Dispelling myths about the Greek origins of math and science, Paramount King Shekhem Ur Shekhem Ra Un Nefer Amen I spoke at Tresidder on Friday afternoon. The talk, inspired by his new book “Not Out of Greece: The Origins of Logic, Mathematics, and Science,” focused on the achievements often attributed to Greek philosophers that actually emerged from Africa and the Middle East.

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Erica Simmons

Shekhem Ur Shekhem Ra Un Nefer Amen I spoke about Africa’s influence on the origins of mathematics and science last Friday. He argued that Pythagoras was affected by intellectuals in Persia and Africa.

Shekhem Ur Shekhem — whose name means King of Kings and Priest of Priests — governs the Ashanti tribe in the Agogo province of Ghana, West Africa. Residing in New York, he visits his tribe twice annually, serving as ambassador for the nation and communicating with ancestral Ghanaians currently living in the United States.

The event was sponsored by the Black Student Union, in cooperation with several other campus organizations, and Nile Valley Mall, the world’s first completely black-owned herbal supplement and vitamin company.

“He’s a very humble man, a gracious man, a healer, a historian, a father and a king,” said Ser-t Hri-Samenab of Shekhem Ur Shekhem. Hri-Samenab, a representative from Nile Valley Mall, who follows the ancient tradition of Kamit, or Egypt. Her name means “one who follows a sage with a stable heart.”

“There’s a lot of information out there, and the more we can communicate to the people, the greater their perspective of the whole picture,” she said. “We want to open their mind’s eye.”

Shekhem Ur Shekhem began his speech with an introduction of his topic and a discussion of what has become known as the “Greek Miracle.” He said that, under this idea, the Greeks were the first to address mathematics, science and logic.

“In this theory, between 600 B.C. and 200 A.D. was the first time in the history of mankind that people started to think in this way, and before that no one was able to approach ideas scientifically and logically,” he said.

Emphasizing his unique approach, Shekhem Ur Shekhem said he attacks the issue not only from an historical perspective, but by evaluating the writings and achievements of Greek philosophers and culture.

“I wanted to go about this by diving into the Greek writings themselves,” he said. “In their writings, they showed themselves not to be leaders in logic, mathematics and science, a notion that universities and professors worldwide have universally accepted.”

The speech centered on refuting scholarly claims and teaching methods that are rooted in the idea of Greek dominance.

“There were certain errors that the Greeks made that are still being neglected in the scholastic system we have today,” Shekhem Ur Shekhem said. “There is a lot of science and mathematics that should be and needs to be taught differently, not from the usual Greek perspective.”

He used the renowned example of Pythagoras to support his argument and said that Pythagoras spent time traveling through Egypt and Persia before returning to the Greek and Italian regions to teach his theorems. With these details, Shekhem Ur Shekhem suggested that Pythagoras drew his discoveries from the works of others in what were viewed as primitive nations.

“There is a very racist element about the issue,” he said. “They claim that before the Greeks came, that before Greek civilization was on the rise, nobody else in the world thought scientifically or logically and that no other nations even had the capability of thinking this way.”

Shekhem Ur Shekhem related his topic to current affairs, drawing a link between the necessity to recognize cultural contributions and recent developments in Iraq. He described the U.S. troops’ recent failure to protect one of Iraq’s oldest museums as indicative of an alarming trend of cultural annihilation.

“Today we find a strong movement toward monoculture, a Western, predominantly American culture,” he said. “We must realize that there are different patterns of thinking and cultural expression that enrich the planet.

“People become upset when they hear that flora and fauna are becoming extinct, but they have no idea that entire cultures are becoming extinct everyday because people do not show proper care and respect,” he added. “They just assume these cultures are primitive and therefore not worth preserving.”