Fast forward six years. Scientific American has published
an interview with Sarah Amiri, the deputy project manager and science lead at the United Arab Emirates Mars Mission. The UAE is working on a mission to Mars in part to transition from an oil-based economy to a knowledge-based one. But the first Arab country to embark on its own space program has a larger goal, one that could profoundly transform the culture of the Middle East. As Amiri explains:
“We’ve staffed our space program with young graduates—the average age of the team is 27. I’m 29. That’s normal; in fact, I’m considered old within the team. Our work requires a monumental shift in mindset, and young people are more able to adapt to change. People aged between 15 and 29 make up over 30 percent of the Middle East’s population, and they should be given big projects.
“We’ve generally had a very positive response from young people in the Middle East. They feel that finally, someone is recognizing their potential and tapping into it. So our underlying objective is to send a message to our youth, to show there is a path that is based on science and technology and not on radicalism.”
One of the problems with fighting terrorism is that the life, too often short, of a jihadi has a certain glamor among some Muslim youth, especially when they feel there are no other options and are being influenced by unscrupulous imams. The West can kill as many jihadis as it can, but their ranks seem always to be replenished by more young people eager to die as martyrs so long as the culture encourages jihad.
The UAE is trying to fight this idea with another idea, harkening back to an old but long-forgotten tradition in the Muslim world that made it a center of science, mathematics, and art over a thousand years ago. But, for various historical reasons, that culture has atrophied in the Middle East. Sarah Amiri is suggesting that it is time to bring back learning and research to provide an alternative to terrorism and jihad.
