فصلنامه پژوهش های فلسفی - کلامی
سال دوازدهم شماره 4 (پیاپی 48، تابستان 1390)

Conjecture, refutation, priority of theory to observation, verisimilitude and realism are the principal elements of refutability approach. Restating these elements, this paper is going to show some of its internal inconsistencies and argue that if observation wouldn’t play a positive role in making theory, there is no guarantee for verisimilitude to be achieved. Besides, it makes clear that some statements of priority of theory to observation are inconsistent with realism. And finally, it will be stated that the Popperian approach involves a kind of deep skepticism.

Most of philosophers who studied the “meaning of life” philosophically regarded it as the “goal of life”. Given that God and his actions are right and true, Tabatabaei considered God to be purposeful in creating man. Therefore the creation of man is not vain and for fun but is targeted toward a certain goal. Man was born without any choice, but he is free to continue his life. Hence he must find out his goal and ideal. Whereas all things met with human life such as fellowman, nature, other worlds and the futures are under God’s providence and lordship, it is reasonable and beneficial for man to act upon God’s advises in choosing his goal. Doing so, man will be helped by all aforementioned things to approach his ideal and will be satisfied with his life. Otherwise we will be in contrast to the general trend of creation and thus our lives become very hard and finally he will be defeated by them and pass a wretched life. The final ideal of man in his life must be the achievement of real and pleasant life, an ideal which all prophets have invited us to reach to.

In a priori knowledge we find out not only subject - predicate relationship, but we also discover the necessity of the predication and this is one of the most significant differences between a priori and a posteriori knowledge Kant has taken metaphysical, physical and mathematical propositions as a priori, basically due to the necessity they involve and as to the source of discovering necessity, he presented intuition. This paper deals with different interpretations of a priori knowledge at first, then advances Kripke’s criticisms concerning the concomitance between necessity and apriori knowledge. Then in continue lays stress on this point that as a priori knowledge cannot resort to the experience, likewise it cannot violate a priori knowledge.

Are there any obstacles in the process of gaining knowledge? This is one of the most important questions raised in contemporary epistemology. For the first time it was William James, the famous American philosopher and psychologist, who draws his attention to this question. In his famous paper, “The Will to Believe”, he shows that despite the idea that our beliefs are usually based on reason, it is non-epistemological factors belonging to our non-rational natures that always shape our beliefs. In other words, James claims that our emotional-volitional nature formed by our interests, affections, fears and hopes, desires, demands, dreams etc. effects our beliefs. Of course, his claim is not only about the negative effects of these factors. Sometimes he considers following the emotional-volitional nature as an epistemic right of human among others, and this point shows the positive impact of the nonintellectual spheres on intellectual realm. This paper discusses the impact of the non-intellectual realm on knowledge according to James view points.

The relation between reason and religion has been an important issue among theologians and philosophers. After becoming familiar with Greek rationalism, some Muslims opposed it, because they took rationalism as a foreign cultural product. Far-sighted Muslims, on the contrary, welcomed it. They believed that rationalism and the basic principles of religion are not opposed. And regarding the cases they saw conflict between reason and religion, they reinterpreted the religious issues as far as possible and if it was impossible, they would prefer the revelation. They believed that reason, like the revelation, is a God-given gift and both of them are originated from one source. Moreover, they believed that rationalism is not a Greek product, because before acquaintance with Greek philosophy, Muslims were dealing with rational topics such as compulsion and choice, decree and destiny, intermediate position, faith and infidelity etc. On the other hand, they believed that there are rational elements in the essence of religion which must be interpreted and explained. Farabi is among prominent Muslim philosophers who believed in harmony between reason and religion. This paper tries to explain his view on this regard.

According to Descarte, man is an autonomous being whose essence is thought. God is also taken as “pure thought” which plays an epistemological role in his philosophy. God is merely a creature and a guarantee for the continuity of nature’s mechanical rules. In other words, He is the same as the nature and rules. Man, in this mechanical world, is merely a machine possessing, unlike other creatures, a soul but yet alongside other things is only a creature of God. God has created man and left him to himself. Like the stable rules of the world, man is simply a rule of this natural aimless world. On the basis of Tabatabaei's perspective, Cartesian man is an abrogated one which is alienatedfrom his identity. One of the important issues concerning anthropology in the west, particularly in modern age, is the discussion about the essence of man and its relation to God as the origin of the world and the absolute reality. The main theme of this research is to examine the relation of man to God according to Descartes’ philosophy and then to criticize it in line with Tabatabai’s viewpoint.

From near the end of eighteenth century, the scholars’ mentality toward the Bible was greatly changed. Before this time, thinking about the Bible was under the authority of church doctrines. But the increasing dissatisfaction of the way ecclesiastical authorities use the Bible, the growth of deism, and the aggressions of enlightenment end to a new age of criticism. The critics addressed the Bible as a human work and a product belonged to an age of human history. They examined it carefully, and challenged almost all aspect of it. Their views about the real authors of the book, its contradictory matters, and historical, scientific and geographical errors cause its position to be declined. Those Christians who considered the Bible as an infallible book guiding humans to happiness tried to find out some general or particular solutions to answer objections. Introducing the critical movement of the Bible and its results, this paper will classify all solutions under four titles: superficiality of contradictions, the analogical interpretation, the original copy and unlawfulness of criticizing the Bible.

The philosophy of religion as a discipline has no long history. Explaining various dimensions of philosophy of religion, this paper tries to distinguish it from apologetic, contemporary and ancient theology. The definition of philosophy and religion determine the definition of philosophy of religion and given their various definitions, the philosophy of religion has different definitions. The accepted definition of philosophy of religion in this paper is as follow: a rational activity aimed to justify or reject the main doctrines of religion and their consistency with each other, and to evaluate them critically.

The proof of truthful ones, which is taken as the most forceful argument in this regard, has different readings. Tabatabai has offered the last one. Explaining this reading, we proceed to mention some critical points. The first one is that the rejection of objective reality doesn’t lead to the approval of “objective reality”; it just invokes a reality which can be a conceptual being. The second point is that in the last premise of the proof which is theoretical, “all reality” is understood as the “the Absolute Reality” (the Necessary Being). This issue is not only inconsistent with his claim, but also calls the proof into question. The third one is that assuming the validity of his reading in proving absolute reality and its being in itself, it lacks a clear explanation to prove its being for-itself. And finally, mediation of the world and the passing world (namely the observation of non-being) in his reading of the proof, while all its mediations supposed to be merely ontological, doesn’t meet with the title of the proof: truthful ones. Thus, even if we accept the validity of his reading and its ability to prove the absolute reality and its being in itself and for itself, it cannot be called the proof of truthful ones.