Having constituted a new epoch in human history and a new religiouspolitical order, the revealed religions challenged the tradition of Greek philosophy to adjust to, investigate, and make intelligible a religiouspolitical order based on prophecy, revelation, and the divine law. The challenge led certain Arab and Muslim philosophers to reassess the relative distance between the thought of the Greek masters, and the doctrines propagated by the revealed religions, and to make use of such works as Plato's Republic and Laws, rather (...) than Aristotle's Politics, when offering a philosophic account of the new religious–political phenomenon and of such new disciplines as the science of the divine law and the science of revealed theology. Les religions révélées, en inaugurant une ère nouvelle dans l'histoire humaine et un nouvel ordre “religio-politique”, ont constitué un défi pour la tradition de la philosophie grecque. Celle-ci devait s'adapter a un ordre religio-politique fondé sur la prophétie, la révélation et la loi divine, en faire un objet d'investigation et le rendre intelligible. Ce défi conduisit certains philosophes arabes et musulmans à réévaluer la distance qui sépare la pensée des maîtres grecs des doctrines propagées par les religions révelées. Il les conduisit aussi à faire usage d'oeuvres telles que la République et les Lois de Platon, plutôt que la Politique d'Aristote dans leur effort de rendre compte philosophiquement du phénomène religio-politique nouveau et des nouvelles disciplines telles que la science de la loi divine et la science de la théologie révélée. (shrink)

As a contemporary neo-Sadraian philosopher, Muhaqeq Isfahani has proposed his own account of the ontological argument for the existence of Allah. This account of the argument is unprecedented and has caught the attention of many contemporary thinkers. There have been proposed five accounts of this argument upon three pivots. First is the concept of necessary being as a mental concept. Second is the concept of necessary being so far as it denotes something beyond the concept. And third is the very (...) reality of necessary being existing by itself in the outside world. Each of the above accounts is open to some criticisms. Prof. Mahdi Ha’iri Yazdi has leveled four criticisms at that account of the argument such as counter-argument, begging the question, the confusion of categorical proposition with non-categorical one. The proponents of ontological argument have raised objections to Ha’iri’s criticisms. Most of those objections are not valid for they stem from the insufficient consideration of the fact that concepts such as “necessary being”, “God”, “partner of Creator” and the like are philosophical secondary intelligible. Accordingly, most of Prof. Ha’iri’s criticisms against Muhaqeq Ishafani are valid and thus the ontological argument fails to prove the existence of Allah. (shrink)

In this work, Muhsin Mahdi--widely regarded as the preeminent scholar of Islamic political thought--distills more than four decades of research to offer an authoritative analysis of the work of Alfarabi, the founder of Islamic political philosophy. Mahdi, who also brought to light writings of Alfarabi that had long been presumed lost or were not even known, presents this great thinker as his contemporaries would have seen him: as a philosopher who sought to lay the foundations for a new (...) understanding of revealed religion and its relation to the tradition of political philosophy. Beginning with a survey of Islamic philosophy and a discussion of its historical background, Mahdi considers the interrelated spheres of philosophy, political thought, theology, and jurisprudence of the time. He then turns to Alfarabi's concept of "the virtuous city," and concludes with an in-depth analysis of the trilogy, Philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. This philosophical engagement with the writings of and about Alfarabi will be essential reading for anyone interested in medieval political philosophy. (shrink)

Science -Philosophy ; Philosophy and science ; Religion and science.

Despite recent noticeable changes in women’s educational opportunities in developing countries such as Iran, there is still much controversy surrounding the common assumption that a direct relationship exists between women’s empowerment and formal literacy. According to the social semiotic method, the present research explores the hidden side of the female educational experience and its relationship with empowerment. In the current study, we conducted 39 interviews and analyzed the collected data using Van Leeuwen’s semiotic approach. The results are based on the (...) analysis of three semiotic sources, all of which are ubiquitous in the daily life of Iranian students: uniforms, queues, and homework. The findings indicate that the emphasis on the ideological aspects of educational experiences, in the form of a ritualistic approach by the educational system’s agents, causes a gradual semantic break between students and educational goals. Such an emphasis also instills an ambiguous and contradictory understanding in the student’s mind, of which the final result is the alienation and internalization of passive patterns of social action. (shrink)

This volume consists of nine essays on the political teaching of such Muslim philosophers as al-Kindi and al-Razi, as well as the more familiar al-Fârâbî, ...

