فصلنامه ذهن
سال بیست و چهارم شماره 3 (پیاپی 95، پاییز 1402)

The cyberspace is a novel arena and lifeworld developed and expanded by the modern human, following the progress in computer sciences and information technology during the previous few decades. In parallel with the increasing openness and development of this new arena, communication beyond the boundaries of place and time was made possible both between people and objects. Moreover, the ontological nature of information underwent a change, whereby information was separated from matter  and was simulated into “bits”. This in turn drastically revolutionized the human epistemology and understanding of everything. for this reason, the problem of the present research is to describe the most significant epistemological characteristics of the present cyber space, to show the most important epistemological transitions resulted from the openness of this space and to consider and analyze these transitions.

The present research uses an analytic-rational method to describe the epistemological characteristics of the cyberspace, and to criticize the epistemic transition resulted from development of this space.

Cyberspace, a perpetually evolving domain, has just been assumed a world and lifeworld of the modern human, as well as a novel manifestation and flow of Being. It is firmly grounded in the material and physical realm, yet it transcends the realm of matter itself. Moreover, in the wake of technological progress, the clear line of demarcation between the analog and digital realms has been progressively disappearing. Consequently, the identity of the contemporary human, along with his/her mind and epistemic apparatus, have undergone alterations by virtue of his/her being within a distinct world that has become the substrate and bedrock of his/her present consciousness. One could assert that the openness and development of cyberspace have fundamentally impacted the manner in which learning, memory, knowledge acquisition, and even the nature of human perceptual faculties occur, engendering momentous transformations within this domain. Thus, contemplation and discernment regarding the epistemological transitions that have ensued from the advent of this space are entirely necessary and inescapable.

One of the most significant epistemological characteristics of cyberspace, which has resulted in a profound metamorphosis in the processes of learning, memory, knowledge acquisition, and even the nature of human perceptual faculties, can be identified as follows: a transformation in the mechanisms of information categorization; a shift from reading textual material to browsing through visual displays; a substitution of mere information for genuine knowledge; a modification in the criteria for the truth of beliefs; an alteration in the pattern of justification of  beliefs; a blurring of the distinction between the real and the virtual; an expansion of knowledge acquisition driven by society-based; and a fundamental shift in the epistemic responsibilities borne by individuals. The epistemological shifts and transformations occurring within the realm of cyberspace encompass both positive and negative dimensions. On the positive side, these changes encompass the expansive reach of cyberspace audiences, encompassing diverse demographics. Additionally, the ease and rapidity with which information is disseminated to cyberspace audiences, as well as their relatively straightforward access to a wealth of information within this digital realm, are noteworthy. These aspects are regarded as constructive elements of the aforementioned changes and transformations. However, the advent of epistemic relativism, stemming from the substitution of information for genuine knowledge, the alteration in the patterns governing the truth and justification of beliefs, and the absence of definitive criteria for discerning truth from error, all contribute to the negative aspects of these cognitive changes. The diminishing potency of human reasoning and memory, resulting from the unregulated and rule-avoidant nature of cyberspace, coupled with the challenges faced by the human epistemic apparatus that may imperil its inherent well-being, constitute the most salient epistemological predicaments associated with cyberspace domain.

This article aims to review and critique Kant's philosophy of mind, its impact on contemporary philosophy of mind, also its impact and relation to functionalism. Kant's influence on philosophy is based on the answers and methods he uses to explain the mechanism of human knowledge. The Copernican revolution of Kant refers to the change in epistemological direction of the object to the subject, for the correct understanding of the object. This approach has had important effects on contemporary philosophy of mind. Now our goal is to explore some of these effects.

Our study method in this article is evaluate these effects in the field of contemporary philosophy of mind and especially, contemporary functionalism.

Kant attempts to explain the mechanism of human cognition by considering the mind as a structured thing that has some cognitive faculties, including the faculties of sense, understanding, and reason. In brief, the effects of such a mechanism in the contemporary philosophy of mind can be expressed in the following cases: (1) The need for a necessary structure of thought and experience. (2) The relationship between certain forms of consciousness and self-consciousness; and (3) excluding the Cartesian self. (4)The separation between sense and understanding is considered as the rise of the subjective matter from a physical foundation, and it indicates the hard problem of consciousness, that is, experience or phenomenal consciousness.

It is not possible to see the influence of Kant's philosophy of mind on the contemporary philosophy of mind as answers or even solutions, but as a way of thinking about problems. Kant's solutions have two characteristics, disregarding them will lead to a misunderstanding of his philosophy. First, Kant has expressed his philosophy of mind in a transcendental form. Taking him out of his vital form certainly leaves some of the most significant aspects of his philosophy behind. Secondly, his approaches are presented in a historical context. For instance, we should consider Kant's statement on the structures of the mind to be a metaphysical mechanism, and his perspective on causation is basically meaningful in a historical context. Admittedly, many of the problems raised in contemporary philosophy were discussed in Kant's philosophy, but the progress and transformation that occurs in these concepts cannot be attributed to Kant. The functionalist interpretation of Kant is possible, but it is in conflict with the most crucial teachings of Kant, which are architecture and the transcendental method. Such a reading excludes many aspects of an individual's mental life, and is based on a purely formal similarity.

