Morrone, M. C. 66 Interaction between Eye Movements and Vision: Perception during Saccades.
 * 14) Vulpetti, G., Johnson, L., & Matloff, G. L. (2015). The Solar Sail Option: From the Oceans to Space. In Solar Sails (pp. 45-58). Springer New York.
 * 15) Melcher, D. (2011). Introduction: Visual stability. Philosophical Transactions: Biological Sciences, 468-475.
 * 16) Catapano, G., & Verkerke, G. J. (2012). Artiﬁcial Organs. Handbook of Research on Biomedical Engineering Education and Advanced Bioengineering Learning: Interdisciplinary Concepts: Interdisciplinary Concepts, 2, 60.
 * 17) Melcher, D., & Morrone, M. C. (2015). Nonretinotopic visual processing in the brain. Visual neuroscience, 32, E017.
 * 18) Streffen, Isabella Sarah Espie. "I spy with my military eye: strategies of military vision and their use in fine art practice." (2013).
 * 19) Del Centina, A. (2016). On Kepler’s system of conics in Astronomiae pars optica. Archive for History of Exact Sciences, 1-23.
 * 20) Yrjönsuuri, M. (2014). Seeing Distance. In Active Perception in the History of Philosophy (pp. 187-206). Springer International Publishing.
 * 21) Normanno, Davide, Thomas van Zanten, and María F. García-Parajo. "Near-Field Optical Microscopy: Insight on the Nanometer-Scale Organization of the Cell Membrane." Nanoscopy and Multidimensional Optical Fluorescence Microscopy (2010): 1.
 * 22) Francl, M. (2015). The enlightenment of chemistry. Nature chemistry, 7(10), 761-762.
 * 23) Vojniković, B., & Tamajo, E. (2013). Horopters–Definition and Construction. Collegium antropologicum, 37(1), 9-12.
 * 24) Paolini, W. (2013). Introducing the Astronomical Eyepiece. In Choosing and Using Astronomical Eyepieces (pp. 3-32). Springer New York.
 * 25) Varvoglis, H. (2014). From Classical Era to the Renaissance. In History and Evolution of Concepts in Physics (pp. 21-26). Springer International Publishing.
 * 26) Gabrieli, F. (1970). Knowledge and Attainments in the Mediterranean. Diogenes, 18(71), 59-64.
 * 27) Masic, I., Dilic, M., Solakovic, E., Rustempasic, N., & Ridjanovic, Z. (January 01, 2008). Why historians of medicine called Ibn al-Nafis second Avicenna?. Medicinski Arhiv, 62, 4, 244-9.
 * 28) Baker, David. "The Caliph's Captive." The Optician, Jun 18 2010: 29-30.
 * 29) Manfroid, Jean. "L’origine du télescope (I)." Ciel (Le) 75 (2013): 22-32. (French)
 * 30) Vuillemin, J. C. (2005). L'œil de Galilée pour les yeux de Chimène. Poétique, (2), 153-168. (French)
 * 31) Ribot, Vincent. "Contribution à l'étude de la vie et l'œuvre relative à l'élevage d'Olivier de Serres." PhD diss., 2009. (French)
 * 32) Júnior, Francisco de Assis Scannavino. "Instrumento Eletro-Optico para o Estudo do Sistema de Inibicao da Acomodacao Ocular" PhD diss., Universidade de São Paulo, 2003. (Spanish)
 * 33) Bernard, Lane. "Visionary science of human eye." Australian, The: Newspaper Source. JAN 17, 2007.
 * 34) Theirault, Richard, and Inhwan Chang. "Milling Tool With Rotatable Cutting Disks." U.S. Patent No. 20,160,059,326. 3 Mar. 2016.
 * 35) Corradi, Massimo. "DELL’ARCOBALENO." (2016). http://www.academia.edu/download/44855741/LM96_17-25_Corradi.pdf (Italian)
 * 36) DE ASSISTIR, A. FABULOSA MÁQUINA. "Cláudio Ribeiro da Cunha." https://tede.pucsp.br/bitstream/handle/18249/1/Claudio%20Ribeiro%20da%20Cunha.pdf
 * 37) Ahmed Khan, Sameen. "Medieval Islamic Achievements in Optics." http://prometeo.sif.it/papers/online/sag/031/01-02/pdf/06-percorsi.pdf
 * And many more sources. --Scienceis (talk) 23:14, 19 October 2016 (UTC)
 * And many more sources. --Scienceis (talk) 23:14, 19 October 2016 (UTC)


 * It is quite clear Scienceis has refused to get the point. --Kansas Bear (talk) 02:18, 20 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Unless Scienceis can explain who these authors are, there is no reason to continue to post questionable sources on the talk page. Considering:


 * Dr Paul Elliott, Lecturer in Film Studies, author, "Hitchcock and the cinema of sensations : embodied film theory and cinematic reception"
 * Seriously?
 * I believe this is proof that Scienceis is simply "googling" Alhazen/Ibn al-Haytham + Persian and not verifying the author's credibility. --Kansas Bear (talk) 15:02, 21 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I have ordered some books. I'm waiting to get them, till then I will occasionally check this page. --Scienceis (talk) 20:53, 21 October 2016 (UTC)
 * If it's possible. Can I get the name of this books ? --Aṭlas (talk) 21:17, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

I made a similar comment in the thread above, but I'll repeat it here, because I think this is a foolish discussion. There are so many things to worry about in this world, but this isn't one of them. Why the hell should we care what his ethnicity was? I mean, seriously! I am descended of one of these two ethnicities, and I can say unequivocally that I couldn't care less. I daresay that he would agree, because if this topic mattered to him, he would have written about it himself. Instead, he wrote things like this:


 * "The seeker after truth, does not place his trust in any consensus, however broad or however venerable: instead, he subjects what he has learned of it to his hard-won scientific knowledge, and he scrutinizes, measures, and verifies ... The road to the truth is long and hard, but that is the road we must follow."

The only reason this would matter to anyone would be either: (a) to feed their own hubris, and/or to (b) cause further racial tension and division. Well, guess what? Neither of those reasons have any value whatsoever. They only serve to tarnish the image of this great thinker and amazing man. — groll tech  ( talk )

Atmospheric science. Alhazen shows that the density of the heavens is less than the density of the atmosphere
""The body of the heavens is rarer than the body of air" -- Alhazen"

Alhazen deduced that the heavens (including outer space), being transparent bodies, like the atmosphere, and like water, cause a change in the direction  of a light ray propagating between Earthly media, and non-terrestial bodies. This phenomenon is due to the change in direction of a light ray from a fixed star, as the light ray propagates through the transparent body, at the interface between the material in the transparent bodies, such as between air and outer space. Alhazen had previously seen this refractive phenomenon at the interface between water and air, as described by Ptolemy 800 years before him. But being an astronomer, Alhazen applies the reasoning to the stars. Alhazen describes an experiment to quantitatively measure the degree of bending of the light ray between air and outer space using an astrolabe or armillary sphere, to measure the angular position of a fixed star, tracking that  star from its rising to its zenith. See: ALHACEN ON REFRACTION: A Critical Edition, with English Translation and Commentary, of Book 7 of Alhacen's "De Aspectibus," the Medieval Latin Version of Ibn al-Haytham's "Kitāb al-Manāzir." Volume Two. English Translation by A. Mark Smith Transactions of the American Philosophical Society New Series, Vol. 100, No. 3, Section 2 (2010), pp. 213-331, 333-397, 399, 401-451, 453, 455-491, 493, 495-535, 537-550. Published by: American Philosophical Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20787651 in JSTOR Page Count: 335

Alhazen points out that the fixed stars travel in circles centered on the celestial sphere.

