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  1 - Objectivity and Representativeness of Propositions in the Practical Philosophies of Kant and Mulla Sadra
  Hossein  Qasemi
  Kant, the modern philosopher, believes that the development of Man’s moral life depends on designing a moral system the principles of which are based on reason and objectivity. In this way, it would be free from any kind of subjectivity and personal bias, which damaged More

  Kant, the modern philosopher, believes that the development of Man’s moral life depends on designing a moral system the principles of which are based on reason and objectivity. In this way, it would be free from any kind of subjectivity and personal bias, which damaged the moral system of his period. The only proposition which enjoys these features is the categorical imperative. Now, the problem is how Kant justifies the objectivity and truth of this imperative. Another question is how this problem is answered in Mulla Sadra’s Islamic philosophy. In his Critique of Practical Reason, Kant maintains that practical matters are rooted in the moral law and tries to justify them by resorting to practical reason and the notion of freedom. Although Kant’s discussions in the field of philosophy of ethics proceed in a way to demonstrate nomena and, particularly, freedom, he considers them to be among axioms. This means that the reality of practical reason and freedom only justify the practical possibility of moral experience and other practical fields. In other words, admitting the reality of the intellect and freedom is merely based on belief and faith, consequently, moral propositions are rational rather than cognitional. In Mulla Sadra’s Transcendent Philosophy, practical propositions in individual and social fields are developed based on practical reason while attending to its relationship with theoretical reason. Moreover, the realms of both theory and practice stem from the innermost of the soul and are known through presential knowledge. As a result, all mental and rational perceptions are related to the truth of the good and its grades as an ontological affair. In this way, the objectivity and truth of these propositions are justified not based on certain axioms but by resorting to the possibility of the presential knowledge of the world of fact-itself. In this paper, the writer has tried to discuss the truth and objectivity of propositions in practical philosophy through employing a comparative method and the analysis of the philosophical principles of Kant and Mulla Sadra in order to highlight the importance of the principles of the Transcendent Philosophy. Manuscript profile
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  2 - A Critical Evaluation of Ibn Sina’s Arguments on the Presential Perception of Essence
  somayyeh ajalli sahar kavandi
  According to Islamic philosophers, the soul’s self-perception is of the type of presential knowledge. In other words, the soul’s awareness of its own essence, unlike what Descartes states in his concept of Cogito, does not occur through external objects, body organs, or More

  According to Islamic philosophers, the soul’s self-perception is of the type of presential knowledge. In other words, the soul’s awareness of its own essence, unlike what Descartes states in his concept of Cogito, does not occur through external objects, body organs, or soulish acts. Rather, the soul perceives its self free from its acts and states and with no reliance on the activities of material body. The prominent Islamic philosopher, Ibn Sina, has posed different arguments in order to demonstrate this claim, the most important of which is the argument of “floating man” or “suspended man”. However, an evaluation of such arguments seems to reveal that they are not capable of demonstrating their claim and, under the best circumstances, they can merely prove the difference between the soul’s self-knowledge and its knowledge of other objects. Therefore, it seems that either more solid arguments are necessary to demonstrate the soul’s independence in self-perception or the soul should not be considered independent of the body and, particularly, the brain in this regard. Manuscript profile
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  3 - A Comparative Study of Ibn Sina and Khwajah Nasir al-Din Tusi on God’s Knowledge
  Einollah  Khademi Mahmood  Ahesteh
  God’s Knowledge is one of the important philosophical problems whose various dimensions have continually been explored by different thinkers. In order to avoid the problem of change in divine essence, Ibn Sina argues that God’s Knowledge of particulars is possible throu More

  God’s Knowledge is one of the important philosophical problems whose various dimensions have continually been explored by different thinkers. In order to avoid the problem of change in divine essence, Ibn Sina argues that God’s Knowledge of particulars is possible through the knowledge of universals and causes. He also holds that the divine undifferentiated knowledge of existents is possible through imprinted forms. On the other hand, Muhaqqiq Tusi considers the necessary knowledge to belong to the category of relation and maintains that, in the Necessary Being’s Knowledge of changing particular affairs, some changes occur in the relation while the essence remains the same. Therefore, unlike Ibn Sina, Tusi accepts God’s Knowledge of particulars. He also criticizes Ibn Sina’s theory of the imprinting of established forms in the essence of the Necessary Being. Ibn Sina argues that the knowledge of divine essence through His Essence and the essential knowledge of imprinted forms, which is the cause of the appearance of existence, are of the presential type, while the differentiated knowledge of other existents is of the acquired type. In this paper, the writers explain and explore the philosophical principles of these two thinkers. Manuscript profile
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  4 - Doubt and Certainty in Contemporary Islamic and Western Philosophies
  Abdurrazzaq  Hesamifar
  Doubt and certainty are two soulish states which form problematic and certain knowledge in the process of human cognition. Problematic knowledge is mainly obtained in the realm of empirical sciences, while certain knowledge is mostly acquired in the domain of certain no More

