BIOGRAPHY OF DR. S.H. NASR

 

Dr. Nasr was born in Tehran, Iran in a family of educators and scholars, his father having been one of the founders of the Persian educational system.  Consequently, he received the best classical Persian and Islamic education during his early years in Tehran.  He later came to the West to finish his secondary education at the Peddie School in New Jersey and after graduating as the valedictorian of his class, he went to MIT where he studied physics and mathematics and graduated with honors in 1954.  Meanwhile, his interest turned to an ever greater degree to philosophy and the history of science and he transferred to Harvard University to pursue graduate studies first in the field of geology and geophysics in order to acquaint himself with a descriptive as well as a mathematical science, and finally in the field of the history of science and philosophy in which he received his doctorate from Harvard University in 1958 with specialization in Islamic cosmology and science.  From 1958 until 1979, he was professor of the history of science and philosophy at Tehran University and for several years the dean of the Faculty of Letters and for sometime the vice chancellor of the University.  He also served for several years as president of Aryamehr University in Iran.  In 1962 and 1965 he was visiting professor at Harvard University and in 1964-65 the first Aga Khan

professor of Islamic studies at the American