"Smith 2010 translation, De Aspectibus, paragraph [4.28] p.271: .. Track one of the large fixed stars that appear on the zenith for your location. Track it at its rising in the east. Take an armillary sphere and set it up in a high location from which you can see the horizon. Arrange the armillary apparatus so that its meridian circle is posed with its pole [pointing] above the earth according to the altitude of the celestial pole on the horizon. When the star rises, turn the ring that rotates about the equinoctial pole until it is in line with the star. Determine the star's location on the ring. This will give you the angular distance of that star from the celestial pole. Track the star until it reaches the meridian circle. Adjust the ring as you have adjusted it before, until the ring is in line with the star. This gives the [angular] distance of the star from the celestial pole when the star lies directly overhead. You will find that the [angular] distance of the star from the celestial pole at its rising is less than the [angular] distance of the star at its zenith.

[4.29] This is so because the fixed star always moves on the same circle among circles parallel to the equator. ..." --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 03:32, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

Ethnicity
The replacement of Persian with Arabic as ethnicity is wrong. It is like replacing Irish with Celtic or Russian with Slavic. Dmcq (talk) 11:49, 29 October 2015 (UTC)

See Arab and Panethnicity "Arabs (Arabic: عرب‎, ʿarab) are a major panethnic group whose native language is Arabic, comprising the majority of the Arab world." Dmcq (talk) 13:09, 29 October 2015 (UTC)


 * That is your opinion. FYI, Wikipedia can not be used to reference Wikipedia. Whereas I have sources stating he was Arab:


 * Science, Medicine and Technology, Ahmad Dallal, The Oxford History of Islam, ed. John L. Esposito, (Oxford University Press, 1999), 192;"Ibn al-Haytham (d. 1039), "..known in the West as Alhazan, was a leading Arab mathematician, astronomer, and physicist. His optical compendium, Kitab al-Manazir, is the greatest medieval work on optics."
 * Ibn al-Haytham, J. Vernet, The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Vol. III, ed. B. Lewis, V.L. Menage, C. Pellat, J. Schacht (Brill, 1996), 788;" "IBN AL-HAYXHAM, B. AL-HAYTHAM AL-BASRI, AL-MisRl, was identified towards the end of the 19th century with the ALHAZEN, AVENNATHAN and AVENETAN of mediaeval Latin texts. He is one of the principal Arab mathematicians and, without any doubt, the best physicist."
 * David J. Hess, Science and Technology in a Multicultural World: The Cultural Politics of Facts and Artifacts, (Columbia University Press, 1995), page 66;"It is known that Galileo had a copy of "Opticae Thesaurus" of Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen), an Arab scholar who is praised today for his experimental method, although views on what this method entails and which importance it has in Ibn al-Haytham's work differ. (Omar 1979:68)." --Kansas Bear (talk) 13:15, 29 October 2015 (UTC)


 * I am not saying he was not an Arab. I am saying that calling him an Arab is like saying he is a Slav rather than a Russian. I see from previous discussion that the eis sufficient doubt over a more precise categorization so I now agree with the Arab but your links are simply confirmation not an attempt at finding out if there is something more precise. Dmcq (talk) 13:24, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Your comparing and constrasting is meaningless here. We state what the sources say, not what we interpret(or want) them to say. I could care less what his ethnicity was, what I will argue is the blind removal of referenced information without a discussion and blantantly ignoring what university sources state. RS & OR are quite relevant in this case. --Kansas Bear (talk) 13:33, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
 * I put the reference back in as it corroborated that he was well known. I agree that he was Arab. However a quick search on Wikipedia gave lots more references at 112000 on 'Alhazen Persian' than 86000 for 'Alhazen Arab' and just producing references that say 'Arab' does not show anything much because others say Persian and Persian is more specific. Saying Russian rather than Slav or Irish instead of Celtic is better. As I was saying the discussion that went on before showed there was real doubt about the Persian part despite what Google shows about higher numbers. I can easily get sources saying Persian so that sort of stuff is just bias confirmation without the evidence shown at the previous discussion. Dmcq (talk) 16:56, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Blanket searches are not going to prove anything. Ignoring university sources, gives the impression you are a nationalistic POV pusher. Another "new user" has brought:
 * Renaissance Theories of Vision, by Charles H Carman and John Shannon Hendrix
 * Charles H Carman, is a professor of Italian Renaissance and Baroque art
 * John Shannon Hendrix is a professor of Architectural History at the University of Lincoln, UK, and an Adjunct Professor of Art and Architectural History --Kansas Bear (talk) 17:24, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Neither seems qualified to make a statement concerning Alhazen or his ethnicity.
 * Whereas Encyclopaedia of Islam is made up of academics whose field is Islam and the areas it inhabits.
 * John Esposito, is an American professor of International Affairs and Islamic Studies. --Kansas Bear (talk) 17:24, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
 * So you descend to name calling when I point out problems. Well that's a great way to get improve an article. I had come along to my talk page and call me a vandal too. Might I suggest you pair try pointing out the previous discussion at  to the person you are warring against on the article page rather than making up your own arguments or reverting without saying anything useful to them? I  shall not bother you further in your nice playground here but I would point out WP:CIVILITY and WP:OWN to you both. Dmcq (talk) 18:25, 29 October 2015 (UTC)

It's always good to look at subject-specifc encyclopedia's for these cases. The eminent Dictionary of Scientific Biography (online) gives a detailed account of the primary sources, never explicitly ascribes an ethnicity and summarizes it with "About Ibn al-Haytham’s life we have several, not always consistent, reports, most of which come from the thirteenth century." The The Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in Islam gives a similar account, but summarizes the whole article as "Ibn al-Ḥaytam was an eminent eleventh-century Arab optician, geometer, arithmetician, algebraist, astronomer, and engineer." Unless some similarly authoritative source would explicitly claim he wasn't I would therefore simply go with "Arab". Sources such as Renaissance Theories of Vision, which only mention an ethnicity in passage, instead of giving a detailed account of the primary sources are not appropriate. —Ruud 19:28, 29 October 2015 (UTC)