  Doubt and certainty are two soulish states which form problematic and certain knowledge in the process of human cognition. Problematic knowledge is mainly obtained in the realm of empirical sciences, while certain knowledge is mostly acquired in the domain of certain non-empirical sciences such as philosophy, logic, mathematics, and gnosis. In the history of philosophy, philosophers often sought certain knowledge and believed that it is possible to attain the truth. In contrast, skeptics undermined the acquisition of such knowledge and did not believe in the existence of any kind of truth. The confrontations of these two groups have always constituted a part of the history of philosophy. Such a confrontation has been revived in contemporary philosophy as a result of the discussions which are made in modern epistemology both in Islamic philosophy and Western philosophy. On the one hand, contemporary Muslim philosophers have tried to defend the strong epistemological principles of Islamic philosophy through negating the views of skeptics. They believe in realism in epistemology and reject any interpretation of knowledge which is based on subjective idealism. On the other hand, at least some contemporary Western philosophers have tried to provide some responses to the questions posed by skeptics by developing a number of new views. In this comparative study, the author has tried to evaluate the attempts of a group of philosophers of each side in this regard. It is eventually concluded that the responses of Islamic philosophers to the posed questions enjoy a stronger basis both in the past and at present. Manuscript profile
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  5 - A Semantic Study of the Description of God as the Simple Intellect in Sinan Wisdom (with Reference to Three Different Interpretations by Fakhr al-Din Razi, Mir Damad and Mulla Sadra)
  SAYYED MOHAMMAD ENTEZAM
  Ibn Sina referred to God as the Simple Intellect; however, his intended meaning of this term has been interpreted differently by Fakhr al-Din Razi, Mir Damad, and Mulla Sadra. Fakhr al-Din Razi believes that the Sinan Simple Intellect depends on the suddenness and non-t More

  Ibn Sina referred to God as the Simple Intellect; however, his intended meaning of this term has been interpreted differently by Fakhr al-Din Razi, Mir Damad, and Mulla Sadra. Fakhr al-Din Razi believes that the Sinan Simple Intellect depends on the suddenness and non-temporality of God’s acquired and differentiated knowledge of existents prior to their creation. According to Mir Damad, this term denotes that God’s knowledge of existents is at the level of essence and identical with essence. He believes that this kind of knowledge is in contrast to His presential knowledge of existents and argues that the attribution of acquired knowledge to Ibn Sina is among Suhrawardi’s mistakes. Finally, Mulla Sadra states that, by the Simple Intellect, Ibn Sina means a general rather than differentiated type of acquired knowledge. In this paper, the author examines each of these interpretations along with their related proofs and, at the end, demonstrates that the correct interpretation of this term is a combination of those provided by Mulla Sadra and Fakhr al-Din Razi. Manuscript profile
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  6 - The Relationship between Weakness of Will and Ethical Life in Aristotle: A Glance at Socrates’ View and Aristotle’s Critique of Weakness of Will
  Simin Kheirabadi Ali Akbar  Abdol Abadi
  “Weakness of will” is one of the fundamental concepts in Aristotle’s ethics, a thorough understanding of which requires an understanding of its meaning and use in his views. In this paper, following a descriptive-analytic method, the authors initially refer to the lexic More