The article “New Essentialism and the Extents of Influence of Religion on Sciences” introduces the course of “New Essentialism”, a course that is not acknowledged and at the same time is very important. New Essentialism is a new version of Aristotelian Essentialism and so a new version of essentialism in Islamic Philosophy. This article, on the basis of New Essentialism, pursues to take an essentialist and realist express from sciences, an explanation of co-side of New Essentialism with views of Ostad Mesbah-e Yazdi on sciences and religious science, and to explain the Islamic Humanities on them.This inquiry firms on this realist supposition that knowledge of one thing is the knowledge of essential properties of that thing. Therefore, this inquiry pursues to know sciences by way of essential properties of sciences and to know the Islamic Humanities by way of essential properties of the Islamic Humanities.

The research method in this article is descriptive and the challenges in both approaches have been addressed as much as possible.

The ontology and methodology of New Essentialism are metaphysical and scientifical philosophy bases of this inquiry. That everything has essence and essential properties, and the realities have de facto essences and essential properties, and the credits have de dicto essences and essential properties, they are metaphysical bases of this inquiry. Also, that experiences come together with experience, intellectuals come together with intellect (and when occasion with religious intellectualization), and traditional come together with tradition, they are scientifical philosophy bases of this inquiry.

This inquiry sees that bases to be in agree with views of metaphysical and methodological of Mesbah-e Yazdi, and with those bases, this inquiry enters to treat from sciences one by one and especially the Humanities one by one.Sciences pursue to discovery of essences and essential properties of themselves. Natural sciences pursue to discovery of essences and essential properties of material things, intellectual sciences pursue to discovery of essences and essential properties of incorporeal beings and universal and theological reals, traditional sciences and traditional half of social sciences pursue to discovery of essences and essential properties credit that credited by way of religion or other than religion, and experimental social sciences, namely experimental half of social sciences, pursues to discovery of credit essences and essential properties that human beings credit them during the themselves experimental lifetime. This inquiry, in treat of religious science and the Islamic Humanities, not at all talk of establishing all sciences by way of religion, and not at all talk of polishing or confirming all sciences by way of religion. But this inquiry makes a distinction between sciences and sees message of religion on confirming of some sciences, polishing of some other, and establishing of some other. In appearance of New Essentialism and of essentialism in Islamic Philosophy, experimental sciences come together by way of experience, intellectual science come together by way of intellectual (and when occasion by way of religious intellectualization), and traditional sciences come together by way of tradition. Therefore, religion confirms experimental sciences and pure intellectual sciences, polishing impure intellectual sciences and social sciences, and establishes interior traditional sciences.

Belief upon insufficient evidence is a permanent challenge in the discussion of justification that has been dealt with by different approaches of epistemologists. Clifford, as a representative of extreme rationalism, founded the theory of "agnosticism" based on solid rational and logical foundations while James, as a pioneer philosopher in pragmatism, had a critical outlook on that approach and attempted to solve this challenge by his pragmatic principles and raised the theory of "the will to believe''. Based on the review of philosophical tenets of the above two thinkers, the present article aims to evaluate their propositions and also introduce a new approach in this regard.

In order to access the valid data, library method was used to study, compile, arrange, and classify information relevant to the subject under study and then, research note-taking lists were prepared by comparative classification and thematic coding. For inferencing the results and proposing new ideas, logical analysis was used with a critical and comparative approach.

Clifford who was born in the age of ignorance, superstition, and illusion felt committed to defend rationality as the strongest means to discover truth and warned against consequences of people's avoidance of reason. However, the essence of some epistemological propositions is in a way that it is not feasible to gather definite evidence to make a rational decision. There is no reasonable solution in this term and thus Clifford, regardless of the significance of many propositions that have no sufficient evidence, presents the theory of agnosticism. His doctrine is not only criticized as being inefficient, impractical, and self-contradictory but also underestimates human power. He just acknowledges rational faculty and attributes more power and potential to that than it really has.James acknowledged epistemological, emotional, and theological realms for humans and claimed that the epistemological aspect which is under the control of rational power is a small segment of human existence that is per se a subcategory of the emotional realm. According to his theory, the power of the emotional realm in perception and analysis of epistemological propositions with no evidence is more than that of the rational power. So human endeavor to discover and produce evidence should trust sentimental power, will, and whatever chosen by them. In the next stage, truth recognition can be achieved based on what is trusted. In James' view, the most basic and influential beliefs in human life have no evidence so agnosticism is not only facilitative but also problematic in this regard. He believes that truth and usefulness are compatible with each other and there is no independent reality out of human existence that needs to be discovered by evidence so whatever is favorable, useful, and efficient is considered reality. Accordingly, neither reason per se saves humans from ignorance nor evidence is the only means to discover reality. Instead, what matters is the perception of usefulness and satisfaction. Confusion between truth and usefulness, underestimating the importance of truth to perceiving favorability, indefensible relativism and immersing into illusion are some major critiques to James' ideas.

