What’s something you used to believe as a kid that seems ridiculous now?

There are many answers to the question above. One obvious candidate for an answer is religion. No need to believe in gods, miracles, virgin births, a talking snake, flying chariots, Hebrew slaves in Egypt, and the rest of the equally fictional stories. However, such an answer would be too easy, and secondly, would not contribute anything original to this question.

So here is my answer – stop believing that the English-speaking nations, what I call the Anglophone world, is a world leader in science. Britain, while an economic powerhouse, is not the centre of scientific knowledge anymore.

To be certain, Britain’s contribution to the sum total of scientific knowledge is awesome. Isaac Newton, Francis Bacon, Lord Kelvin – these are just some of the heavyweights in the scientific canon of Britain’s history. Oxford, Cambridge, Exeter – Britain’s universities are among the best in the world.

The Enlightenment, the scientific revolution of the 1500s to 1700s, the emphasis on empirical evidence and rational thinking, which built upon but also superseded the Ancient Greek view of nature and the universe – these were momentous achievements, no doubt. These accomplished were taught to us in Australia as the birthplace of modern science.

That is all well and good, but there is something fundamentally wrong with this picture, namely, the rest of the world is excluded. Oh yes, we learnt about Leonardo Da Vinci as a non-British Renaissance polymath. However, we learned next to nothing about the important scientific achievements of other civilisations. This led to a skewed belief that Britain was the epic centre of scientific progress.

Nothing could be further from the truth. That belief lives on in the popular culture of the Anglophone nations. It can be difficult to step outside of one’s own cultural environment to consider other nations and their achievements. But that is what we must do.

Centuries before Da Vinci, and while Britain was still a patchwork of competing kingdoms, there was the Muslim scholar, scientist, astronomer and philosopher Al-Biruni (973 – 1050). Born in what is today Uzbekistan, he was one of the world’s first anthropologists.

He did not reject the heritage provided by the ancient Greeks, but he developed his own work, and built his own foundations. He was a pioneer in the study of ancient India – he made a detailed analysis of that country’s philosophy and social practices.

His work spanned numerous branches of science – astronomy, geography and physics, just to name a few. He spoke Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Sanskrit and Hebrew. In fact, he was the earliest writer to distinguish astronomy from astrology. That was quite a daring and groundbreaking path to take at the time.

He wrote a book which today would be classified as an expose of astrology as a pseudoscience. Using trigonometric calculations, he calculated the radius of the Earth – at a time when in Europe the earth was considered a flat surface.

Far ahead of his times, he surmised that there must be a landmass between Asia and Europe. He was a pioneer in what today is known as geology. No, he did not sail to the continents we know today as the Americas. But to suggest another landmass was quite a stunning claim to make at the time.

Columbus, after he got lost, thought he bumped into Asia and called the indigenous people of the Americas ‘Indians.’

Al Biruni’s work and achievements are part of what we now acknowledge as the Islamic Golden Age. Indeed, it is chronologically correct to say that Da Vinci was the European Al Biruni. Learning about this neglected history helped me to abandon the adolescent belief that Britain was the homeland of science and rationalism.

But that is all history, is it not? What about today? Are not the Islamic nations stuck in a quagmire of fanatical dogma and scientific backwardness? There is an element of truth to this. Yes, Muslim majority nations must be more proactive in the scientific fields.

When we mention Iran, the image we have here in the Anglophone community is a country of mad mullahs, fanatical ayatollahs, gun-toting militants screaming anti-Western slogans, and submissive burqa-clad women. Underlying these stereotypes is the belief that Muslim nations are impervious to logic and reason. How can you talk to such closed-minded zealots?

One of the revelations from the latest US-Israeli attack on Iran is the remarkable advances Iran has made in science and technology. No, not just in the military sphere. Let’s think beyond bombs and missiles. Tehran has cemented itself as a scientific hub and powerhouse in Western Asia.

Iranian surgeons have become world leaders in organ transplantation. Iran’s medical institutions domestically developed vaccines for Covid during the pandemic, all the while under US sanctions. Iranian researchers are leading the world in stem cell technology, gaining international recognition for the development of treatments for leukaemia and blood cancers.

Let us step away from Iran for a moment, and have a look at the Nature Index, an international ranking of universities for scientific research. In 2025, that ranking released its top ten universities for science – nine of them are in China. Beijing has surged ahead over the last few decades, surpassing the US and Britain as hubs for scientific expertise.

These rankings not only reflect Chinese scientific knowledge and competences, but also a stunning triumph for Beijing’s vision as a global leader in science.

If we maintain the misguided belief that we, meaning the Anglophone West, are still the best in science, we risk becoming the scientific backwaters which we accuse other nations of being. This is not a competition to see who is best, but a recognition that if we maintain teenage-like beliefs in our own superiority we will face a rude awakening one day.