He gets quite a lot wrong about Wahhabism (which I am not a fan of). To his credit he does mention he didn't bother going deep into trying to understand it, and his research is very superficial relying on all the well-known debunked cliches about it.
First there are 5 prayers a day not 6.
Also the official doctrine of SA’s head imams is not that the earth is flat and doesn't rotate.
On the earth not rotating he links to a random cleric not an official position. This is no different from citing any of the random nutty clerics in the US who every once in a while make absurd scientific claims (including Ben Carson) and then projecting it as an official position of the entire evangelical movement.
An easier way to debunk the above is to note that newtonian mechanic and astronomy are taught in the Saudi curriculum in a way that is virtually identical to any western curriculum.
I think it is true that Wahhabism is one of the least progressive and anti-science mainstream modern islamic movements, but not to the extent that the author presents.
A better illustration of Wahhabism's anti-science stance is its semi-hostile position on darwinism, but this is true to many mainstream movements in abrahamic religions (including christian and jewish movements).
It is also amusing to note that Wahhabism has a more progressive stance on abortion than most mainstream American christians.
First there are 5 prayers a day not 6.
Also the official doctrine of SA’s head imams is not that the earth is flat and doesn't rotate.
On the earth is flat this has been widely mis-reported and debunked, see (https://www.reddit.com/r/islam/comments/2hc96u/shaykh_abd_al...)
On the earth not rotating he links to a random cleric not an official position. This is no different from citing any of the random nutty clerics in the US who every once in a while make absurd scientific claims (including Ben Carson) and then projecting it as an official position of the entire evangelical movement.
An easier way to debunk the above is to note that newtonian mechanic and astronomy are taught in the Saudi curriculum in a way that is virtually identical to any western curriculum.
I think it is true that Wahhabism is one of the least progressive and anti-science mainstream modern islamic movements, but not to the extent that the author presents.
A better illustration of Wahhabism's anti-science stance is its semi-hostile position on darwinism, but this is true to many mainstream movements in abrahamic religions (including christian and jewish movements).
It is also amusing to note that Wahhabism has a more progressive stance on abortion than most mainstream American christians.