Previous empirical studies have suggested that language is primarily used to exchange social information, but our evidence on this derives mainly from English speakers. We present data from a study of natural conversations among Farsi speakers in Iran and show that not only are conversation groups the same size as those observed in Europe and North America, but people also talk predominantly about social topics. We argue that these results reinforce the suggestion that language most likely evolved for the transmission (...) of information about the social world. We also explore sex differences in conversational behavior: while the pattern is broadly similar between the sexes, men may be more sensitive than women are to discussing some topics in the presence of many other people. (shrink)

Background: Moral sensitivity is the foremost prerequisite to ethical performance; a review of literature shows that nurses are sometimes not sensitive enough for a variety of reasons. Moral distress is a frequent phenomenon in nursing, which may result in paradoxes in care, dealing with patients and rendering high-quality care. This may, in turn, hinder the meeting of care objectives, thus affecting social healthcare standards. Research objective: The present research was conducted to determine the relationship between moral sensitivity and moral distress (...) of nurses in intensive care units. Research design: This study is a descriptive-correlation research. Lutzen’s moral sensitivity questionnaire and Corley Moral Distress Questionnaire were used to gather data. Participants and research context: A total of 153 qualified nurses working in the hospitals affiliated to Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences were selected for this study. Subjects were selected by census method. Ethical considerations: After explaining the objectives of the study, all the participants completed and signed the written consent form. To conduct the study, permission was obtained from the selected hospitals. Findings: Nurses’ average moral sensitivity grade was 68.6 ± 7.8, which shows a moderate level of moral sensitivity. On the other hand, nurses also experienced a moderate level of moral distress (44.8 ± 16.6). Moreover, there was no meaningful statistical relationship between moral sensitivity and moral distress (p = 0.26). Discussion: Although the nurses’ moral sensitivity and moral distress were expected to be high in the intensive care units, it was moderate. This finding is consistent with the results of some studies and contradicts with others. Conclusion: As moral sensitivity is a crucial factor in care, it is suggested that necessary training be provided to develop moral sensitivity in nurses in education and practical environments. Furthermore, removing factors that contribute to moral distress may help decrease it in nurses. (shrink)

This study examines the impact of the level of religious observance on the attitudes toward end‐of‐life (EOL) decisions and euthanasia of Jews in Israel—where euthanasia is illegal—as compared to Jews living in the USA, in the states where euthanasia is legal. A self‐reporting questionnaire on religiosity and personal beliefs and attitudes regarding EOL care and euthanasia was distributed, using a convenience sample of 271 participants from Israel and the USA. Findings show that significant differences were found in attitudes between Jews (...) of different levels of religious observance with respect to patient autonomy, right to die with dignity, and dying in familiar and supportive surroundings. The USA and Israeli Jews have similar knowledge regarding EOL care and expressed similar attitudes and perceptions toward the issues of authority of medical staff and religious figures and patient's autonomy. Findings indicate that the level of religious observance has more potency in shaping their attitudes and perceptions of EOL decisions than the state law. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings with regard to multicultural health systems and providing practical recommendations. (shrink)

Transplant coordinators play a pivotal role in the process of obtaining consent for live or dead donation of organs. The objective of the project is to unveil emotional experiences and ethical conduct of transplant coordinators using a qualitative research methodology. Ten transplant coordinators who have worked for more than 20 years in this job were recruited by using a purposive sampling technique. The transplant coordinators spoke of negative feelings and moral distress with regard to futile care of family members of (...) deceased donors as well as of living donors. Transplant coordinators experience moral distress on a daily basis; being compelled to compromise their integrity causes moral distress and moral residue, hence, training and support should be offered to them. (shrink)

Taking a cue from Slavoj Zizek’s reading of the Qur’anic tale of the two sons of Adam, Abel and Cain, this paper examines an overlooked erotic layer of meaning archived in the key Qur’anic term for sacrifice; it also explores the nexus of eroticism and sacrifice in this tale. At the beginning of this text the Qur’an announces that the “truth” of this story will be told. However, that truth turns out to be the symbolic absence of the truth, allowing (...) for a range of interpretive possibilities. I will argue that in the Qur’anic narrative of Cain and Abel the “shame/penis” of the murdered brother is the site of the archive, and interpretive possibilities are conditioned by the function of the master-signifier, the phallus alluded to in the text by the presence of the penis. (shrink)

