I found this interview on Youtube, and decided I wanted to share it on here. I think highlighting the life of Dr. Abdus Salam is a reflection of how the Muslim world treats science, scientists, and anyone with progressive thoughts to better the Muslim World from within.

While this interview doesn't necessarily highlight Dr. Abdus Salam's plight for science, it certainly highlights just how great a man he was, and how what he brought to the Muslim world has been lacking, and continues to lack.

Some background information:
Dr. Abdus Salam was a Pakistani Theoretical Physicist who devoted his life to the study of the elementary particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1979, along with Sheldon Lee Glasgow and Steven Weinberg, "for their contributions to the theory of the unified weak and electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles, including, inter alia, the prediction of the weak neutral current". Their theory was later validated through experiments conducted at CERN.

The theory has been put to much use in modern physics, contributing greatly to String Theory, as well as to the quest for the Grand Unified Theory of Physics.

Dr. Abdus Salam, for all his work and notoreity, was never accepted among his own people in Pakistan, because of his adherence to Ahmadiyyat, instead of mainstream Sunni or Shia Islam.

To highlight the extent of rejection taken by the Pakistani Gov't at the time, note that not a single top official from the Pakistani government attended his funeral in 1996. The highest government official to attend was a local police chief. Even on his grave, the local government forced the Ahmadiyya Muslims to change the words on his tombstone from "First Muslim Nobel Laureate" to "First Muslim Laureate".


Enjoy.