According to the author's view and by an innovative approach, although a preposition upon insufficient evidence is not claimed to be true, it can be accepted or pretended to be accepted in order to use its results and consequences. Based on this approach, when we confront a proposition that does not have sufficient evidence, we react as if it is accepted and use its practical outcome to fulfill our vital needs. Therefore, we practically act as if there are definite reasons for our performance while theoretically it has no confirmed reasons and no unjustified belief can be claimed as truth. As a result, we neither neglect our basic needs nor consider the accepted or seemingly accepted issues as the reality or truth.

The nature of perception and its types have always been the focus of thinkers of various sciences throughout history. Although this phenomenon is worthy of research from various dimensions in philosophy, what makes the present writing more necessary is to deal with types of perception that are less considered in scientific research.Basically, the exploration of Islamic philosophers In the mentioned subject, presents various types of simple and complex perceptions to the minds, which study their essence, coordinates and examples helps to understand the religious texts and in general to deepen ontological and anthropological studies.Among the Muslim philosophers, Mulla Sadra has been able to deal with the dimensions of this issue more than others with the help of his philosophical foundations. However, it seems that his worthy effort in this field also had some shortcomings. Therefore, the basis of the main question of the present article is what is the detailed analysis of the types of simple and compound perception from Sadra's point of view and what are its shortcomings?

Method of Study:

 We use analytical-rational method in this article.

In a descriptive and analytical approach to Mulla Sadra's opinions, and at the same time expressing the shortcomings of his view on the simple and complex view of Islam, he has assigned the differences and exact coordinates of each set to the explanations.The findings of the research with regard to the teachings of revelation show that with a relative view, all beings can be seen as possessing complex knowledge from one point of view, and from another point of view, they can be distinguished by simple and complex knowledge.The most important examples of simple perception should be considered to be simple perception to the Creator, as well as simple consciousness to the soul. Considering the evidences and religious texts, it is also possible to clearly reveal the composite perception in all creations.

At a relative analysis compared to simple and complex perception as long as the scale of perceptions is considered to be human perception and other beings are considered to have only a material face, simple perception will be considered and other perceptions will be considered simple compared to human perception. Kingdom in every creatureBut if we go beyond the natural world in our analysis and consider other levels of existence in every being, then simple science is meaningless and all the parts of the world are considered to be speaking and alive and the possessor of composite science due to their other dimensions of existence.It is emphasized that what this research is trying to achieve is only the expression of the principle of the " hierarchical of complex perception in the universe" and with the help of some evidences and principles found in Mulla Sadra's works.It is obvious that due to the novelty of the claim, more research is expected and it is hoped that more dimensions of this problem will be revealed in the next research.One of the benefits of this claim is the interpretation of a large number of Quranic verses and religious texts that are understood in the context of complex perception and are believable according to this understanding..

One of the most important branches of cognitive semantics is image schemas. These schemas are proposed by Mark Johnson (1987) in the book “Body in Mind”. According to this theory, Johnson has studied the corporeal knowledge of man. Johnson considered the container, path, and force schemas as the most important schemas. These schemas are considered as a kind of sensory experience. Because they have arisen from the perceptual mechanisms of sense and connect the world of the mind to the outside world. This mechanism has a high function due to the objectification of abstract concepts in religious texts. Regarding this purpose, the present study using Johnson schemas in cognitive linguistic approach examines the story of Prophet Ibrahim (AS) because of its importance on different parts of life, such as religious topics, the existence of God, how to deal with enemies and belief in resurrection, confidence and trust in God. Although few researches have addressed these issues outside of cognitive linguistics. Therefore, the current study answers the following questions according to the story of Prophet Ibrahim (AS) in the Holy Quran and Johnson's linguistic theory:1.In what conceptual frequency are image schemas presented in the Quranic story of Prophet Ibrahim (AS)? Which types of image schemas has the greatest contribution in conveying the concepts and accurate understanding of the verses of the story of Prophet Ibrahim (AS)?

To answer the research questions, the image schemas of the story of Prophet Ibrahim (AS) have been discussed using the descriptive-analytical method. In the current study, all the verses of this story have been examined and they were adapted to the Johnson's three schemas (container, path, and force). Then, each verse has been placed in its own image schemas. At the end, the table and diagram of the relevant schemas were drawn.

“Considering the obtained results, from the total number of verses in the story of Prophet Ibrahim (PBUH), the path schema has the largest number of verses compared to the container and force schemas. Then the highest frequency was for force and container schemas, respectively.

In the story of Prophet Ibrahim (PBUH), container schemas were used to convey different concepts such as: fear and torment. The concepts of dealing with polytheists and receiving rewards for obedience and servitude were drawn with a path schemas. Also, concepts such as going astray and surrendering to the divine command have been displayed with the help of force schemas.