فصلنامه نقد و نظر
سال بیستم شماره 3 (پیاپی 79، پاییز 1394)

Intuitions have a justifying role in ethics, and moral judgments are formed in accordance with them. Scientific studies in cognitive sciences challenged the validity of moral intuitions and strengthened the position of singer that reliance on intuitions cannot be plausible. Singer found three problems with practical intuitions and merely accepted the theoretical intuitions. He believes that relying on pure reason is the only element for preventing us from skepticism, and while he criticized Rawls’s reflective equilibrium, he suggests that any methodological or epistemological theory, like reflective equilibrium that pays a role in intuitions, is fundamentally problematic, and may be an obstacle for moral reformation. In this essay, we introduce Singer's position about validity of intuitions and evaluate it, and then study critic's arguments and show its weak points and strengths.

The main purpose of this paper is to examine Moore's view regarding the indefinability of good: is good undefinable? On his view, the concept of good is not derivable of any other concept. Therefore "good" is irreducible to other concepts. According to him, goodness is simple and undefinable. What is meant by definition? Among different definitions, Moore focuses on the most important sense thereof. In addition, Moore considers the "good," as a non- natural quality. He thinks that any effort to identify the good with other natural qualities is a fallacy. It is a naturalistic fallacy as he calls it. He supports his idea by the open question argument. In this paper we will argue that Moore's argument shows at most that the meaning of good and pleasure, for example, are not the same. They are conceptually different but it does not preclude the supposition that they both refer to one and same property.

The concept of "self" is very significant in moral philosophy. The definition of this concept and the demarcation of self and the other have important repercussions in the formation of a moral theory. Ayn Rand and Aristotle have considered the problem of self in their moral theories, and they delimited their theories accordingly. A significant part of Rand’s moral theory is influenced by Aristotelian principles. Rand’s theory of human person as well as her emphasis on the role of rationality in ethics has an Aristotelian character, but there are significant differences between their respective moral theories that I think are rooted in their differences over the concept of the self in a moral sense and the relation between the self and the other. In this paper, I seek to elaborate the limits of the self in the moral theories of Rand and Aristotle, and then compare this concept in their views and explain its consequences in their moral theories.

This paper investigates the role of higher-order evidence in the debates concerning the epistemology of disagreement. After providing definitions for first-order and higher-order evidence respectively and emphasizing the difference between them, I propose an argument for the view that higher-order evidence can be considered as evidence just in the absence of first-order evidence. Then even through assessing the example concerning the reasoning-distorting drug, I investigate and criticize one of the most important views in the epistemology of disagreement, namely David Christensen's view. In this part, I defend the similarity between the role of higher-order evidence and undercutter evidence and the sameness of their functions in the epistemology of disagreement. Finally, I propose and assess Thomas Kelly's argument for the neutral role of higher-order evidence in the debate. In this part, after defending Kelly's argument from an objection according to which considering the probative force of higher-order evidence leads to Equal Weight View, I will show how Kelly's argument claims to work.

The conceptual principle of "existential gradation" as a principle of transcendental theosophy attempts to explain the multiplicity in the world under the theory of the fundamentality of existence. Although it is supported by rational arguments, the multiplicity in the stage of horizontal entities is not explained by this principle. Or at least there is no clear explanation about horizontal multiplicity under this principle. There is a fact that every explanation that we have seen in different books is an explanation of vertical multiplicity. This article seeks to explain the principles of horizontal and vertical multiplicities in entities and then explain the way in which horizontal gradation can be explained in a manner that there is no factor other than existence. This article is just concerned with a part of this explanation. This is not a new theory, nor a new theory based on Mulla Sadra’s principles, but just an explanation for one of Mulla Sadra's theories such that it preserves the principle that the criterion of differentiation is nothing but existence.

Qāḍī Nu’mān, a well-known Islma’īlī jurisprudent (faqīh), introduced a different approach to the problem of interpretation (ta’wīl) from other Isma’īlī scholars. In contrast with the dominant Isma’īlī view that is too liberal with interior interpretations and sometimes leads to mistakes, Qāḍī Nu’mān commits himself with ta’wīl with an eye to the explicit meanings of texts. With this moderate approach to ta’wīl, he tries to be immune from errors of other Isma’īlī scholars. He takes the apparent meanings of the Quran to be silent and a miracle of the Prophet (s) and the interior (bāṭin) meanings of the Quran (ta’wīl) to be a miracle of the Shiite Imams (a). He takes ta’wīl to be a discipline that is verifiable in terms of Quranic verses and some rules and principles. Although he made some implausible ta’wīls or interpretations, we can extract some rules and conditions for ta’wīl from his views: considering both the apparent and the interior or hidden meanings, conceptual relation between ta’wīl and reasoning, the effect of purity or piety on the accuracy of ta’wīl, its leading to Imam (a)’s knowledge, and the role of faith in the accuracy of ta’wīl. Despite the advantages of Qāḍī Nu’mān’s approach to ta’wīl, there are serious problems with it that I shall deal with in this paper.

The issue of motion has as long a history as that of human beings. Human beings were concerned with it before they were concerned with significant issues in philosophy such as “existence” and “intellect”. An early philosopher who was concerned with the issue was Anaximander-the philosopher in the Ancient Greece-who believed in the eternal motion in the world. The theory of substantial motion can be traced back to the philosophy of Heraclitus-another Ancient Greek philosopher. Muslim philosophers also concerned themselves with this issue and discussed many problems regarding motion. The “motion” is a problem in ontology, epistemology, cosmology, and anthropology. In this paper, we will concern ourselves with anthropological problems of motion from a certain perspective; we will evaluate the role of “substantial motion” in the problem of “mind-body relation” and the substantial perfection of human beings. Given that the theory of “physical incipience of the soul” is an implication of the substantial motion, we will examine the theory of soul perfection and its development from a material body to pure immateriality or spirituality, and we will finally evaluate Mullā Ṣadrā’s account given hadiths concerning the creation of the soul.