EIBF: Tariq Ramadan defends Islam, Nicholas Carr attacks the internet

Preaching tolerance, love and respect between people of all faiths, Swiss Muslim thinker Tariq Ramadan doesn’t once come off as condescending or naive in his discussion about faith and identity.

To some in the Islamic world he is a sell-out, an apostate who is diluting the true meaning of the religion. Some Westerners see him as a terrorist sympathiser who doesn’t go far enough to tackle Islamic radicalism.

It is therefore easy to see where he got the inspiration for his latest book, What I Believe. Whereas his previous works had been weighty tomes aimed at either the Western Muslim audience or readers in Muslim-majority countries, this is short and to the point.

A very short speech on the book led to a fruitful discussion on the main points of contest between the West and Islam. The proposed “Ground Zero Mosque”, loathed by America right wingers, was quickly brought up. Ramadan said that while it was legitimate to have questions about the community centre’s location, the issue was being negatively “instrumentalised” by political forces.

The concept of jihad, popularly feared as a byword for holy war, is in Ramadan’s view “an internal route to peace” rather than an outward expression of violence. When the Danish cartoons controversy was brought up, he again offered that this was a result of misunderstanding rather than malice. He condemned the violence “without discussion”, but again said that the mistrust the cartoons created in the Muslim world were instrumentalised by political forces.

Some of his harshest criticism was reserved for French President Sarkozy. His banning of the burka in public places and proposals to strip citizenship for bigamists were described as an unwelcome “escalation” in the needless conflict between two faiths.

Though his philosophy might soundnaive, Ramadan eloquates it well, and his latest book will further cement his authority as one of the world’s foremost Islamic thinkers.

What faith in humanity Tariq Ramadan gave me, Nicholas Carr went a long way to destroying.  To hyperbolise Carr’s view; the internet might lead to the downfall of civilisation, and we’ll be too busy Tweeting and Googling to notice society collapsing around us.

His book, The Shallows is based on his provocatively-titled essay Is Google Making us Stupid? Carr has developed quite a reputation in technology circles, after clashing with Wikipedia creator Jimmy Wales over his site’s quality. Yet The Shallows will make difficult reading for heavy internet users, in more ways than one.

Using neurological research and a broad range of academic studies, Carr argues that the fast-paced, multifaceted nature of information available on the internet is rewiring our brains, largely changing them for the worse.

This was based on his own experiences following a period of heavy internet use. The “deep reading” that had previously come naturally to him when leafing through a book was not possible any more; he was constantly distracted and looking for the next link. “Science confirmed my fears... Our brains are malleable throughout our lives. You can teach an old brain new tricks” he says. If he’s right, the effects could be profound.

As the screen slowly edges out the printed word through iPads and Kindles, human thought will become less deep, and social interactions less meaningful. When the Q&A session brought up some challenges to his thesis, namely that the internet can broaden our horizons and be a tremendous liberating force, he was able to defend it with the weight of academic research at his disposal. Memorably, when some teachers in the audience asked about the usefulness of computers in schools, he criticised the tendency to equate more computers with better education.

However all this didn’t stop Carr from geeking out about his own gadgets. “I’ve got this really cool blu-ray player that can stream movies from online!” he said in an out of character aside.