Talk:Alchemy in the medieval Islamic world

message: All branches of "chemistry" where under the umbrella name of Alchemy right up until the latter part of the 1700's, when Europeans readopted atomic theory, which itself was also theorised by Europeans, at an age when the people of the Arabian peninsula where living in caves . I am not wanting to belittle the vast contribution made by the Muslim alchemists, but i do find it annoying  when people create false history, especially when writing “but later there were disputes between the traditional alchemists and the practical chemists who discredited alchemy”. This is a prime example of innovation so as to crate yet another myth of high utopian Islamic civilisation, if the author had written rubbish about the Islamic faith, then he would have been stoned to death by now. Face the fact mate, Alchemy was alchemy until it became separated by Europeans. 
Ahmadwill (talk) 18:09, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Its hilarious you are saying that this is all distortions, when you yourself present a distorted account of the history of Chemistry. It is literally as if they send you from the late XIX century to the present in a time machine.--142.68.47.178 (talk) 21:51, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

text: No. Ahmadwill is right per WP:RfC/Jagged 85. And 142.68.47.178 and Mr No Signature should read WP:GOODFAITH. Rursus dixit. (mbork3!) 13:17, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  What Rubbish? 

message: Just a quick note as to why I have assessed this article as start class.
* The lead could summarize the overall article better
* The article body could be more structured. The biographies section is presented in a nice chronological order, but offers no real indication of how the craft/science developed over those years.
* After reading the article, I have some knowledge of the names of several prominent alchemists, but I only a little about what their alchemy actually consisted of, and nothing at all about the transition into something more like modern chemistry.
* There are reference syntax errors in various places (easily fixed).
* There are several unlinked references to alchemical books with no indication of their significance or content.
* There are several unlinked references to beliefs (e.g. gnosticism) and authorities (e.g. Anawati) with no indication of their significance.
* Occasionally the dense Arabic makes readability difficult.
Overall I feel that the article presents some starting points for research - names, places, years - but doesn't yet present a coherent narrative or leave me with any take-home points. As the quality scale says, "provides some meaningful content but the majority of readers will want more."
Cheers,
Thparkth (talk) 20:18, 12 October 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  History of science assessment - Start class 

message: * Although the information in the lead paragraph is relevant to this topic, it dominates too much of the page with information that is not directly related to the topic. It reads almost as a research paper with an introduction that sets up the information like that. Instead, the focus of the main paragraph should be what kind of alchemy and chemistry was performed, who performed it, and where/what locations this work was located at. This information should be in there, just not as the main talking point. As it is, it is distracting. 
* I think the effect of the experiments done and the outcomes for future experiments/research should be gone into in more depth. How these experiments were accepted by Islamic religious leaders, if it had an effect outside of Islamic culture, etc. 
I think all the information currently in this article are relevant, but could be restructured to make it flow better. Some more research into the effects should be done to provide readers with a better understanding of the importance of this topic. 
DylanDunbar24 (talk) 16:46, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article structure and flow 

message: I added some addition info the description of Jabir Hayyan and his life, work in alchemy, and contributions. Just some minor stuff, but necessary nonetheless. DylanDunbar24 (talk) 17:07, 9 October 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Additional Info to Jabir Hayyan 

message: The numbered references are a mess. The first reference to Holmyard is  
21 pp. 86-92, Holmyard 1990.
But there is no Holmyard 1990.  Has someone cut and pasted bits of his unmarked undergraduate essay into this text? Cvhorie (talk) 16:36, 17 December 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: @Cvhorie I found the Holmyard 1990 ref (lurking inconspicuously, starting with the page numbers) and reformatted it: other refs to books could do with being similarly upgraded for clarity. PamD 12:00, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  References