Hello everybody, invited me on my talk page to give an opinion on the sources. Since I am an uninvolved editor, I hope you will give it due consideration. As far as I can see, it is probably difficult to be sure of anything, and it is definitely worth fighting over. If Basra was a Persian-speaking region at that time, it is very likely that he grew up speaking Persian, but Arabic was certainly the lingua franca and all his work would have been written in Arabic. I agree with that the best sources to resolve the issue would be biographies. Scientific books, no matter how reliable, would only gloss over the issue. Perhaps you can agree to punt the issue and note his ethnicity as "Persian and Arabic." Notice what we do with Al-Biruni. - Kautilya3 (talk) 20:07, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
 * Can we just call him Muslim, so we don't have these Arab-Persian wars on Wikipedia. We know at least for sure that he was Muslim. 70.50.212.52 (talk) 22:04, 13 January 2016 (UTC)
 * The Persian Wikipedia calls him "Arab and Iranian" (according to Google Translate, and I guess it could also be translated as "Arab and Persian") -- fa:ابن_هیثم. So I think it is reasonable to call him "Arab and Persian" using the same citations given on the Persian Wikipedia. I don't think Caliphates had "no nationalities" in them. Of course there are some cultural groups which exist today which existed before and after a Caliphate was in control. For example, Kurds and some other Persian groups. Many people inside Caliphates were not Muslims. While we know Alhazen was a Muslim, making a 1:1 relationship with cultural identity and religion is just as outdated and wrong as not describing him as a scientist (the archaic equivalent would be "natural philosopher"). --BurritoBazooka (talk) 23:02, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Most sources list him as Persian, which would not be surprising given the era he lived in. Still a lot list him as being Arab. But there is certainly clear agreement that he was Arab, as the main editor shows proclivity towards. It should be changed to 'Arab or Persian (or Persian or Arab)'. I think this is as reasonable as other contributors do. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:882:100:EF90:386A:843D:F048:641C (talk) 05:43, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * What sources? I have seen NO reliable sources stating he was Persian. Instead I see you removing quote(s) from reliable soruces that state he was Arab. Which is disruptive editing. --Kansas Bear (talk) 05:57, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

How are quotes 90000 quotes stating he was Arab, more reliable as the 120000 that refer to him as Persian? You have provided extremely arbitrary sources, which themselves do not provide any specific justification for his 'Arab' ethnicity, just as many sources who refer to Al Haytham as 'Persian', do not. Various scholarly sources, list him as being either Persian or Arab - mind you this has been the case for, at least, several decades now. There is no way anyone can determine his ethnicity with good confidence, and it may never be determined. For that, it would only make sense to change his ethnicity to 'Arab or Persian', as another contributor, above, has suggested.2601:882:100:EF90:386A:843D:F048:641C (talk)


 * I still see NO evidence backed by reliable sources calling him Persian. Your opinion or those of other IPs, most likely the same person, have no influence on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is written using published reliable secondary sources, not the opinion(s) of editors. --Kansas Bear (talk) 16:24, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

You are wrong. There are NO reliable sources which make it clear that he was Arab. You are clearly biased against any suggestion, no matter how reaonable, that Al Haytham was Persian. You are going against the majority viewpoint which cites him as Persian, and you are not even allowing for the suggestion that he may have been Persian. Your edits are entirely baseless. Please revert to "Arab or Persian". Jpz1979 (talk) 17:23, 15 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Illiterate much?


 * "There are NO reliable sources which make it clear that he was Arab."
 * Can't read?


 * Ibn al-Haytham, J. Vernet, The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Vol. III, ed. B. Lewis, V.L. Menage, C. Pellat, J. Schacht (Brill, 1996), 788;" "IBN AL-HAYXHAM, B. AL-HAYTHAM AL-BASRI, AL-MisRl, was identified towards the end of the 19th century with the ALHAZEN, AVENNATHAN and AVENETAN of mediaeval Latin texts. He is one of the principal Arab mathematicians and, without any doubt, the best physicist."
 * "It is known that Galileo had a copy of "Opticae Thesaurus" of Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen), an Arab scholar who is praised today for his experimental method, although views on what this method entails and which importance it has in Ibn al-Haytham's work differ." -- Hess, David J. (1995), Science and Technology in a Multicultural World: The Cultural Politics of Facts and Artifacts, page 66.
 * Reasonable? You have produce NO reliable sources! LOL. --Kansas Bear (talk) 17:29, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

Those are not sources that make it clear he was arab, but rather, sources that clearly state he was an arab. But such statements are ubiquitous and, unfortunately, always ungrounded. There are plenty of scholarly sources, which similarly suggest, that he was Persian. Ignoring the body of conflicting opinions, can only be described as Cherry picking. At this point, there is no sound basis for excluding Persian as his possible ethnicity.


 * Maybe you should direct your energy towards research instead of baseless, ignorant accusations directed at another editor.
 * "There are plenty of scholarly sources, which similarly suggest, that he was Persian."
 * And yet you haven't presented any. Instead you have attributed your lack of reliable sources to accusing me of bias and cherry picking.
 * "there is no sound basis for excluding Persian as his possible ethnicity."
 * Except you have NO reliable sources . LMAO.
 * "Those are not sources that make it clear he was arab, but rather, sources that clearly state he was an arab."
 * I believe COMPETENCE is coming into play here. BOOM! --Kansas Bear (talk) 03:15, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Just go back through a few hundred of your corrupt edits, and I'm sure you will find all the sources supporting he was Persian. There have already been countless references for this, and you have mindlessly removed them. "I believe COMPETENCE is coming into play here." More like your incompetence in grasping the English language. 2601:882:100:EF90:B569:5681:F528:93CB (talk) 04:26, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Why the hell should we care what his ethnicity was? I mean, seriously! The only reason this would matter to anyone would be either: (a) to feed their own hubris, and/or to (b) cause further racial tension and division. Well, guess what? Neither of those reasons have any value whatsoever. They only serve to tarnish the image of this amazing man. — groll tech  ( talk ) 20:08, 22 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Not to mention that currently the vast majority or 80% to 90% of both Iraq and Basra population is Arab. 45.116.233.18 (talk) 03:54, 15 December 2016 (UTC)

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"Ptolemaeus secundus"
It is correct that Corbin (1993/1964) claims he was "nicknamed Ptolemaeus secundus". No source is given, and I cannot verify this anywhere else. Is Corbin a credible source? Why are there no footnotes substantiating this, were they removed in the English translation or is this just a book aimed at a "popular audience"? Similarly, it is completely unsubstantiated that al-Haytham was called "The Physicist" as a title. How would this even have been phrased in Latin, physicus or something? This is attributed to Lindberg (1967) and I cannot verify it, but in any case it seems to have been repeated nowhere else. It is really doubtful if either of these epithets have sufficient notability to figure in the lead section. --dab (𒁳) 10:21, 10 October 2017 (UTC)


 * The issue here seems to be that "Alhazen" was not received in Latin tradition as an identifiable individual. His works were only received indirectly, and not consistently attributed to him. Apparently, the identification of "Alhazen" with Ibn al-Haytham is only a result of late 19th century scholarship. Now, John Peckham, writing in the late 13th century, attributes various opinions to either "the Philosopher" or "the Physicist", which eventually turn out to go back to Alhazen (ed. Lindberg 1972 p. 48, fn. 57). This is apparently the nucleus of the claim he was so "nicknamed", but the way this is presented in the article is extremely misleading.
 * Here Corbin attributes the Ptolemaeus secundus to Carl Brokelmann's Geschichte der arabischen Litteratur. It appears to be true that Alhazen was called this at least once by some Latin author. We will need to consult Brokelmann to find out more. --dab (𒁳) 10:46, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I found Brokelmann's entry here. No mention of "Ptolemaeus secundus", apparently this appears only in one of the supplementary volumes to the 2nd edition -- seems less and less relevant. --dab (𒁳) 10:53, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
 * See Lindberg and A. Mark Smith. The scholarship of the influence of Alhacen stretches not just from the 19th c., but also from 1976 to this day, including Smith (2015) From Sight to Light. See Lindberg,1976 p.86. David Lindberg, Mark Smith and Nader El-Bizri note Alhazen's considerable influence on the Perspectivists:


