COVID-19 has caused far-reaching humanitarian challenges. Amongst the emerging impacts of the pandemic is on the dynamics of human trafficking. This paper presents findings from a multi-methods study interrogating the impacts of COVID-19 on human trafficking in Sudan—a critical source, destination, and transit country. The analysis combines a systematic evidence review, semi-structured interviews, and a focus group with survivors, conducted between January and May of 2021. We find key risks have been exacerbated, and simultaneously, critical infrastructure for identifying victims, providing (...) support, and ensuring accountability of perpetrators has been impeded. Centrally, the co-occurrence of the pandemic and the democratic transition undercut the institutional and governance capacity, limiting the anti-trafficking response and exposing already vulnerable groups to increased risks of human trafficking. Findings point to increased vulnerabilities for individuals with one or more of the following identities: migrants, refugees, females, and informal labourers. (shrink)

To help ensure the ethical conduct of research, many have recommended educational efforts in research ethics to investigators and members of research ethics committees (RECs). One type of education activity involves multi-day workshops in research ethics. To be effective, such workshops should contain the appropriate content and teaching techniques geared towards the learning styles of the targeted audiences. To ensure consistency in content and quality, we describe the development of a curriculum guide, core competencies and associated learning objectives and activities (...) to help educators organize research ethics workshops in their respective institutions. The curriculum guide is divided into modular units to enable planners to develop workshops of different lengths and choose content materials that match the needs, abilities, and prior experiences of the target audiences. The content material in the curriculum guide is relevant for audiences in the Middle East, because individuals from the Middle East who participated in a Certificate Program in research ethics selected and developed the training materials (e.g., articles, powerpoint slides, case studies, protocols). Also, many of the activities incorporate active-learning methods, consisting of group work activities analyzing case studies and reviewing protocols. The development of such a workshop training curriculum guide represents a sustainable educational resource to enhance research ethics capacity in the Middle East. (shrink)

This article examines the implications of Richard Steigmann-Gall's recent revisionist representation of Nazism as a Christian movement for the increasingly fashionable accounts of Nazism as a secular or political religion. Contrary to Steigmann-Gall's contention that Protestant Nazism undermines these accounts, I suggest that his portrayal of Nazism as a variant of Protestant millennialism is not necessarily inconsistent with the secular religion approach. A closer look at the so-called Löwith-Blumenberg debate on secularization indeed reveals that modern utopianisms containing elements of Protestant (...) millennialism are the best candidates for the label of secularized eschatology. That Steigmann-Gall has reached exactly the opposite conclusion is primarily because his conceptual understanding of secular religion is uninformed by the secularization debate. Insofar as Steigmann-Gall extracts his model of secular religion from contemporary political religion historiography on Nazism, this article points to a larger problem: a disjunction between historians utilizing the concept, on the one hand, and philosophers and social theorists who have shaped it, on the other. (shrink)

This book offers the first comprehensive introduction to one of the most significant Arab thinkers of the late 20th century and the early 21st century: the Moroccan philosopher and social theorist Mohammed Abed al-Jabri. With his intellectual and political engagement, al-Jabri has influenced the development of a modern reading of the Islamic tradition in the broad Arab-Islamic world and has been, in recent years, subject to an increasing interest among Muslims and non-Muslim scholars, social activists and lay men. The (...) contributors to this volume read al-Jabri with reference to prominent past Arab-Muslim scholars, such as Ibn Rushd, al-Ghazali, al-Shatibi, and Ibn Khaldun, as well as contemporary Arab philosophers, like Hassan Hanafi, Abdellah Laroui, George Tarabishi, Taha Abderrahmane; they engage with various aspects of his intellectual project, and trace his influence in non-Arab-Islamic lands, like Indonesia, as well. His analysis of Arab thought since the 1970s as a harbinger analysis of the ongoing “Arab Spring uprising” remains relevant for today's political challenges in the region. (shrink)

Mit diesem Band wendet sich der Philosoph Mohamed Turki gegen die Behauptung, dass geisteswissenschaftliche Debatten in der arabisch-islamischen Welt ausschliesslich vom Diskurs des Glaubens beherrscht werden. In fundierter und zugleich überblickender Manier wird zunächst der historische Wandel von Bestimmungen des Rationalitätsbegriffs nachgezeichnet und verständlich gemacht, um anschliessend einzelne Diskurse der Gegenwart darzustellen. Deutlich wird dabei das Ineinandergreifen von Konzepten wie Glaube, Vernunft, Offenbarung und Interkulturalität, aber auch Konfliktlinien innerhalb der Diskussion. Die beziehungsreichen Aufsätze des Bandes vereinen Themen wie Pluralität, Toleranz, (...) Frieden und Menschenrechte aus dem Blickwinkel des arabisch-islamischen Denkens und verdeutlichen, dass eine Verbindung zum klassischen Kanon der abendländischen Geistestradition immer schon bestand und keinesfalls dazu im Widerspruch steht"-- Back cover. (shrink)