In pursuit of moralities and beliefs in the grey area of culture, the researchers carried out a study on Top Notch series to pinpoint the trace of ethics. This paper seeks to unfold the representation of ethics as an indubitable part of culture in Top Notch series. After having extracted all culturally and ethically-related topics and texts of Top Notch Series, 25 instances, featuring 6 patterns, were collected. Later these 6 patterns were dubbed as: violence, superstition, modesty,individualised ethics, religion, and (...) modernity. Having analysed these 6 themes, well representing beliefs and moralities, the researchers came to the conclusion that both misrepresentation of ethics and underrepresentation and overrepresentation of different cultures are at work. The results show a reconsideration of therepresentation of ethics, or better to say reconsideration of misrepresentation of ethics which might find its root in wrong dominance of culture over ethics. (shrink)

The perplexing relationship between consciousness and quantum mechanics remains one of science's greatest enigmas. The "wavefunction collapse" phenomenon, where a quantum system's superposition of possibilities resolves into a single definite state upon measurement, has ignited heated debates about the role of consciousness in shaping reality. This article delves into the heart of this "quantum quagmire," exploring various interpretations of wavefunction collapse and their implications for the nature of consciousness and the observer-observed relationship.

THE ARTICLE COMMENTS ON THOSE SECTIONS OF ALFARABI'S "BOOK OF LETTERS" WHERE HE PRESENTS A META-PHILOSOPHICAL ACCOUNT OF THE 'HISTORY' OF PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION, THE STAGES THROUGH WHICH THEY PASS, AND THE RELATION AND CONFLICT BETWEEN THE TWO-BOTH AS THEY DEVELOP WITHIN A SINGLE NATION AND WHEN THEY ARE TRANSFERRED ACROSS NATIONAL BOUNDARIES. IT SHOWS ALFARABI'S ACUTE SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS REGARDING THE TEMPORAL AND RELIGIOUS CONTEXT WITHIN WHICH PHILOSOPHY WAS BEING PRACTICED IN THE ISLAMIC WORLD.

Freedom is one of the major elements in Henry James’s The Portrait of a Lady. In an age when American women were usually engaged or married, James’s heroine, Isabel, was somewhat ahead of her time in hoping for a marriage in which she could still be independent. She was very fond of her liberty and afraid of losing it, but does her return to her husband, Osmond, at the end of the novel suggest that she has put an end to (...) her eagerness for freedom? It is an underlying argument of this study that James’s novel, in its last scene, covers a different aspect of freedom which, through a Schopenhauerian approach, delivers a different insight into liberty. This perception of freedom in The Portrait of a Lady has never been considered in connection with Arthur Schopenhauer’s view on the experience of freedom. The implicit critical point on which the paper is founded is that, although Schopenhauer is not conspicuously mentioned in James’s notes, there is important evidence that shows the convergence between the thoughts of Schopenhauer and Henry James; that is, that evidence through which this study aims to analyse the heroine’s final decision in the last scene. (shrink)

Nursing, a scientific and practical discipline, faces continuing challenges of finding new direction in order to decipher its core values and develop current ethical codes for nursing practice. In 2009–10, 28 nurses were purposely selected and interviewed using a semi-structured format in focus groups and individually. Thematic Content Analysis helped explore the perception of Iranian nurses on ethical values in patient care. Seven major themes emerged: respect for dignity, professional integrity, professional commitment, developing human relationships, justice, honesty, and promoting individuals (...) and the nursing profession. Iranian nurses revealed a unique and culture-based set of ethical values. This study found that Iranian nurses place a greater emphasis on preserving the dignity of those accompanying the patient and in showing regard for patients' religious beliefs in a gender appropriate environment. (shrink)

While extensive scholarship has been dedicated to the emotional experiences of transplant patients, little is known about the emotional experiences of transplant co‐ordinators. Semi‐structured face‐to‐face interviews conducted with ten transplant co‐ordinators who have worked for more than 20 years in this job. The transplant co‐ordinators spoke of negative feelings and moral distress with regard to futile care of deceased donor family members as well as of living donors. Transplant co‐ordinators experience intense negative feelings, emotional pain, and moral distress on a (...) daily basis. Transplant co‐ordinators play a pivotal role in the process of obtaining consent for live or dead donation of organ; however, their well‐being and job satisfaction are impaired by contradictions between their moral values and the tasks they are instructed to perform. The study exposes the silent emotional suffering of transplant co‐ordinators; main findings show that the transplant co‐ordinators are torn between contradictory expectations and a gap between values and praxis. It is recommended to offer them training and support for the sake of their retention. (shrink)