  “Weakness of will” is one of the fundamental concepts in Aristotle’s ethics, a thorough understanding of which requires an understanding of its meaning and use in his views. In this paper, following a descriptive-analytic method, the authors initially refer to the lexical roots of the expression of “weakness of will” in Greek and, then, try to explain Socrates’ idea of weakness of will and Aristotle’s critique of this view. Next, given some of the referents of the concept of weakness of will in Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics, they seek to demonstrate why human beings sometimes act against their ethical knowledge. Later they provide Aristotle’s analysis of the phenomenon of weakness of will as one of the obstacles to living an ethical life and argue that sometimes it stands in contrast to rationality. As a result, while being aware that something is ethically wrong or right, an individual, under the influence of their misplaced desires, might act unethically or cease to act ethically. In Aristotle’s view, a necessary condition for the rationality of ethical necessity is for human beings to benefit from “practical wisdom”. He also believes that if the intellect leads the other human faculties at the level of act, individuals will certainly choose and do the right thing. Manuscript profile
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  7 - Man’s Intellectual and Intuitive Knowledge of the One and the One’s Knowledge of Himself and other than Himself in Plotinus’ Philosophy
  Asadullah  Heydarpour Kiya’i
  The present paper explores whether, based on Plotinus’ view, man can have a demonstrative and inferential knowledge of the One. It also tries to provide answers to the questions of whether he can describe and explain Him, whether he is capable of having an intuitive and More

  The present paper explores whether, based on Plotinus’ view, man can have a demonstrative and inferential knowledge of the One. It also tries to provide answers to the questions of whether he can describe and explain Him, whether he is capable of having an intuitive and presential knowledge of the One, what kind of knowledge the One has of Himself, and, finally, whether this knowledge is of an intellectual demonstrative nature or of an intellectual-intuitive type. Plotinus believes that man is not capable of attaining a theoretical concept and intellectual-demonstrative knowledge of the One. Therefore, he cannot provide a description and explanation for Him. Nevertheless, he will be able to have intuitive knowledge and presential knowledge of the One under certain conditions. In this case, he will become one with the One in some way. Demonstrative thinking, which is concomitant with plurality in its essence, has no way into the essentially simple and pure One. Accordingly, He is intuitively self-conscious, and since He is the Origin of everything, and since everything is present in Him, He is aware of other than Himself in the same way that He is aware of Himself. Manuscript profile
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  8 - The Relationship between the Pillars of Wisdom and Utopia in Suhrawardi and Plato
  Saeed  Rahimian
  The idea of utopia entails extensive discussions with a history as long as the history of humanity. Plato was the first philosopher who portrayed utopia in a philosophical mould. On the other hand, in the Islamic world, Farabi was the pioneer of this view and left it as More

  The idea of utopia entails extensive discussions with a history as long as the history of humanity. Plato was the first philosopher who portrayed utopia in a philosophical mould. On the other hand, in the Islamic world, Farabi was the pioneer of this view and left it as a legacy to the thinkers living after him until today. Shaykh Shahab al-Din Suhrawardi is one of the philosophers who gives a specific direction to his philosophical thoughts in search of an ideal state; one that emerges from the heart of his Illuminationist ontology and epistemology. The present paper aims to explore this firm relationship and, given the place of Plato’s ideas in Suhrawardi’s philosophy, highlights the points of agreement and disagreement of these two thinkers in this regard. Considering the similarities between their views, particularly in cases such as man’s interest in a civil society, the conformity and harmony between their ideal state and the order of being and confining the ruling power to the people possessing the knowledge of the truths of the higher world, one cannot deny the independence of Suhrawardi’s philosophy, especially, with respect to the leadership of an ideal state and its leader’s attributes. Manuscript profile
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  9 - Value of Philosophia Prima in Kant and ‘Allāmah Ṭabāṭabā’ī
  Armin Mansouri Abbas Izadpanah
  20.1001.1.20089589.1400.11.4.6.5
  The present study investigates the scientific value of philosophia prima from the epistemological perspectives of Kant and ‘Allāmah Ṭabāṭabā’ī. As a philosopher whose standpoints were under the influence of other sciences and, due to the conditions of his time, he sided More

  The present study investigates the scientific value of philosophia prima from the epistemological perspectives of Kant and ‘Allāmah Ṭabāṭabā’ī. As a philosopher whose standpoints were under the influence of other sciences and, due to the conditions of his time, he sided with both empiricism and rationalism, Kant tried to solve the conflicts between these two schools relying on apriori synthetic propositions. Finally, he argued that, firstly, knowledge is acquired through sense perception and, secondly, it is limited to phenomena. Hence, he concluded that, while metaphysics cannot be denied, the existence of scientific propositions of philosophia prima are not epistemologically possible. Nevertheless, based on the ideas that, apart from sensible knowledge, pure rational knowledge can also be demonstrated, and that knowledge includes not only phenomenon but also essence, ‘Allāmah Ṭabāṭabā’ī believed that philosophia prima enjoys epistemological value in terms of its demonstrative method, subject, and problems. He places it on the top of all human sciences and considers all of its propositions and achievement to be certain and scientific. Manuscript profile
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  10 - A Critique of Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī’s Criticism of Ibn Sīnā’s View of the Truth of Knowledge
  SeyedehZahra Mousavi Baygi Vahid Khademzadeh
  20.1001.1.20089589.1400.12.3.4.4
  Although Muslim Philosophers have not specifically discussed epistemological problems, they have extensively spoken of some general issues regarding knowledge. Ibn Sīnā has provided various definitions and explanations in relation to the nature of knowledge on different More