Depuis l’Antiquité, l’Ame du monde constitue une figure majestueuse des courants philosophiques et spirituels. Après Platon qui, dans le Timée, décrit le monde comme possèdant une âme qui a pour principale fonction de justifier les mouvements réguliers des corps célestes, puis les stoïciens, qui identifieront l’Ame du monde à la divinité elle-même, ce fut au tour des néoplatoniciens, des alchimistes de la Renaissance, des philosophes romantiques et des métaphysiciens de l’Orient d’attribuer à l’Ame une fonction essentielle dans l’ordonnancement du cosmos (...) et des êtres. Retrouver aujourd’hui le sens et les chemins de l’Ame du monde apparaît, aux yeux de toute une lignée de poètes, de visionnaires, d’artistes, de scientifiques, de philosophes, comme une exigence spirituelle, une nécessité morale, un impératif de survie. (shrink)

We introduce the notions of weakly and locally positive Robinson theories. We give a characterization of weakly positive Robinson theories by the amalgamation property, and a syntactic characterization of locally positive Robinson theories.

This research examines the methods by which a common person can recognize a Mujtahid. The study presents the various juristic schools of thought on disputed issues, clarifies the preponderant opinion and its evidence, and explains the less favored opinions along with their evidence and the responses to them. The research concludes with a summary of the findings that the researcher arrived at through this study.

Recently, due to the rapid progress of computer technology, researchers develop an effective computer program to enhance the achievement of the student in learning process, which is Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS). Science is important because it influences most aspects of everyday life, including food, energy, medicine, leisure activities and more. So learning science subject at school is very useful, but the students face some problem in learning it. So we designed an ITS system to help them understand this subject easily (...) and smoothly by analyzing it and explaining it in a systematic way. In this paper, we describe the design of an Intelligent Tutoring System for teaching science for grade seven to help students know the 7 characteristics for living things smoothly. The system provides all topics of living things and generates some questions for each topic and the students should answer these questions correctly to move to the next level. In the result of an evaluation of the ITS, students like the system and they said that it is very useful for them and for their studies. (shrink)

The rapid advancement of information and communication technologies has resulted in a variety of maintenance support systems and tools covering all sub-domains of maintenance. Most of these systems...

Death is the opposite not of life, but of power. And as such, Mohammed Bamyeh argues in this original work, death has had a great and largely unexplored impact on the thinking of governance throughout history, right down to our day. In Of Death and Dominion Bamyeh pursues the idea that a deep concern with death is, in fact, the basis of the ideological foundations of all political systems. Concentrating on four types of political systems—polis, empire, theocracy, and modern (...) mass society systems—Bamyeh shows how each follows a specific strategy designed to pit power against the equalizing specter of death. Each of these strategies—consolation, expansion, preparation, and repression—produces a certain style of political behavior, as well as particular psychic traumas. In making his argument, Bamyeh revisits a wide range of empirical and theoretical discussions in existentialist philosophy, psychoanalysis, comparative historical sociology, literary studies, and anthropology. By demonstrating how schemes of power are by definition also schemes for defying death—despite their claims to the contrary—his book encourages us to think of a new style of politics, one oriented toward life. (shrink)

: The thesis put forth in this study is that, while coitus interruptus was known to the early Muslims, it was not practiced for reasons that were primarily theological. For ʿazl is in obvious conflict with the rule that prevailed until the third/ninth century, that of enjoining the believer to marry and procreate without trying to curb one’s fertility. A careful examination of the oldest traditions on the subject leads us to conclude that only about the end of the first/seventh (...) century some religious authorities spoke in favor of resorting to this contraceptive method, in a limited context – the relationship between a master and his slave girl. And it is probably during the same period that the controversy over coitus interruptus arose. This is why it is anachronistic to see traditions in favor of coitus interruptus as testimony on how long this type of birth control has been practiced in the Islamic world. In addition to relying on textual criticism, the study uses prosopographical information to show that the first Muslims often had many children with concubines. Some Muslim authorities encouraged believers to resort to coitus interruptus, not in order engage in «birth control» but because of the negative reputation of slave girls. To avoid having children with them was to avoid having «illegitimate» children – who were considered evil – and especially to avoid increasing their number so as not to hasten the end of the world. Later, when the rule that believers must marry and produce offspring ceased to be a dogma, allowing for celibacy to be an option, albeit for a tiny minority, coitus interruptus came to be permitted as a means of limiting births, but only if the purpose was religious in nature. Birth control for strictly economic reasons continued to be strictly forbidden. (shrink)

The Arab Spring of 2011 has highlighted an unprecedent fact in the region: it was the young and educated population who established the spearheading of change, and led their countries to democracy. In this paper, we try to analyze how science has been a key factor in these moves, in Tunisia as well as in Egypt, and how it can help to anchor democracy in these countries.