 * Smith, A. Mark (1981), "Getting the Big Picture in Perspectivist Optics" Isis 72(4) (Dec., 1981). via JSTOR
 * It's a pretty dramatic story: from anonymity in Christendom, to a dedicated search for more knowledge via translation from the Arabic, to intellectual victory over preachers in the cathedrals, because it fit their ideology. The scholars took the optics to heart, and Kepler figured it out, so that he could continue his astronomy and physics. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 17:01, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

We are not talking about the same thing. I am asking you to do research into medieval Latin tradition before you make claims about medieval Latin tradition. "See Lindberg and A. Mark Smith" does not cut it, I am asking for an evaluation of the reception of Alhazen in the 13th and 14th centuries. What is your quote saying? Can you explain what exactly Kepler has to do with this? --dab (𒁳) 18:03, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Please Google A. Mark Smith, Curators' Distinguished Professor of History, University of Missouri, who has spent 40 years on the topic you are requesting, Medieval history of science. Smith proves that Alhacen's example showed Kepler just how to complete the chain of visual perception begun by Alhacen, thereby fulfilling Lindbergs' program. Lindberg did precisely what you are requesting, the evaluation of the medieval Latin tradition in optics, called perspectiva. Smith 2015 From Sight to Light is a summary of this 40 year study. Please see the Smith citations in Book of Optics, which are a series of Smith's translations of all seven books, from Latin to English of De Aspectibus, the Latin translation of Kitab al Manazir. The well-known compilation by Friedrich Risner was one data point in Smith's research, who also surveyed the extant 18 Latin manuscripts that are complete, of De Aspectibus. The Latin manuscripts outnumber the Arabic manuscripts. This was an advantage, because the different manuscripts had different illustrations.
 * Although Alhacen started the revolution in visual perception, Smith, in a number of survey articles, shows that Kepler completed, and solved, the geometrical problem of how we see, which Kepler needed to solve for his astronomical researches. That is why Kepler complained about Witelo (Alhacen's ape), for not solving the puzzle of visual perception, which forced Kepler to take his detour. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 03:29, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I would be happy to amplify the Latin-to-English coverage of De Aspectibus in the Book of Optics article. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 03:54, 14 October 2017 (UTC)
 * From the Science_in_the_medieval_Islamic_world: "Al-Haytham proposed in his Book of Optics that vision occurs by way of light rays forming a cone with its vertex at the center of the eye".
 * Kepler's contribution was to model the eye as a water-filled glass sphere, which was Giambattista della Porta's idea, and showed that light entering an aperture (the entrance pupil) is imaged as a point on the back of the sphere. Alhacen's influence was embodied in the idea to use an aperture ("holes in darkened rooms"). See Treatise on light as well as Book of Optics
 * Before the telescope, we had naked eye astronomy. We need to fix the timeline of telescope technology because Kepler's contribution was 1604, not 1609. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 17:57, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

The nickname is Islamic not European

 * Ancheta Wis, dab
 * Sorry for the late answer, but I had to re-open the discussion since I am well-informed about the matter.
 * dab is right. The nickname of Alhazen as the "Second Ptolemy" was given to him by the Muslim historian, Abu'l-Hasan Bayhaqi, not by the medieval Europeans.
 * In fact, Alhazen was not that well known, let alone being honored, in medieval Europe compared to the likes of Averroes or Avicenna. There are no sources to support that he was honored by such a nickname in the wast. Henry Corbin, who himself seems to be confused, only says that Alhazen was nicknamed as the "Second Ptolemy", he does not says that he was nicknamed as such by the Europeans. The nickname as I have mentioned belongs to Abu'l-Hasan Bayhaqi.
 * So please re-edit the article and delete this sentence from the lead, because posting such fallacies in a high-profile article like this is disrespectful to Alhazen himself before any one else. 2001:16A2:1411:8C00:45E7:9C17:3811:4D55 (talk) 18:12, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 October 2017
Change: Ibn al-Haytham was a mathematician, astronomer, and physicist of the Islamic Golden Age. To: Ibn al-Haytham was an Arab mathematician, astronomer, and physicist of the Islamic Golden Age.

We should not obscure his Arab identity; it is a historical fact which is a source of pride for the Arab people. Objective Historian (talk) 04:11, 21 October 2017 (UTC)


 * This was discussed and consensus was to remove any mention of ethnicity from the lead. I would suggest starting a new discussion and gain consensus for a change. --Kansas Bear (talk) 04:48, 21 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Actually, there rather seems to be a consensus over his Arab ethnicity not only in all authoritative modern sources, but also through examining all circumstantial evidence of his biography like his name, place of birth, native language..etc. The fact that even Encyclopædia Iranica agrees on this should put this case to rest.
 * However, if we are to remove mention of ethnicity from the lead of this article, than we should be consistent and remove any mention of Persian ethnicity from the lead of Avicenna and al-Khwarizmi articles as well, since there are also modern non-scholarly sources which refer to them as Arabs like and.
 * I mean we either comply with wikipedia policy of reliable sources, or be consistent in editing material otherwise. Acquiescing to nationalist-motivated vandalism is not a solution.94.99.88.128 (talk) 16:52, 23 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Have you checked the latest history of this article? Where an IP that was closely involved in the discussion removed Arab using the edit summary, "unsourced claim", knowing full well that Arab ethnicity was sourced. This is the problem Wikipedia continues to have. Disingenuous IPs/editors that can not and will not accept what reliable sources state. Anyway, I am digressing. If you want Persian ethnicity moved out of the lead of those articles, start a conversation and get consensus. --Kansas Bear (talk) 18:38, 23 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I am well aware of this pathetic edit-war that has been going on here for a while. My point is that we should not bow to this persistent vandalism by removing well sourced material without a legitimate reason calling for it.
 * I was wondering if there was any way through which we could prevent such disruptive edits in future. Something like immediate, permanent ban of the IP, or maybe moderated editing of some sections, or staff lake that ?. I doubt that a platform like Wikipedia would not have precautions against such behavior.
 * And no, I'm certainly against moving out the Persian ethnicity from the lead of those articles, just as i am against removing the Arab ethnicity from this one, since both are well sourced, and there is no reason to question any of them. I just brought up those examples to showcase the absurdity of the reasoning behind questioning the authoritative sources of this article, and how the same procedure could be applied on many articles if we were to consider non-scholarly sources, which is absolutely absurd and against Wikipedia policy.-- 94.99.88.128 (talk) 21:09, 23 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I hear you. I’m not exactly happy about it, but when faced with constant IP vandalism this was supposed to be a way to cut down on it. Clearly, that failed. --Kansas Bear (talk) 21:18, 23 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Padlock-silver-open.svg Not done: The page's protection level has changed since this request was placed. You should now be able to edit the page yourself. If you still seem to be unable to, please reopen the request with further details. &mdash; KuyaBriBri Talk 18:02, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