  Although Muslim Philosophers have not specifically discussed epistemological problems, they have extensively spoken of some general issues regarding knowledge. Ibn Sīnā has provided various definitions and explanations in relation to the nature of knowledge on different occasions in many of his works. He has conceived of knowledge sometimes as pure quality, sometimes as quality possessing relation, and sometimes as pure relation. Moreover, he has interpreted knowledge as abstraction from matter in some of his works. Such a diversity of interpretations has given an excuse to some people such as Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī to criticize and question Ibn Sīnā’s view of the truth of knowledge. In different places in his works, Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī emphasizes that Ibn Sīnā’s view of knowledge was divided, and he failed to attain a single standpoint concerning the truth of knowledge. The present study, which was conducted following an analytic-descriptive method and a critical approach, firstly presents Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī’s claim and, then, evaluates its truth. Next, the authors delve into his other works to examine the definitions of knowledge in his view. The findings of this study demonstrate that, although there are some fundamental problems in Ibn Sīnā’s view, his words are based on his own principles, are solid, and can be reduced to a unitary view. However, Rāzī’s words on this problem are inconsistent. Manuscript profile
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  11 - Middle Platonism: Introduction and Analysis of Religious and Philosophical Theorems
  Mahbobeh  Hadina
  20.1001.1.20089589.1400.12.2.8.6
  Middle Platonism is one of the most important philosophical-religious schools of the first century BC. While claiming to revive the original Platonic school, it is rooted in the fundamental epistemological and philosophical theorems of that time including the essence of More

  Middle Platonism is one of the most important philosophical-religious schools of the first century BC. While claiming to revive the original Platonic school, it is rooted in the fundamental epistemological and philosophical theorems of that time including the essence of the One, God as Creator, descent of the soul, rational knowledge, and salvation. A study of middle Platonists’ works reveals that the philosophical principles of this school are mainly based on a reinterpretation of certain religious-philosophical theorems of Platonic, Stoic, Pythagorean, and gnostic schools. In fact, a clear trace of the concern for explaining the problem of the oneness and transcendence of the essence of Almighty, the quality of the creation of the world, and the presence of evil therein can be witnesses in the works of the philosophers that advocate the mentioned schools. The fundamental principles of middle Platonism are basically religious, and this school is mainly concerned with such topics as the duality of the essence of divinity in two concepts, God as the Maker or Creator of the world, the duality of the spiritual and material origin of Man and the descent of the soul, cosmology and the material structure and fate of the world, eschatology with an emphasis on the theorem of Man’s salvation through rational knowledge, and finally the discussion of ethics and the definition of its practical frameworks for attaining rational perfection, which is necessary for salvation. The present paper aims to explain and provide a comparative analysis of the principles and quality of the formation of the philosophical theorems of Middle Platonism as a philosophical-religious school. Manuscript profile
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  12 - Development of the Concept of Free Will in the View of Modern Philosophers
  Roohollah Karimi
  20.1001.1.20089589.1401.13.1.6.9
  The concept of free will is one of the fundamental concepts in Western metaphysical tradition. Although there are some important signs regarding the origination of this concept in Greek classical philosophy and Middle Age philosophy, it was just at the beginning of the More