Brigitte Foulon et Mohamed Nachi nous indiquent ainsi que le concept d'ikhtilâf (la possibilité de divergences d'opinions entre les autorités du droit religieux) fut très tôt admis comme légitime dans le sunnisme.

لعلَّ أهميَةَ دراسةِ فلسفةِ أوغسطينِ وتصوُّره عن فلسفة التاريخِ وعن مفهومِ الزَّمان مأتاها من أنَّ هذا المفكِّر يحظى بقيمة مزدوجة؛ إذ هو قبل كلِّ شيءٍ ينتمي إلى الفلسفة الغربية في العصر الوسيط؛ ولأن الأمر يتعلَّق بأكبر – وأوَّل – المفكرين المسحيين، والحقيقة أنَّ أوغسطين كان الوريث الشَّرعي للفلسفة المثالية التي جسَّدتها الأفلاطونية المحدثة، وهو في الوقت عَينِه يمثلُ قطيعةً مع الفلسفة القديمة. ولد أوغسطين في 354م توفي في 430م، عاشَ في خضمِّ فترةٍ مهمة من تاريخ الحضارة الغربية، وبالتحديد فقد عاش (...) نهايات الإمبراطورية الرومانية، وعرف على اليقين جانباً من التداعيات البربرية ضدَّ روما سنة 410م. ويمكن أن نلاحظ أنَّ السياق الذي عاش فيه القديس أوغسطين لم يكن خالياً من التأثيرات الثقافية المتباينة، والتي انعكست على كتاباته وأفكاره، وعلى رُؤَاه اللاهوتية، وعلى فلسفته بوجه عامّ. درَّس أوغسطين الخطابة بقرطاجة، وسافر إلى روما وإلى ميلانو، إلى أن استقرّ به الحال سنة 395م في بون بشمال إفريقيا وعاش هناك إلى نهاية حياته. ترك أوغسطين عملين رئيسين ومهمَّين، يعنينا النَّظرُ فيهما لتعلُّقهما بموضوعنا، هما: "الاعترافات"، و"مدينة الله"، وهما عملان ينفتحُ من خلالهما أوغسطين على قضايا فلسفية مهمَّة، وتعرضُ فلسفتهُ في التاريخ وتصوُّراته عن معنى الزَّمن؛ فما دلالة مفهوم التاريخ – الزمن – عند أوغسطين؟ كيف يمكننا تحديدُ دلالة الزمن في فلسفة أوغسطين؟. (shrink)

We show that the U.S. anti-discriminatory laws prohibiting discrimination in the workplace based on sexual orientation and gender identity identities) spur innovation, which ultimately leads to higher firm performance. We use the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index of 398 U.S. firms between 2011 and 2014, and find a significantly positive relationship between CEI and firm innovation. We also find that an interacting effect of CEI and firm innovation leads to higher firm performance. We use our understanding of Rawls’ Theory (...) of Justice and stakeholder theory to show that firms with workplace diversity policies are likely to be more innovative and perform better than those without such policies. Our results are robust to endogeneity, reverse causality and simultaneity issues. Our results will trigger debate in similar markets around the globe on the economic benefits of LGBT workplace diversity policies for firms. (shrink)

_The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam_ is Muhammad Iqbal's major philosophic work: a series of profound reflections on the perennial conflict among science, religion, and philosophy, culminating in new visions of the unity of human knowledge, of the human spirit, and of God. Iqbal's thought contributed significantly to the establishment of Pakistan, to the religious and political ideals of the Iranian Revolution, and to the survival of Muslim identity in parts of the former USSR. It now serves as new (...) bridge between East and West and between Islam and the other Religions of the Book. With a new Introduction by Javed Majeed, this edition of _The Reconstruction_ opens the teachings of Iqbal to the modern, Western reader. It will be essential reading for all those interested in Islamic intellectual history, the renewal of Islam in the modern world, and political theory of Islam's relationship to the West. (shrink)