Persian ethnicity
Hi everybody, i added Persian for his ethnicity as Institute of physics states so. I would like to say that one must consider the historical situation at that time: Arab language was just like English today, and all scholars at that time used to write in Arabic, this is why they are often listed as "Arabs". For example, Britannica lists the Persian scholar Nasir ibn al-Tusi as Arab: https://www.britannica.com/topic/trigonometry "Several Arab scholars, notably Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (1201–74) and al-Bāttāni, continued to develop spherical trigonometry and brought it to its present form." Of course some "Arab" scholars were true ethnic Arabs, my aim is not to minimise Arab contribution which is great. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.225.246.222 (talk) 07:09, 15 June 2017 (UTC)


 * Physics.org is not a reliable source for Islamic history. --Kansas Bear (talk) 21:41, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Hi, i can see you're reverting all sources without any explanation, Ibn Al-Haytham was a scientist and i think that the IOP of London is a more reliable source that your sole opinion. They are dealing with all physicians and not only muslims, that's not a reason to say they are not reliables...It's easy to revert all changees just because you don't want to admit that the ethnicity of that scholar is NOT clear and doing so means you don't respect the rules of Wikipedia, and apparently you just don't care about that. So could you please give me an explanation for that ? or maybe it's because you just don't like Persians ??? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.233.218.32 (talk) 22:05, 15 June 2017 (UTC)


 * Not a single mention of Ibn al-Haytham in this recent 448 page book about the Persians by an Iranian scholar. Case closed? Famous  dog   (c) 17:03, 20 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Lets not jump the gun, as there is only obscure sources, and limited historical account of Al-Haythams ethnic background. At this point, there is not nearly enough sources to resolve this question, so the dogged stance of this article is not justifiable. I would definitely recommend to leave it as "Arab or Persian".


 * Unfortunately for you Famousdog, i don't think that this book is an extensive list of ALL famous Persians...
 * Sorry, the case is all but closed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E34:EE9D:A200:DC77:68BC:C00B:D13C (talk) 02:26, 2 August 2017 (UTC)


 * There is another source (seemingly reliable) stating he was a Persian:


 * http://mustafaprize.org/en/?p=1162


 * and this other one sponsored by California Department of Education:


 * https://www.mydigitalchalkboard.org/portal/default/Resources/Viewer/ResourceViewer?action=2&resid=48566


 * — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E34:EE9D:A200:DC77:68BC:C00B:D13C (talk) 03:35, 2 August 2017 (UTC)


 * (indenting comments for readability) Not to sound like a broken record, Anonymous Users, but that first link is written by an organisation promoting science and technology, not a historian, and as far as I can see it doesn't contain any mention about his ethnicity (even in the history section it simply refers to him as 'Muslim'). The second link is a self-published article written by two British mathematicians, again: not historians or specialists in Islamic culture or history, and the article doesn't explicitly state his ethnicity, just that he was born ("possibly") in Basra, which is now in modern-day Iraq. These are unbelievably weak sources. I realise that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but if this is the best you can do then this conversation is over. Famous  dog   (c) 08:05, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

In the title of my first link, it's stated: "Ibn al-Haytham’s “Noor” Filmmaking Contest, A Revival of IRANIAN Scientific Dignity" Isn't that clear enough ?

About the second link, it's stated (again) in the description (on the right of the page...):

"This resource, from the Illuminations-reviewed HISTORY of Mathematics Archive, features biographical information about ancient PERSIAN mathematician Abu Ali al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham."

This one is a historical source, so i don't understand your comment about it...

Anyway, you want more sources? ok : 1) "Understanding History" by John Child, Paul Shuter, David Taylor - Page 70

2) "Science and Human Destiny" by Norman F. Dessel, Richard B. Nehrich, Glenn I. Voran - Page 164.

3) The Journal of Science, and Annals of Astronomy, Biology, Geology by James Samuelson, William Crookes - Page 497.

4) Killeen, Kevin (2014). Thomas Browne. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 940 (I think that Oxford University Press is known to be a reliable source, isn't it ?)

5) This one is from Missouri state University: https://science.missouristate.edu/assets/science/PosterAlhazen.pdf

6) If you can understand french, this is from "Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon": http://acces.ens-lyon.fr/acces/thematiques/neurosciences/actualisation-des-connaissances/vision/comprendre/vision_scientifique/vision_historique

7) This is from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/science/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/abu-ali-al-hasan-ibn-al-hasan-ibn-al-haytham

I'm not saying he was a Persian or an Arab, i just say that we don't know his ethnicity because many reliable sources are divergent about him. The wast majority of contributors about this topic are saying that we should just say "muslim" or "Arab or Persian". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E34:EE9D:A200:31E1:8A5B:D657:EB04 (talk) 00:32, 4 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi every body, Some users are stating that ecyclopaedia of islam is a very reliable source, this is only partly true. Just have a look on what wikipedia says about it : "EI is considered to be the standard reference work in the field of Islamic studies.[1] Each article was written by a recognized specialist on the relevant topic. However, unsurprisingly for a work spanning 40 years until completion, not every one of them reflects recent research."

SO, THIS SOURCE "MAY NOT REFLECT RECENT RESEARCH"... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.164.235.104 (talk) 13:05, 14 August 2017 (UTC)
 * There is no recent academic research when it comes to his ethnicity, if there was those works would already have been presented. - Tom &#124; Thomas.W talk 13:22, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

I think that Oxford University Press is a recent academic source :

Killeen, Kevin (2014). Thomas Browne. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 940 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E34:EE9D:A200:3CD5:26C9:40EC:8CF5 (talk) 20:56, 14 August 2017 (UTC)


 * So instead of the Encyclopaedia of Islam(ie. Juan Vernet, historian of Arab science), we should use a Professor of English Literature(Killeen)? Sounds like POV pushing to me. Refusing to listen to FamousDog, repeating the same tired sources that have been debunked before, example:


 * "Regarding the list of publications by Child, Hodge, Shuter, and Taylor provided above. I note that many of their works are published by Heinemann Educational; Heinemann's web page describes them as: "Heinemann is the UK's most trusted education partner and publishes resources for Primary and Secondary schools, FE colleges and training providers." Considering this fact and the broad topic range of the authors' works and the general nature of their titles, it seems we are dealing with authors of introductory textbooks for the school market; hardly the kind of works we would look at for scholarly research into Islamic history."--SteveMcCluskey (talk) 20:13, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Please notice that there is NO biography concerning the authors of the sources presented by the IP(s), whether they are mathematicians, physicists, English professors, Professors of Photography, etc. Because, as long as their "source" says what they want then the source could be written by a monkey.


 * "7) This is from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/science/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/abu-ali-al-hasan-ibn-al-hasan-ibn-al-haytham"
 * So Encyclopedia.com written by "someone" is a reliable source compared to Juan Vernet's article which was edited by Bernard Lewis, V.L. Menage, Charles Pellat, and Joseph Schacht?