  The concept of free will is one of the fundamental concepts in Western metaphysical tradition. Although there are some important signs regarding the origination of this concept in Greek classical philosophy and Middle Age philosophy, it was just at the beginning of the modern period that the role of free will in the interpretation of the world was more highlighted in the thoughts of each philosopher more than those of the previous one. It seems as if the role of rational knowledge has become gradually less important in this process while the role of free will has become more significant. Inspired by Heidegger, the author has tried to strengthen his standpoint by yielding more proofs than he has offered in order to examine the development of the concept of free will. In doing so, he starts with Descartes and, by investigating the views of Espinoza, Leibniz, Rousseau, Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche, aims to analyze the quality of the development of this concept, particularly the relationship between the free will and knowledge in the modern period. The purpose is to show that the significance of free will for Schopenhauer and Nietzsche is not accidental, and the preliminary contexts of such a development had been previously and gradually paved by modern philosophers. The findings of this study indicate that, unlike the previous comments and interpretations, Nietzsche’s “will to power” is not a complement to a Schopenhaurian project but, rather, a complement to German idealism. Manuscript profile
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  13 - Historical Trends of Epistemological Issues in Pre-Sadrian Philosophical Tradition
  Ali Asghar  Jafari Valani Donya  Asadi Fakhrnejad
  20.1001.1.20089589.1401.13.2.4.9
  A study of epistemological developments in Islamic philosophy indicates that, although the issues in this philosophical trend have not been independently dealt with and have been generally discussed under epistemological issues, there are other problems in Islamic philo More

  A study of epistemological developments in Islamic philosophy indicates that, although the issues in this philosophical trend have not been independently dealt with and have been generally discussed under epistemological issues, there are other problems in Islamic philosophy that, if organized and classified, can open the door to philosophical approaches to ontological discussions. Perhaps, some of the fundamental ambiguities in epistemology can be clarified based on the outcomes of such discussions. For example, reference can be made to the effects of ontological views of Ibn Sīnā and Suhrawardī over their epistemology. The main question of this study is how an epistemological approach can be extracted from an investigation and analysis of a collection of problems and demonstrate it with reference to the standpoints and views of Islamic philosophers. In order to achieve this purpose, it must be said that an epistemology based on the sense, reason, and intuition can lead to the development of Islamic philosophers’ epistemology. The Peripatetic philosophy is mainly based on the intellect and reasoning, and the Illuminationist philosophy, although relying on reasoning, basically draws on unveiling and intuition in epistemological analyses. However, logic, as a gateway to epistemology, usually opens the discussion because almost all Islamic philosophers consider the theory of definition as a tool for unveiling the unknown (unveiling the general nature of affairs) relying on acquired knowledge and the five predicables (universals). Nevertheless, Suhrawardī and his followers, while relying on presential knowledge, believe that a genus-differentia definition is not justified and, by criticizing the theory of definition, try to discover the particular unknown through observation and illumination. Accordingly, the problem of vision and imagination in the common epistemological system is usually viewed as one of the sides of acquired knowledge. In contrast, it is explained under presential knowledge in Illuminationist philosophy. Manuscript profile
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  14 - A Critical Study of the Views of ‘Alī Qulī Khān Qarchoghāi Khān on Acquired and Presential Types of Knowledge
  Hamid Reza  Khademi
  20.1001.1.20089589.1402.14.2.2.4
  ‘Alī Qulī Khān Qarchoghāi Khān was one of the philosophers of the Safavid era, many of whose works have remained unknown. However, his book Revival of Wisdom, which contains many of his philosophical ideas, has been edited and published. Among the innovative accomplishm More

  ‘Alī Qulī Khān Qarchoghāi Khān was one of the philosophers of the Safavid era, many of whose works have remained unknown. However, his book Revival of Wisdom, which contains many of his philosophical ideas, has been edited and published. Among the innovative accomplishments of this philosopher, reference can be made to his novel classifications and interpretations of acquired and presential types of knowledge. When describing his approach in this regard, while presenting the views of early philosophers regarding the truth of knowledge, prior to explaining the two types of true knowledge – essential knowledge and accidental knowledge – he introduces acquired and presential types of knowledge as subcategories of accidental knowledge. On the one hand, some of his classifications of acquired knowledge and presential knowledge are unprecedented in the history of Islamic philosophy. On the other hand, he maintains that the truth of knowledge is an accidental affair that is added to the rational soul. In fact, through his analysis of the problem of the union of the intellect and intelligible, ‘Alī Qulī Khān views knowledge as a quality that has occurred to the qualified. Here, his approach has been studied at four stages: examining different types of acquired knowledge and presential knowledge, investigating the incompleteness of his first argument about the accidental nature of presential knowledge and acquired knowledge, revealing the shortcomings of the second and third arguments, and illustrating the insufficiency of his view regarding the union of the intellect and intelligent. In this paper, the author has initially tried to provide an accurate explanation of ‘Alī Qulī Khān’s innovative view on acquired and presential types of knowledge and, then, to examine and criticize this view following an analytic-descriptive method. Manuscript profile