This paper presents some thoughts focusing on the problems of ethnico-cultural communalism, its meaning in the current global socio-political context and its implications with regard to principles of democracy, citizenship and the nation-state. It gives particular attention to the issues of interculturality and intercultural communication (IC) as central markers in the contemporary socio-political landscape. The author claims that IC (particularly in its communal and ethnic forms) may prevent or resolve the communal separation that threatens many groups throughout the world. Apart (...) from the essential role it has in production, reproduction and circulation of meaning within, as well as outside, the group, the discourse developed by communal communication media is an ideological, reflexive construction whose aim it is to create an impact on the social cognition of its receivers. This is why ethnicocultural groups scattered around the world generally have effective communal media that reinforce their social, cultural and political cohesion at local, national and global levels. Because, as well as expressing their positions and views on the issues facing a nation's society, this formal discourse provides group members with a legitimate and coherent framework for action and argument. (shrink)

There is a necessity to build a new republican regime in the Great Middle East, based on a broad sense of citizenship, on a respect for pluralism, and on re-evaluating difference as a positive element rather than as a threat. However, this re-building will succeed only when it is accompanied by a restoration of the religious space. The reformist national model is the best and most appropriate model for real situations within the current historical period. It is a model that (...) is able to develop according to each society’s developmental and political experience. (shrink)

The term takyīf fiqhī stands for one crucial concept in Islamic jurisprudence and refers to one of the important steps in the process of formulating fatwā. It basically revolves around the categorization of particular issues under the appropriate rules and precedents established in Islamic juristic thought. The present article attempts to examine the concept of takyīf fiqhī in a comprehensive manner in terms of its meaning, authority, types, importance, and governing criteria as can be gleaned from the works of Sharī‘ah (...) scholars. This is then followed by an exploration of its application to modern contracts, taking as a case study the Central Provident Fund Nomination in Singapore. The article concludes with the view that the Central Provident Fund Nomination, in terms of its essential characteristics and objective, resembles the Islamic will contract as discussed in books of Islamic Jurisprudence. (shrink)

The people's‐led Separatist movement was justified as an effort to bring about self‐determination, freedom, and justice for marginalized planets that did not feel represented by the Republic. The same spirit of resistance of the Separatist movement can also be found in the citizens of the Republic itself. The Clone Wars depicts the dangers and costs of endless militarism and highlights problems with the Jedi. Cornel West discusses the ways democratic traditions and values are under threat in the US, highlighting three (...) dogmas that seriously threaten democratic sensibilities: free‐market fundamentalism, aggressive militarism, and escalating authoritarianism. In the Clone Wars episode “Sabotage,” the end of the war is near, and the Republic's increasing militarization foreshadows its transition to the Empire. With Admiral Tarkin in command, the Republic becomes more ruthless in carrying out the war effort. (shrink)

This article discusses the career of Joseph Moses Juran. He is described as being an astute observer, attentive listener, brilliant synthesizer, and prescient prognosticator. Juran has been called the father of quality, a quality guru, and the man who taught quality to the Japanese. One of his stellar contributions is the Juran trilogy of the three quality processes: quality control, quality planning, and quality improvement. Juran summarized the following three features of quality control activities in Japan that created the revolution (...) in quality: a massive quality-related education and training program; an annual program of quality improvement; and upper-management leadership of the quality function. (shrink)

This paper explores the important role of critical science, and in particular of post-colonial and decolonial theories, in understanding and shaping the ongoing advances in artificial intelligence. Artificial intelligence is viewed as amongst the technological advances that will reshape modern societies and their relations. While the design and deployment of systems that continually adapt holds the promise of far-reaching positive change, they simultaneously pose significant risks, especially to already vulnerable peoples. Values and power are central to this discussion. Decolonial theories (...) use historical hindsight to explain patterns of power that shape our intellectual, political, economic, and social world. By embedding a decolonial critical approach within its technical practice, AI communities can develop foresight and tactics that can better align research and technology development with established ethical principles, centring vulnerable peoples who continue to bear the brunt of negative impacts of innovation and scientific progress. We highlight problematic applications that are instances of coloniality, and using a decolonial lens, submit three tactics that can form a decolonial field of artificial intelligence: creating a critical technical practice of AI, seeking reverse tutelage and reverse pedagogies, and the renewal of affective and political communities. The years ahead will usher in a wave of new scientific breakthroughs and technologies driven by AI research, making it incumbent upon AI communities to strengthen the social contract through ethical foresight and the multiplicity of intellectual perspectives available to us, ultimately supporting future technologies that enable greater well-being, with the goal of beneficence and justice for all. (shrink)

