Toby E. Huff

Toby E. Huff was born in Portland, Maine and has been living in the Boston area since 1960. His interest in big questions in the philosophy and history of science led to a life long interest in the problems of Arabic-Islamic science and the question of why modern science developed only in the West. These interests resulted in two major studies, The Rise of early Modern Science: Islam, China and the West (1993), and Intellectual Curiosity and the Scientific Revolution (2010). The former book was chosen as the Alternative Selection of the Library of Science Book-of-the-Month Club in 1994. While doing research on Islam, science and development, Huff lived in Malaysia and also visited Indonesia, Morocco, Tunisia, and Syria. He taught courses on Women and Islam at UMass Dartmouth for a many years. He is currently a Research Associate in the Dept. of Astronomy at Harvard University.