Today, nurses are required to have knowledge and awareness concerning professional values as standards to provide safe and high-quality ethical care. Nurses’ perspective on professional values affects decision-making and patient care. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the importance of professional values from clinical nurses’ perspective. The present cross-sectional study was conducted in 2016 in four educational hospitals of Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Iran. Data were collected via the Persian version of Nursing Professional Values Scale-Revised by Weis and (...) Schank. Sampling was conducted through the use of stratified random sampling method and 250 clinical nurses participated in the study. Results indicated that the total score of the nurses’ professional values was high.. From nurses’ perspective items such as “Maintaining confidentiality of patients” and “Safeguarding patients’ right to privacy” had more importance; however, “Recognizing role of professional nursing associations in shaping healthcare policy” and “Participating in nursing research and/or implementing research findings appropriate to practice had less importance. A statistically significant relationship was observed between NPVS-R mean scores and nurses’ age, work experience as well as participation in professional ethical training. Although the total score related to the clinical nurses’ perspective on professional values was high, the importance of certain values was at a lower level. Owing to the emerging ethical challenges, it is indispensable to design educational programs in order to improve nurses’ awareness and understanding of the comprehensive importance of professional values. Furthermore, it is recommended that mixed methods studies should be conducted in order to design an instrument to evaluate the use of values in nursing practice. (shrink)

Recently there is an increasing technological development in intelligent tutoring systems. This field has become interesting to many researchers. In this paper, we present an intelligent tutoring system for teaching information security. This intelligent tutoring systems target the students enrolled in Advanced Topics in Information Security in the faculty of Engineering and Information Technology at Al-Azhar University in Gaza. Through which the student will be able to study the course and solve related problems. An evaluation of the intelligent tutoring systems (...) was carried out and the results were promising. (shrink)

جان کاتینگهام فیلسوف معاصر انگلیسی دیدگاه خود در رابطة عقل و سااحت تعهاد ی ایماان را ذیا ل سا – - محور مطرح کرده است: 1 . کارکرد تعهد دینی در حیات اخلاقی انسان؛ 2. عدم منافاات م یا ان تعهاد د ینا ی و خودمختاری انسان؛ 3 . کارکرد متمایز قرین در تعهد دینی و علم تجربی. در اثر پیش رو دیا دگاه کاتنیگهاام در دو محور نخست ارزیابی شده است. وی در محور اول، پشتوانة تعهد دینی و التزام (...) ب قوانین اخلاقی را اعتقااد ب منبع خیر بودن خداوند می داند. در محور دوم، باا اساتفاده از مباان ی اگزیستانسیالیسات ی در رابطا ة انساان و جهان، معتقد است انسان موجودی خودساز نیست و در شرایطی قرار دارد ک خود تاثیری در تحقق آن نداشات است. در چنین شرایطی، تسلیم در برابر قوانین اخلاقی، تسلیم در مقابال اراد ۀ بیگانا نیسات، بلکا انتخااب ی آگاهان برای رشد خویش است. دیدگاه وی در این دو محور با توج با آرا علاما ة طباطباا یی قابال برر سا ی است. در محور نخست، تبیینی عالی تری بر اساس مبانی فلسفی علام طباطبایی قابل طرح است. اماا نسابت ب محور دوم، دو نکتة قابل ملاحظ وجود دارد: نخست آنک پاسخ او در این مسال ، بیا انی متوسا در تب یای ن کلیدواژه: رابطة خداوند و انسان است، و دوم آنک تعهد اولی ب همان رکن ایمان مقدم بر عمل است، ن متاخر از آن. (shrink)