Background Moral courage is the ability to defend and practice ethical and moral action when faced with a challenge, even if it means rejecting pressure to act otherwise. However, moral courage remains an unexplored concept among middle eastern nurses. Aim This study investigated the mediating role of moral courage in the relationship between burnout, professional competence, and compassion fatigue among Saudi Arabian nurses. Research design Correlational, cross-sectional design following the STROBE guidelines. Participants and research context Convenience sampling was used to (...) recruit nurses ( n = 684) for four government hospitals in Saudi Arabia. Four validated self-report questionnaires (Nurses’ Moral Courage Scale, Nurse Professional Competence Scale-Short Form, Maslach Burnout Inventory, and Nurses Compassion Fatigue Inventory) were used to collect data between May to September 2022. Spearman rho and structural equation modeling analyses were employed to analyze the data. Ethical considerations The ethics review committee of a government university in Ha’il region, Saudi Arabia, approval this study (Protocol no.: H-2021-012; Approved: 08/022,021). Participants were fully explained the study aims, and consent was voluntarily secured. Results The emerging model showed that burnout had a direct and positive influence on compassion fatigue, while professional competence had a direct, negative effect on compassion fatigue. Moral courage had a small and direct but negative influence on compassion fatigue. Mediation analyses also indicated that moral courage significantly mediated the indirect effects of burnout and professional competence on compassion fatigue. Conclusion Moral courage can be a crucial aspect in preserving the psychological and mental health of nurses, particularly under stressful conditions. Therefore, it is advantageous from an organizational and leadership standpoint to implement measures such as programs and interventions to foster moral courage among nurses. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine the question of commitment transmissibility in public political arguments. I explore the idea that under certain conditions, arguers become accountable for the commitments of their “argumentative associates” (Mohammed 2019a ). I present cases where arguers make discursive effort to distance themselves from an undesirable associate in order to avoid acquiring the associate’s commitments, as well as cases where arguers fail to do so and face the consequences. I discuss the concept of commitment in argumentation (...) (e.g. Hamblin 1970, Walton & Krabbe 1995 ), and I build on the scheme of guilt and honour by association (Groarke and Tindale 2004 ). The result is a nuanced normative view of arguments by association: the transmissibility of commitments between argumentative associates is a way to hold arguers accountable for the argumentative potential (Mohammed 2019b ; see also Kjeldsen 2017 ; Serafis 2022 ) of their discourse, and yet, commitment transmissibility remains defeasible to avoid the over-attribution of commitment by association. (shrink)

In 2022, the Research Center for Islamic Legislation & Ethics (CILE) and the World Innovation Summit for Health (WISH) submitted a proposal to host the 17th edition of the World Congress of Bioethics. After announcing that the CILE‐WISH proposal was the winning bid, concerns were raised by bioethicists based in Europe and the USA. To address these concerns, the International Association of Bioethics (IAB) developed a dedicated FAQ section, in coordination with the host institutions, for the first time in IAB (...) history. One‐to‐one communication ensued and individual responses were shared with these colleagues. As a continuation of this conversation, we (CILE Acting Director, WISH Research Fellow and Head of Content, and WISH CEO) address the concerns raised in the Letter‐to‐the‐Editor of Bioethics by Graaf et al. As we support the call to revisit some contentious issues within the global community of bioethicists, we maintain that this should be based on meticulously discussed, informed, consistent and equitable criteria. We also argue that mutual learning from diverse cultures and moral traditions is the optimal way for our scholarly community to be truly global and to eschew the flaws ensuing from ethnocentric discourses. (shrink)

Do not believe that the philosophy that has reached us through the writings of Aristotle, Abû Nasr (al-Fârâbî), and the book of Healing (of Ibn Sinâ), will satisfy your longing; neither that any of the Andalusians has written anything adequate on this matter. For the men of superior understanding who lived in Andalusia before the spread of logic and philosophy in that country, devoted their lives to the mathematical sciences…; but could do nothing more…” Ibn Tufayl, Hayy ibn Yaqzân, p. (...) 12.Much remains to be done by way of determining exactly the ways in which Arab thought penetrated Western Islam-I refer both to its sociological extension and the depth of its psycho-cultural effect. The question thus posed is of considerable historical importance, above all if one wishes to cover the whole period from the beginning of the Eighth Century (i.e. the end of the First/beginning of the Second Century of the Hegira), up to the present day. In fact, the spread of Arab thought to the Maghreb, and its penetration in depth, was accelerated again after the reconquest of the politically autonomous areas. This situation lends our research a certain topicality, whence spring both advantages and disadvantages: there is the advantage of historical knowledge not being limited to an erudite accumulation of facts about a past that has no links with any extant community; yet there is the problem that it is hard not to evoke the past in order to justify present ideological ventures. (shrink)