 * "https://science.missouristate.edu/assets/science/PosterAlhazen.pdf"
 * Is taken from Jim Al-Khalili, who is Professor of Theoretical Physics;and Anthony Carpi, PhD in Environmental Toxicology;and Anne E. Egger, professor of Geological science.
 * Norman F. Dessel, earned a B.S. in 1957, an M.S. in 1958, and a Ph.D. in Physics in August 1961.
 * Richard B. Nehrich, chemist
 * Glenn I. Voran, appears to have only written the above book and "Atomic light".--Kansas Bear (talk) 03:06, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

I aggree that Vernet is a reliable source about this topic but that's not the question. The question is are there other reliable sources stating he was a Persian, and the answer is yes. You say Killeen is a professor of english literature and that's not true. Just have a look at your own link, it's said on his profile : "I have research interests in early modern science and INTELLECTUAL HISTORY" So he is an historian and a legit source. Another point is that he has been published by Oxford University Press which is a very reliable source. The prestigious ECOLE NORMALE SUPERIEUR of France is also stating he was a Persian... These Sources are reliable and don't publish false informations usually... Encycloedia.com is not writen by "someone" as you say just have a look at the "about us" link : "As the Internet's premier collection of online encyclopedias, Encyclopedia.com provides you reference entries from credible, published sources like Oxford University Press and Columbia Encyclopedia." Please, avoid carcaturing other contributors work to make Wikipedia being a true reliable source and not a battlefield of POV... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.171.52.41 (talk) 14:10, 15 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Killeen, has no specialization in the field of Arab studies, Persian studies, Islamic studies, or Islamic history. Your insistence to place the "historian" tag on him in no way makes him a reliable source.
 * Killeen's book, Thomas Browne, has nothing to do with Islamic studies or Islamic history. An arbitrary comment about Ibn al-Haytham hardly qualifies as a source for Islamic history.
 * "The Browne volume in the 21st-Century Oxford Authors series offers a comprehensive selection of the work of the author of some of the most brilliant and delirious prose in English Literature. Lauded by writers ranging from Coleridge to Virginia Woolf, from Borges to W.G. Sebal, Sir Thomas Browne's distinct style and the musicality of his phrasing have long been seen as a pinnacle of early modern prose. However, it is Browne's range of subject matter that makes him truly distinct. His writings include the hauntingly meditative Urn-Burial, in which the broken shards of urns found in a field lead him onto a history of mortality and oblivion, and the elaborate Escheresque architecture of The Garden of Cyrus, a work that borders on a madness of infinite pattern. Religio Medici, probably Browne's most enduringly famous work, is at once autobiography, intricate religious-scientific paradox, and a monument of tolerance in the era of the English civil war. This volume also includes his Pseudodoxia Epidemica, an encyclopaedia of error which contains within its vast remit the entire intellectual landscape of the seventeenth century - its science, its natural history, its painting, its history, its geography and its biblical oddities. Across this range of material, Browne brings his lucid, baroque and stylish prose to bear, together with a carefully poised wit. This volume contains almost all of the author's published work, as well as much of his posthumous writing, together with detailed endnotes and an expansive introduction to Browne's work and life."
 * I see nothing that has to do with Islamic history.


 * "As the Internet's premier collection of online encyclopedias, Encyclopedia.com provides you reference entries from credible, published sources like Oxford University Press and Columbia Encyclopedia.""
 * That's amusing coming from the person that just condemned the Encyclopaedia of Islam.
 * And since you continue to fail at fact checking

""Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon": http://acces.ens-lyon.fr/acces/thematiques/neurosciences/actualisation-des-connaissances/vision/comprendre/vision_scientifique/vision_historique"
 * Jauzein Françoise, Associate Professor of Life and Earth Sciences
 * Jean-Pierre Changeux, French neuroscientist
 * Still nothing to do with Islamic history.
 * Here is something you need to read:


 * "The word "source" when citing sources on Wikipedia has three related meanings:
 * The piece of work itself (the article, book)
 * The creator of the work (the writer, journalist)
 * The publisher of the work (for example, Random House or Cambridge University Press)
 * Any of the three can affect reliability. Reliable sources may be published materials with a reliable publication process, authors who are regarded as authoritative in relation to the subject, or both. These qualifications should be demonstrable to other people." --Kansas Bear (talk) 18:11, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the time you spent explaining me some rules about Wikipedia... I would never allow myself to "condemn" Ecyclopaedia of islam which is a reference in that field, i just said that it´s a quite old work (about 40 years old...) and it may not include recent researches. I think that Encyclopedia.com is reliable source which checks the 3 points you indicated to me... Most of Wikipedia articles don't have sources with so much conditions, i don't know why this one is so much disputed... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.166.50.147 (talk) 19:17, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

When i look to the talk page, i can see that although editors are far away from a concensus about his ethnicity, it's written that he was an Arab, why ? if it's because some editors are saying that sources claiming he was a Persian are not reliable, it's seems that this is not true (see Encyclopedia.com above). 89.225.246.222 (talk) 12:33, 11 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Please see Rüdiger Thiele's obituary of Matthias Schramm (1928-2005). It's a complex subject for reasons internal to the subject of History of science, namely that this kind of history is balkanized by topic and culture. One historian specializing in one topic cannot read materials in another topic. Schramm's reason for espousing Arabic science rather than Islamic science was that one might then apply this label to Christian, Jewish, and Muslim scientists alike (Thiele 2005 p.273). (In order to widen a label further, one might then assign such a label as say, southwest Asian scientist! Or to be both more general and more precise, southwest Asian scientist of the Buyid age might do.) Thiele closes Schramm's obituary with "Today’s historian with all his contemporary knowledge but with possibly incomplete understanding of the past must avoid easy judgments and strive instead with historical rigor to give the past its full due.". Remember, Schramm's view was that Ibn al-Haytham is the true founder of physics in the modern sense of the word, anticipating Galileo by six centuries (Schramm 1963 Ibn al-Haythams Weg, Summary), as cited by (Thiele 2005). --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 11:50, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

I added back "Persian" as possible ethnicity. I am coming across too many sources, that have suggested so (many offered in a couple paragraphs above), and I'm not able to find critical evidence supporting an "Arab" background. 2600:1700:1030:2070:F8A7:4487:41B9:4D37 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:19, 14 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Why should we use a source by a biomedical researcher? --Kansas Bear (talk) 21:50, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

10 October 2017
I am mostly confused because according to physics, his death year is 1039 and here is 1040. Please confirm the correct date. 182.182.54.10 (talk) 13:58, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
 * The article says 'around 1040', in Latin circa 1040 abbreviated 'c. 1040' --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 14:33, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

1040 Farah Allan (talk) 11:47, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

Influences on Book of Optics
Please see the article Book of Optics and the citations for Euclid's Optics and Ptolemy's Optics. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 22:47, 1 January 2018 (UTC) In addition, consider his Doubts Concerning Ptolemy, in which Alhacen stated "Truth is sought for its own sake. And those who are engaged upon the quest for anything for its own sake are not interested in other things." Furthermore Alhacen uses the idea that he must become his own worst critic. His conclusive disproof of Ptolemy is in Book of Optics Book One, Chapter 9, paragraphs [8.1] through [8.10] (I use Smith's translation 2001). Note Alhacen's reliance on Aristotle's scheme of logic. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 23:33, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Hi IP user from Rockville, Maryland. You removed some Greek scholars who influenced Ibn Al-Haytham, however, i would suggest you to take a look at this source stating for example : "Ibn al-Haytham’s most important work is Kitāb al-manāẓir (“Optics”). Although it shows some influence from Ptolemy’s 2nd century AD Optics, it contains the correct model of vision". Please do not remove content without legit reasons, per WP:ONUS. Thanks. ---Wikaviani  (talk) (contribs)  23:46, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