Emergency care providers regularly deal with ethical dilemmas that must be addressed. In comparison with in-hospital nurses, emergency medical service personnel are faced with more problems such as distance to resources including personnel, medico-technical aids, and information; the unpredictable atmosphere at the scene; arriving at the crime scene and providing emergency care for accident victims and patients at home. As a result of stressfulness, unpredictability, and often the life threatening nature of tasks that ambulance professionals have to deal with every (...) day, ethical decision-making has become an inevitable challenge. The content analysis approach was used to conduct the present qualitative study in Iran. The participants consisted of 14 EMS personnel selected through purposive sampling, which continued until the data became saturated. Data were collected using semi-structured interviews and analyzed concurrently with their collection through the constant comparison method. The process of data analysis resulted in the emergence of 3 main categories “respecting client’s values”, “performing tasks within the professional manner”, “personal characteristic”, and the emergence of eight sub-categories signifying participants’ experiences with regard to EDM. According to the results, when EMS personnel are faced with ethical dilemmas, they consider the client’s values and professional dignity, and perform the assigned tasks within the framework of the regulation. The findings also suggest that pre-hospital care providers assess legal consequences before making any decision. Further studies should be conducted regarding the experiences of the subordinates and other related parties. (shrink)

John Cottingham, a contemporary English philosopher, considers the best way to understand religious beliefs to be an empathic understanding. He calls his theory “the epistemology of involvement”. Based on this theory, in order to understand religious beliefs, one should put aside the detachment approach and by entering the life of faith, provide the conditions for the realization of the religious experiences of the believers, and at the same time, maintain the critical opinion in this sympathetic participation in religion. He considers (...) such an approach to be a middle way between Kierkegaard's irrationalism and Plantinga's relativism and considers it generalizable to other philosophical fields. This approach faces criticism. First, before entering a religious life, it is necessary to evaluate its worldview, and this evaluation precedes the practical system and literary and emotional texts of that religion. Second, there is no connection between an empathetic understanding of religion and entering into a life of faith, and thirdly, by entering into a life of faith, the acceptance of a belief will be involuntary, and after the realization of such a belief, it is not possible to criticize it. (shrink)

A number of animal species from different lineages live socially. One of the features of social living is the formation of dominance hierarchy. Despite its obvious benefit in the survival probability of the species, the hierarchical structureitself poses psychological and physiological burden leading to the chronic activation of stress related pathways. Considering these apparently conflicting observations, here we propose that social hierarchy can act as a selective force in the evolution of social species. We also discuss its role on social (...) psychology. (shrink)

Throughout his philosophy, Kant relies on the crucial concepts of “objective validity” and “objective reality,” pivotal in arguments such as the “Transcendental Deduction of the Categories” and the “Refutation of Idealism” in his Critique of Pure Reason. However, the lack of desired clarity in Kant’s usage impedes scholarly progress. Despite their significance, “objective validity” and “objective reality” have not received sufficient attention in secondary literature. Consensus on whether they represent the same idea remains elusive, and even among those recognizing them (...) as distinct concepts, disagreement persists regarding their precise meanings. In this paper, I show that these concepts are distinct. I argue that a concept is objectively valid when our right or entitlement to apply it to objects is established independently and prior to any intuition. Conversely, a concept is objectively real when presented to us in intuition, either in pure intuition, as seen in geometrical figures, or in empirical intuition, as evident in material objects. This interpretation, however, falls short of fully elucidating Kant’s use of these terms due to his lack of systematicity in their application across concepts, intuitions, objects, cognitions, representations, synthesis, and even ideas, God, and purposiveness. Consequently, while shedding light on many instances, this interpretation encounters limits. (shrink)

My study aims to offer a Schopenhauerian reading of Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady and D. H. Lawrence's The White Peacock. Throughout the dissertation, I am driven by two goals. First, I aim to examine the selected novels by considering Schopenhauer's philosophy. Secondly, I shall investigate why characters, especially the heroines, having recognised that their marriage was basically a mistake, still remained in their tormented relationships. Why it is important to answer this question and what makes this a (...) unique concern, especially in James's novel, is the possibility that previous studies and many other critiques have questioned the destiny of these heroines in regard to the novelists' anti-feminist tendencies or their social and personal concerns, while I believe that by using Schopenhauer's philosophy I can provide a deeper conceptualisation of the novels' ending. In so doing, in the second chapter I will describe the reception of Schopenhauer's philosophy in England, and the direct and indirect presence of his philosophy in Lawrence's and James's Works. In the third chapter, I concentrate on Schopenhauer's concept of freedom, morality and the will in James's novel. My fourth chapter considers Lawrence's philosophy of love and reveals how his philosophy differs from Schopenhauer's. Furthermore, it draws his readers' attention to the Schopenhauerian notion of the will-to-live, acknowledged in Lawrence's novel. (shrink)

