Noam Chomsky Quotes
Modern China; one also finds many things that are really quite admirable.
Chomsky, Noam. Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky. Edited by Peter R. Mitchell and John Schoeffel, The New Press, 2002.
This was a radical speech for the time, suggesting reforms that had been unthinkable to most Turks. Although it is not prohibited by the Koran and early Islamic artists made some of the greatest paintings and depictions of people, fundamentalists gained control of Islam and interpreted any statue as an idol that could be worshipped and this generalized to Islamic art in general where people ceased to be depicted and even animal depictions were rare. Muslim art developed incredible geometric intricacy but tended not to depict anything that is real. This extended to photography and illustrations in books including textbooks. At the same time, not unlike some Christian and Jewish Fundamentalists, the Muslim fundamentalists opposed science and the teaching thereof on the grounds that all authentic knowledge was in the Koran and anything else was not only false but also heretical. So this speech was a type of “declaration of war” against the established religious order and culture.
His hope that the elite intelligentsia would lead the nation was thwarted by Islamic fundamentalism which destroyed most of Pakistan education by only teaching religion in its Madrassas and not allowing the leadership to have compulsory education. There has been an enormous brain drain with a huge number of the Pakistani intelligentsia on which Jinnah pinned his hopes, had no opportunity in Pakistan and emigrated to the United Kingdom and America.
This was an incredible prediction that few people thought was possible. This speech was given in the early days of WWII when it was far from clear that we would win.
After Turkey’s defeat in WWI, some Turkish leaders like Riza Nur wanted Turkey to become a colony of America. This they believed would hasten Turkey’s development and modernization.
Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He is Laureate Professor of Linguistics at the University of Arizona and Institute Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and is the author of more than 150 books on topics such as linguistics, war, politics, and mass media. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism.
