Muslim scientists and clerics have called for the
adoption of Mecca time to replace GMT, arguing that the Saudi city
is the true centre of the Earth.
Mecca is the direction all Muslims face when they perform their
daily prayers.
The call was issued at a conference held in the Gulf state of
Qatar under the title: Mecca, the Centre of the Earth, Theory and
Practice.
One geologist argued that unlike other longitudes, Mecca's was
in perfect alignment to magnetic north.
He said the English had imposed GMT on the rest of the world by
force when Britain was a big colonial power, and it was about time
that changed.
Mecca watch
A prominent cleric, Sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawy, said modern
science had at last provided evidence that Mecca was the true
centre of the Earth; proof, he said, of the greatness of the Muslim
"qibla" - the Arabic word for the direction Muslims turn to when
they pray.
The meeting also reviewed what has been described as a Mecca
watch, the brainchild of a French Muslim.
The watch is said to rotate anti-clockwise and is supposed to
help Muslims determine the direction of Mecca from any point on
Earth.
The meeting in Qatar is part of a popular trend in some Muslim
societies of seeking to find Koranic precedents for modern
science.
It is called "Ijaz al-Koran", which roughly translates as the
"miraculous nature of the holy text".
The underlying belief is that scientific truths were also
revealed in the Muslim holy book, and it is the work of scholars to
unearth and publicise the textual evidence.
But the movement is not without its critics, who say that the
notion that modern science was revealed in the Koran confuses
spiritual truth, which is constant, and empirical truth, which
depends on the state of science at any given point in time.