4 ms·
I don't think anyone disputes that there were religious centers of learning that occurred earlier. But in cases where these institutions are Christian, people s
by bnralt 4y ago
I don't think anyone disputes that there were religious centers of learning that occurred earlier. But in cases where these institutions are Christian, people seem fine saying that they were monasteries and not universities. Monastic intellectual tradition is well known. But with many non-Christian intellectual religious centers, people seem intent on using the term "university."
Using different standards for Christian and non-Christian intellectual monasteries is strange. It doesn't make sense to call the latter universities and then turn around and act like the former weren't. For instance, from the article:
> The monastic university predates the University of Oxford and Europe's oldest university, Bologna, by more than 500 years.
If Nalanda counts as a university, then Europe certainly had universities older than Bologna. Or perhaps those institutions shouldn't count, and neither should Nalanda. I personally don't care which definition is used, as long as it's used consistently. But we seem to be dealing with definitions that change mid-sentence to accommodate whatever conclusion the author wants.
- dopidopHN 4y agoMonasteries were closed to the public and most orders ( if we exclude the jésuites) we’re not that into science. Rather theology / philosophy. Their main goal was often conservation of the scriptures.
- kamaal 4y ago>>If Nalanda counts as a university, then Europe certainly had universities older than Bologna. Yup, a lot of things have existed earlier than we perceive. I do think 0 was invented by cave dwellers when they plucked 2 fruits from a tree, eat those 2 fruits over a day and counted the next day how many fruits were remaining(When they felt hungry and if they had to pluck more fruits)
- zamnos 4y agoThat's the concept of lacking something you had before. What was revolutionary about zero, is it means you can add 1000 + 900 + 90 + 9 and aligned like that, to get 1999, instead of having to do math to figure out what the hell MCMXCIX works out to be. With zero as the place holder, larger numbers are way easier to represent.