I added back the deleted influences, with citations, as stated above. Aristotle is Smith 2001 p.xvi --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 02:15, 28 August 2018 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much for that, . Take care. ---Wikaviani  (talk) (contribs)  02:20, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Commons files used on this page have been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons files used on this page have been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 08:39, 29 August 2018 (UTC)
 * 10000IQDfront.jpg
 * 10IQDfront.jpg

Transliterations and transcriptions, versus Latinised names
✅ --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 08:05, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) The use of the subject's actual name, Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥasan ibn al-Ḥasan ibn al-Haytham أبو علي، الحسن بن الحسن بن الهيثم, and of various Latinised forms such as Alhazen, Alhacen et al throughout the article is extremely inconsistent.
 * 2) In the article, Alhacen occurs twice as the subject's name, Alhazen 84 times (not counting attributive or possessive uses), Ibn al-Haytham about one-fifth as often.
 * 3) From the perspective of European history, I understand that the Latinised forms were the names appearing on mediaeval and early Renaissance Latin translations of ibn al-Haytham's work; early European scholars knew the works before learning anything about the man; and not until relatively recently did they connect these various works and purported authors with the one person.  Therefore, in detailing the history of the early European reception of those works, it seems entirely appropriate to continue to use the names by which both works and author(s) were known.
 * 4) Some modern authors of our reliable sources, who may have spent a lifetime thinking of the subject (or his writings) under one or other of his Latin aliases, have continued to produce articles denoting him by those aliases rather than his real name.  In such cases, the proper names of such sources are, of course, those under which they were published, and we should reproduce verbatim any quotations we take from them.
 * 5) However, beyond those two specific contexts, in the interests of accuracy, why continue to use those early approximations when the author's name is now well-known?  Therefore, I suggest that we should replace those aliases by his own name in any other discussion of the subject's work.  That is, in about 7 dozen instances.
 * 6) This being the English language Wikipedia, we of course use the best accepted transliterations to English letters of names normally written in other scripts.  The transliteration given in the article's lead, and which I've quoted above in my first point, is consistent with best practices (as I understand them) for Arabic names when font support is available for long vowels (with macron): Āā, Īī, Ūū; voiceless pharyngeal fricative: Ḥḥ; and ʻayn: ˁ.  (When only basic Latin font support is available, one might use the following instead: Abu 'Ali al-Hasan ibn al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham.)
 * 7) Alhacen is not an accurate transcription for English speakers of either al-Ḥasan or of al-Haytham.  It might be considered a reasonable approximation of al-Ḥasan by French speakers, but I leave that judgment up to them, as French is only my second language.  And there are many standards for transcription, none having universal currency or authority.  So I fail to understand the following statement (sourced to p. xxi of "A. Mark Smith (2001), Alhacen's theory of visual perception: a critical edition, with English translation and commentary, of the first three books of Alhacen's De aspectibus, the medieval Latin version of Ibn al-Haytham's Kitab al-Manazir") in the article:  "Risner is also the author of the name variant "Alhazen"; before Risner he was known in the west as Alhacen, which is the correct transcription of the Arabic name."
 * 8) The question has to be asked: What rules exist for a "correct transcription"?  Without knowing the standard by which we should judge correctness, this seems a contentious claim.
 * 9) I conclude that we should take the following actions:
 * replace aliases by Ibn al-Haytham's own name in about 7 dozen instances.
 * either source support for, or more simply delete, the contentious phrase "… which is the correct transcription of the Arabic name" from the above quote. yoyo (talk) 11:57, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

Timestamping a citation from ip anon 2001:16A2:1411:8C00:45E7:9C17:3811:4D55 --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 21:39, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

Selenographia title page
The page shows Alhazen and Galileo, and two symbols labelled ratione and sensu. The implication is not that Alhazen represents the former and Galileo the latter, that would make no sense. The two terms are in the ablative, to be translated "by reason" and "by sense", they are to be read together, "by sense and by reason" as a summary of the scientific method. The interpretation that Alhazen represents pure reason, and Galileo pure empiricism seems rather far-fetched, and made-for-Wikipedia, if this is the case, we would at least need a published source making the inference. --dab (𒁳) 16:50, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

Father of modern optics
Alhazen has been dubbed the father of modern optics by the UNESCO.Three reliable references were given for that,but the whole content (along with the references) was removed by dab .I want to know the reason for its removal. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.55.63.185 (talk) 11:19, 10 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Here is a citation for 'father of optics': Irina Bokova (Director-General of the UN's education organization, UNESCO), message upon the program opening of the international year of light 2015, commemorating the 1000 year anniversary of al-Haytham's 'Kitab al manazir' (book of optics). The sponsoring institutions included optics or physics institutions (think photonics), such as the society of photo-optical instrumentation engineers (SPIE), and the events listed 5 Nobel laureates, including a laureate from the photonics field. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 14:33, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

@Ancheta Wis This citation is good and more reliable - see:  .The website was launched by UNESCO.Look at the last para,its is clearly written that the UNESCO in Impact of Science on Society - Volumes 26-27 – (1976) Page 140, 1st Edition 1950 dubbed Alhazen as the father of modern optics''. It also says that there are many sources describing Ibn al-Haytham as the father of modern Optics.Yes there are many reliable sources that describe Alhazen as the father of Modern optics.I dont know why other users remove contents that describe him as the father of modern optics
 * In the optics field, his position is recognized as fundamental. He did not recognize the function of the retina; it took Giambattista della Porta's invention of water-filled glass spheres as optical elements, and Kepler's use of these spheres as a model for the eye to explain the optical chain. But that's the paradigm: it takes patient work, acceptance of those who have built what has come before you, and adding what you are able. No optiker would dispute al-Haytham's significance. Even Isaac Newton's experimental optical setup used al-Haytham's setup. Just look at the societies who signed up for his 1000-year commemoration. --Ancheta Wis    (talk  &#124; contribs) 16:21, 10 October 2017 (UTC)


 * @Ancheta Wis. Under the header Optical treatises in the main text it says: “Experiments with mirrors and magnifying lenses provided the foundation for his theories on catoptrics.”. But glass clear and pure enough to serve as lenses (cristallo) was developed considerably later, in Venice in the 15-th/16-th century ([1], p. 95-96.). So al-Haytham can never have experimented with lenses, magnifying or refracting. Earlier on, North Italian glassmakers invented eyeglasses around 1300 AD ([1], p.91); the glass was still of inferior quality, but that didn't matter, because the eye uses only a small portion of the surface of the lens.


 * Above you state: “Even Isaac Newton's experimental optical setup used al-Haytham's setup.” But to what set-up are you referring? And what was supposed to be verified? I think we need a reference here.