Background: Emergency care providers are frequently faces with situations in which they have to make decisions quickly in stressful situations. They face barriers to ethical decision-making and recognizing and finding solutions to these barriers helps them to make ethical decision. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to identify barriers of ethical decision-making in Iranian Emergency Medical Service personnel. Methods: In this qualitative research, the participants (n = 15) were selected using the purposive sampling method, and the data were collected (...) by deep and semi-structured interviews. Finally, the data are analyzed using the content analysis approach. Ethical considerations: Permission to conduct the study was obtained from the Ethics Committee of the Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences. The objectives of the study were explained to the participants and written consent was received from them. Also, participants were assured that necessary measures were taken to protect their anonymity and confidentiality. Findings: The results of the analysis are classified in five main categories. It encompasses the following areas: perception of situation, patient-related factors, input and output imbalance, uncoordinated health system, and paradoxes. Conclusion: Emergency Medical Service personnel make ethical decisions every day. It is important that prehospital personnel know how to manage those decisions properly so that clients’ moral rights are respected. Hence, by identifying the dimensions and obstacles of ethical decision-making in Emergency Medical Service personnel, it is possible to enhance the moral judgment and ethical accountability of the personnel and develop the strategies necessary for ethical decision-making in them. (shrink)

Introduction: Due to the stressful nature of prehospital emergency providers’ duties, as well as difficulties such as distance to information resources and insufficient time to analyze situations, ethical decision-making in prehospital services is a daily challenge. Objectives: This study aimed to describe the experiences of Iranian prehospital emergency personnel in the field of ethical decision-making. Methods: The data were collected by semi-structured interviews (n = 15) in Iran and analyzed using the content analysis approach. Ethical considerations: This study was conducted (...) in accordance with the principles of research ethics and national rules and regulations relating to informed consent and confidentiality. Results: The results obtained were categorized into three main categories that included “assessment of the scene atmosphere, assessment of patients’ condition and their family, and predicting outcomes of decision-making.” The central category was “field assessment,” which demonstrated the strategy of ethical decision-making by prehospital providers when facing ethical conflicts. Conclusion: Although findings showed that the majority of prehospital providers make ethical decisions based on the patients’ benefit, they also consider consequences of their decisions in dealing with personal and professional threats. This article identifies and describes a number of ethical values of prehospital providers and discusses how the values may be considered by paramedics when facing ethical conflicts. (shrink)

The role of culture in a field as vast as applied linguistics is so pronounced and vital that even a highly selective overview might not be sufficient to be comprehensive. What follows might be a synoptic account of the role of culture in the realm of applied linguistics. The enigmatic point which even makes the vast field of applied linguistics goes to unbeaten tracks is the similar nature of culture. Due to the aforementioned point, here the canonical overlap of them (...) is emphasised. Moreover, as culture and language are intrinsically intertwined, we decided to have a more cultural stance rather than a linguistic one. Therefore, first, we go through the major studies in connection with language and culture. These studies might fall into three broad categories, namely those relating to epistemology of culture, those relating to its relation to language, and finally those relating to its presentation through a given language. Then, we touch on the trends, and in the end we try sum up and to unravel, or better to say, to come to grips with this enigmatic riddle, culture. In other words, in conclusion, we attempt to portray what culture will be. (shrink)

John Cottingham focuses on two types of religious experience: general religious experience and specific religious experience. According to him, general experiences do not require special and complex education, scientific research or philosophical theorizing, but are a simple act of accepting a gift. Of course, unlike everyday observations, such experiences are not available to everyone and their realization requires special conditions. Regarding specific religious experiences, he also believes that when dealing with parts of the Bible that contain reports of such experiences, (...) one should neither have a naturalistic or demythologizing approach, nor an appearance-oriented approach; Rather, these verses should be interpreted in such a way that both its amazing content is preserved and this content does not conflict with modern science. Using the basics of Islamic philosophy, this work has a critical review of both parts of his view. The result of these criticisms is that due to the personal nature of evidences from religious experiences, the epistemological guarantee of these experiences is obtained through the rational and revelatory method. And based on this, these experiences cannot be considered as an independent path alongside the rational and revelatory path. Also, the observation of specific religious experiences is not a sensory observation and occurs in the container of human imagination and fantasy, without being a part of these experiences, they have become a characteristic of the self. (shrink)

