نشریه فلسفه تحلیلی
پیاپی 18 (پاییز و زمستان 1389)

Among different sources the one which made a considerable impactupon Aquinas’ aesthetics is the teachings of the Bible. Aquinas hasalways tried to prove that these teachings are compatible withphilosophical thought’s achievements on God, universe and human.This idea is also applicable to aesthetics. This article is to validate theclaim about existence of several words in the Bible which are translatedas "beauty" and are referring to different dimensions of meaning.Accordingly, variant and different referents about beauty can be foundin the Bible. In this respect, the discussion of beauty explores a largedimension of meaning in Aquinas’ perspective. The most importantaesthetic referents in the Bible include the beauty of God the Sun as thesecond person of trinity, beauty of universe and beauty of human.Accordingly, we are encountering the same variety of beauty inAquinas’s aesthetics. In respect of appointing referents of beauty, thesort of relation and their relationship with each other, and theirclassification, Aquinas has considerably followed the Holy Bible’steachings and has matched his ideas with.

Kant’s Copernicusian revolution is a well-known topic in history ofepistemology, though its implications and impacts are not welldiscussed enough. No need to mention that analysis of knowledge wasKant’s first philosophical self-commitment. Aspiring of Copernicus’srevolution in astronomy, he changed the centrality of subject/object inhis epistemological approach and maintained that mind (cognitivefaculties) must be departure of metaphysical analysis; that was arevolutionary idea. Doing so, he, as it is well-known, divided alljudgments from two different aspects: first, analytic/synthetic; andsecond, apriori/aposteriori. He, then, argued that there are apriorisynthetic judgments – by which the possibility of knowledge iswarranted – are universal and necessary. These judgments not onlyrefer to external world, but also belong equally to physics,mathematics, and metaphysics. He believed that his doctrine could(dis)solve the old long-standing epistemological problem in modernphilosophy such as the debates on source of knowledge(reason/experience), dogmatism/skepticism, etc., among rationalistsand empiricists. Although his ideas, specially stressing on aprioriconcepts as a key, help him to (dis)solve some epistemological puzzles,either reveal a few new problems in newly changed epistemologicalscope.

Libertarians on the one hand hold that free will is incompatible withdeterminism, and on the other hand free will is real and can be realizedeven in indeterministic conditions. Therefore, libertarianism tries toshow that firstly how determinism and free will are incompatible andsecondly how free will can be possible in an indeterministic world. Thesecond challenge seems to be more difficult than the first one, since inindeterministic conditions agent's actions and choices would seem to bematter of luck and not under control of the agent. Most of traditionallibertarians had tried to solve these problems by appealing to nonnaturalfactors. However, some people like Robert Kane have presentedtheir solutions without any explicit metaphysical presupposition. Theybelieve that modern sciences can resolve the problem of free well. Inthis essay, we will firstly explore Robert Kane's ideas and then try totake a critical view on it.

This paper tries to study the question of whether the notion ofcollective unconscious as developed by Jung has any neural correlates.Also, the notion will be pinned down with respect to the realm ofcognitive science as well as the interpretation of modern cognitivepsychologists. For example, it will be shown that unconscious humanemotions somehow are related to the long term memory which hasgenetic base in psychology and is based on the changes in genotypestructure. With reference to the ideas projected by people such asRoederer, Panksepp, and McLennan, it will be clarified that why innatural dreams and imaginations, there are always fixed backgrounds,called archetypes by Jung. The claim, then, is that archetypes have todo with brain structure, neurons, and genetics of the brain structure.

This paper is a reflection on the interaction between metaphysics andscience that has been existed since the pre-modern epoch, an exampleof which was actualized in Aristotle's system of metaphysics andscience. Yet, this interaction was gradually undermined by the adventof scientific revolution especially the classic period of science in the17th and 18th century in modern epoch. In the 19th century, theappearances of positivism caused metaphysics lose its meaningfulnessand laid it aside from the realm of episteme and then put it in the sphereof tastes, emotions and passions. In the 20th century, philosophies andmetaphysical systems, in the common sense, failed to direct sciencesand claimed a sort of independence from sciences through raisingtechnical problems in fields of language and logic.However, this independence supported metaphysics and philosophyversus techno-science, in the meanwhile metaphysics lost another mainrole, the raising rationality in the field of sciences. This article explainsthis problem after a brief introduction and argues that pursuit of thisissue is not a technical-academic problem but a matter of human life.

The English biologist and philosopher, Richard Dawkins, in hissimplicity argument claims that the basic rules of physics are simple, soit is actually more likely that the relatively simple laws of nature wouldbe came into existence for no reason than that they would be designedby a God whose being would have to be more complex than they are.Thus, there is no God. By contrast, keith Ward and other theistphilosophers like Richard Swinburne and Alvin Plantinga withseparating "exclusive" and "inclusive" simplicity, defends from"integrative" simplicity of God. The existence of God integrates allelements, products of evolution and natural basic rules, in acomprehensive system, thus, it is simplest explanation, whileDawkins's materialistic view, is not enough explanatory. So "simplicityargument", is in fact, "the fallacy of simplicity". In this article, it istried to deny Dawkins's simplicity argument.

Psychology as a knowledge has a direct relationship with religion.Therefore, there are different theories and approaches in psychology tostudy religion and its impact on the human psyche. Carl Gustav Jung(1875-1961) Swiss psychologist and founder of Analytical psychologyis one of the psychologists; who has done extensive research in thefield of religion. With his proposed theory of 'CollectiveUnconsciousness' he considered the origin of religion far beyond thenon-cognitive reasons such as trauma, fear, and poverty. He tried tojustify human tendencies toward religion through novel ways. Thepurpose of this article is to review of Jung's consideration on religionand the religious thought on a descriptive – analytical procedures .Inthis regard; first of all, Jung analytical psychology is introduced briefly,then analytical psychology thoughts on issues such as religiondefinition, religion origin, religiosity consequences and perceives ofGod is considered. The review will continue and criticize each concept.Despite Jung's psychology and positivist view of religion has beensubjected to intense criticism but additionally, these studies andcriticism shows that: He has a positive view about religion and he wasalways considered as one of the defenders of it.