 * [1] Robert Friedel, A Culture of Improvement. Technology and the Western Millennium, 2007.--Gerard1453 (talk) 19:33, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

UNESCO has nothing to do with Arabic literature,it is at best pop culture or politics. So yes, mention this under "modern reception" or something, but it certainly has no place in the lead section. This is a serious topic and not some random collection of trivia. --dab (𒁳) 17:59, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

(𒁳) UNESCO stands for United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.Its purpose is to promote   educational, scientific, and cultural reforms .This page is not about Arabic literature.Its about a famous philosopher,scientist and mathematician.This page has to do with History of Science.You are saying it is at best pop culture or politics,this is your personal view.I dont care about your personal views.I dont think it should be mentioned under "modern reception" or something.UNESCO first described him as 'the father of optics' in 1976.It described alhazen 'without question the father of modern optics'.He has been regarded as the father of optics by many prominent historians and physicistst.It should appear in the lead section.The lead should stand on its own as a concise overview of the article's topic. It should identify the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is notable, and summarize the important points, including any 'prominent controversies'. --edit by user:119.42.56.87
 * Thank you for your note and questions. Please see A.Mark Smith, ed. and trans. (2010)  Alhacen on Refraction : a critical edition, with English translation and commentary, of Book 7 of Alhacen's De aspectibus, [the Medieval Latin version of Ibn-al-Haytham's Kitāb al-Manāẓir], Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 100–3 Chapter 2, which establishes 6 fundamental principles of refraction (summarized on p.xvi). His media are 'transparent bodies' which are air, water, glass, and the heavens. His measurements are in cubits, with fine units of barleycorns. The experimental setup described in English translation are on pp 220-224. His glass media are cubes, hemispheres and quarter-spheres. See for example his setup on paragraphs 2.35-46 for glass cubes. There is a diagram (fig.3, p.403). Smith p.xxi summarizes the setup for refraction air-to-glass, glass-to-air, or glass-to-water (paragraphs 2.59-78).


 * Smith (2010) p.xxii notes Alhacen's conclusion that the principles of refraction hold for all types of light and all types of transparent media (Which Alhacen noted in his Treatise on Light).
 * Smith 2010 p.xv notes Alhacen Book of Optics Book 7 chapter 5, has 10 theorems proving that 'any object point seen through any refractive interface, whether plane, convex spherical, or concave spherical, will yield only one image.'
 * Generally, Alhacen used rays of sunlight which he enhanced with 'darkened rooms', produced from holes in the walls ( a technique used in Isaac Newton's chambers for his 'Opticks', with the holes in his curtains). (Newton's reflecting telescope was trying to solve the problem of chromatic aberration endemic with refraction by glass optical elements. — hence his famous experiment in his darkened room.)
 * Alhacen used this work (Book 7, para. 4.28) to conclude that 'The body of the heavens is rarer than the body of air'. In other words, outer space is a vacuum, but our atmosphere isn't.
 * --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 22:22, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
 * G J Toomer notes that the linguist and historian of science, Matthias Schramm (who could read Classical Chinese and Arabic), claims that Alhacen was the true founder of modern physics.   Smith 2015 From sight to light would probably have a good summary for you. Smith 2015 does cover the history of lens-quality glass. I should caution that optical glass per se is a red herring; what matters in today's terminology is the propagation of wave-fronts, which Alhacen described very well (it reads like a modern physics article). I'll have to dig for the paragraph, though. Ancheta Wis    (talk  &#124; contribs)


 * @Ancheta Wis. Thanx. What puzzles me is that islam, with all its optical 'might', never came up with the idea of spectacles and of combining two suitable lenses to arrive at the telescope - which would have been so useful in the starry clear skies of the Middle-East. I find this fascinating in itself from the viewpoint of the history of science.


 * @Gerard1453, I haven't read Smith 2015, which has a very clear history of glass-making for optics. I have read that China had spectacles simultaneously with Europe (much like Magellan's 1500s voyage to Brunei, where they discovered there were more cannons in Brunei than on their 3 ships, probably from the Chinese tech families who reinforced the harbor of Brunei). Probably there was cross-fertilization of ideas/technology (gunpowder etc). Those ideas undoubtedly made their way through southwest Asia on the way to southeast Asia. I have already provided the citation to Alhacen's Optics Book 7, para.4.28, which used naked-eye observation, just as in China's astronomical observatories. Alhacen used lathes, astrolabes, armillary spheres in his Book from 1000 years before us. Probably the greatest lack was in the scientific community's competition with each other. Since China had centralized politics, and so did the Caliphates, they lacked the political competion provided by the smaller dukedoms of Europe (China used to have feuding dukedoms, but they were eliminated by 213 BCE). --Ancheta Wis    (talk  &#124; contribs) 20:09, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * Something else: in paragraph Alhazen's problem it says, somewhere in the middle: "(...) where the formulas for the sums of integral squares and fourth powers allowed him to calculate the volume of a paraboloid." However, a paraboloid is a surface; the volume it encloses has a very simple expression.--Gerard1453 (talk) 18:30, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
 * As A.Mark Smith pointed out, Alhacen is best not underestimated. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 20:14, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

I continue to insist that UNESCO isn't a quotable reference here, outside of a "pop culture" or "modern reception" section. UNESCO is political/ideological in purpose and outlook, it is not scholarly, and makes no pretense at being scholarly. UNESCO can and shold be cited in the context of modern-day international politics and nothing else. Surely, if al-Haytham being called the "father of optics", this can be referenced to serious literature, not to BBC News and the UNESCO. If it cannot, there is nothing wrong with making statements about UNESCO and modern journalism under Ibn_al-Haytham.

The countless "father of this" and "father of that" epithets are thrown around breathlessly by journalists at the drop of a hat and are in themselves completely meaningless. Al-Haytham is indeed notable as a medieval scientist, I am not disputing that at all. I am, quite on the contrary, asserting that this is a fact that can in fact be based on serious references and that we do not need to resort to cheap journalistic lingo for it. --dab (𒁳) 16:56, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

"The Physicist"
Ancheta Wis

Just like the case with the "Second Ptolemy" epithet, there seems to be another source misrepresentation in the article. Alhazen in medieval Europe was not known as "The Physicist". The source provided for this claim does not support that all.

Here is what the source really says: "Though but one of many authorities, Alhazen exerted by far the dominant influence. Bacon continually cites him by name, and Peckham and Witelo consciously patterned their major optical works after his Perspectiva, respectively condensing and expanding its treatment. Peckham continually bows to the authority of Alhazen, whom he cites as 'the Author' or 'the Physicist'. Lindberg, David C. (1967), 'Alhazen's Theory of Vision and Its Reception in the West', p. 331"

As you can see, the "the Physicist" was just a casual name given to Alhazen by one Eoropean author, John Peckham. It was neither an honorary epithet nor a common name for Alhazen in medieval Europe.

I also propose moving the paragraph about Alhazen's nicknames from the lead altogether, since it has been established that both nicknames were uncommon and rarely used in scholarly literature. This paragraph belongs in the Legacy section at the end of the article, keeping it in the lead is very misleading and clumsy. 188.50.248.212 (talk) 19:26, 29 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Peckham is a good source. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 18:07, 2 December 2018 (UTC)