I offer a counterexample to Timothy Williamson’s conjecture that knowledge is the most general factive mental state; i.e., that every factive mental state entails knowledge. I describe two counterexamples (Ernest Sosa’s and Baron Reed’s) that I find unpersuasive, and argue that they fail due to a specific feature they have in common. I then argue that there is a primitive mental state that is factive but does not entail knowledge, and that constitutes a counterexample to Williamson’s conjecture that is not (...) subject to the problems faced by Sosa’s and Reed’s counterexamples. Je propose un contre-exemple à la conjecture de Timothy Williamson selon laquelle la connaissance est l’état mental factif le plus général, c’est-à-dire que tout état mental factif implique la connaissance. Je décris deux contre-exemples (développés par Ernest Sosa et Baron Reed) que je considère comme étant peu probants, et je souligne que l’un et l’autre échouent à convaincre de par une caractéristique spécifique qu’ils partagent. Je soutiens ensuite qu’il existe un état mental primitif, factif mais n’impliquant pas la connaissance : ce dernier constitue un contre-exemple à la conjecture de Williamson sans être sujet aux problèmes rencontrés par les deux contre-exemples précédents. (shrink)

This book, first published in 1957, is the study of 14th-century Arab historian Ibn Khaldun, who founded a special science to consider history and culture, based on the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle and their Muslim followers. In no other field has the revolt of modern Western thought against traditional philosophy been so far-reaching in its consequences as in the field of history. Ibn Khaldun realized that history is more immediately related to action than political philosophy because it studies the (...) actual state of man and society. He found that the ancients had not made history the object of an independent science, and thought it was important to fill this gap. A factual acquaintance with the conclusions of Ibn Khaldun's reflections on history is not the same as the full comprehension of their theoretical significance. When these fundamental questions are answered, it becomes possible to pose the specific question of the relation of Ibn Khaldun's philosophy of history, or his new science of culture, to other practical sciences and, particularly, to the art of history. After an exposition of the major trends of Islamic historiography, part of this book attempts to answer this question through the analysis of the method and intention of the sections of the 'History' where Ibn Khaldun himself examines the works of major Muslim historians, shows the necessity of the new science of culture, and distinguishes it from other practical sciences. (shrink)

This paper concerns the recent revival of entity realism. Having been started with the work of Ian Hacking, Nancy Cartwright and Ronald Giere, the project of entity realism has recently been developed by Matthias Egg, Markus Eronen, and Bence Nanay. The paper opens a dialogue among these recent views on entity realism and integrates them into a more advanced view. The result is an epistemological criterion for reality: the property-tokens of a certain type may be taken as real insofar as (...) only they can be materially inferred from the evidence obtained in a variety of independent ways of detection. (shrink)

This paper will offer a systematic reconstruction of al-Ġazālī’s Sceptical Argument in his celebrated Deliverer/Delivered from Going Astray (al-Munqiḏ/al-Munqaḏ min al-Ḍalāl). Based on textual evidence, I will argue that the concept of certainty (yaqīn) in play in this argument is that of the philosophers—most notably Ibn Sīnā—and that it is firmly tied to demonstration (burhān) and hence to the materials of syllogism (mawwād al-qiyās). This will show that contrary to what many scholars believe, this Sceptical Argument is al-Ġazālī’s discovery of (...) a latent sceptical problem in Muslim philosophers’ epistemological theories based on Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics that escaped even the agile mind of aš-šayḫ ar-raʾīs Ibn Sīnā. This reconstruction will also shed some light on the widespread assumption that al-Ġazālī anticipates Descartes’s sceptical considerations in the First Meditation. I will argue that not only do the two thinkers use incompatible strategies to reach their respective sceptical conclusions, but both their conclusions and their use of God in refuting them are also essentially non-identical. The conclusion is that the two sceptical arguments are essentially different. (shrink)

After a brief review of the relationship between science and value, this paper introduces the value of ‘traditionality’ as a value in the pure and applied sciences. Along with other recognized values, this value can also contribute to formulating hypotheses and determining theories. There are three reasons for legitimizing the internal role of this value in science: first, this value can contribute to scientific progress by presenting more diverse hypotheses; second, the value of external consistency in science entails this value; (...) and third, this value helps to eliminate some of the adverse social and cultural effects of Western science in non-Western societies. ‘Traditionality’ is an extrinsic epistemic value, according to the first two reasons, and at the same time, is an ethical value, according to the last reason. Also, the ethics of belief is adopted to further confirm the ethical role of this value. Finally, this paper discusses three potential criticisms that can be levelled against this idea and responds to each of them. (shrink)