نشریه متافیزیک
سال چهارم شماره 1 (پیاپی 13، بهار و تابستان 1391)

Although the correspondences between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia (1618–80) and René Descartes cover a vast range of philosophical topics, their discussions were mainly focused on what has become one of the most central issues in contemporary philosophy—the mind-body problem. Elizabeth had identified a fundamental anomaly in the interaction between mind and body, and she asked her question as follows: “How can the human soul, which is only a thinking substance, determine the movements of the animal spirits in order to perform a voluntary action? …. You exclude extension completely from your concept of the soul and, it seems to me, it is incompatible with being an immaterial thing.” In this article, we first provide an overview of the philosophical issues engaged in these correspondences, along with some essential background for understanding such issues. Finally, some attempts will be done to deal with Elizabeth's own philosophical position and her influence on Descarte's system of thought.

Sadr-ol-Motaalehin has looked at the sensory perception from multiple perspectives and, therefore, presented inconsistent views. The aim of this research is to analyze the relation between these ideas. Thus, his discussions are studied in two steps. First, his famous view, that is, the creativity of the percipience, is considered and it is tried to introduce some thoughts of Mulla Sadra as influencing parameters on this view. Also, his theory that considers these perceptions as Being is introduced and, after pointing to some of its fundamentals, probable accessories of it such as: solving the problems of subjective being, unity of the perceiver and the perceived, the conformity of the perception with the Worlds and self-evident Knowledge are investigated. After looking deeply into this attitude, it is revealed that each of these accessories is also a theory by itself and leads to other views. Therefore, there is a kind of solidarity and concomitance between these ideas. In the second step, compatibility or incompatibility of theories such as Emanation (Efaze) from the World of Command, observation of Ideal Forms and Descent of the Soul in this position is investigated systematically. How is it possible that one perception is created simultaneously out of the creativity of the Soul, emanated by Donor, being the result of observation of the incorporeal characters (Tabaye) through the Ideal and intellectual senses and created with the descent of Perceiver Soul to the level of Nature and the corporeal senses? These are the main issues studied in this research in detail.

Negative theology is a modern theological approach that idiomatically implies those theological doctrines which are based on the negative premises and concepts for describing God. Among Greeks, this approach was on its climax in Neo-Platonism. Proclus is one of the Neo-Platonists who lived in fifth century (A.D) and was in charge of Athena academy for years. He was the most important Neo-Platonist after Plotinus. In his philosophical system, on the one hand, it is impossible to recognize the first source and, on the other hand, the existence of some principles like the relationship between the creator and the universe, reversion and the way of emanation receiving, requires the knowledge of the first source. It seems that such paradox can be resolved by separating the stages of existence order.

The problem of gradation in being is one of the fundamental debates in philosophy. Some Muslim philosophers have accepted the gradation and some have denied it. By comparing the ideas of Muslim thinkers, the present article tries to examine Mirfendereski’s peculiar idea on this issue and by presenting valid arguments, it proves that, in spite of common opinions about him, he believed in gradation in being.

Peter Demianovich Ouspensky, in line with continuing and deepening Kant’s view on time and place, while accepting the mental and illusive nature of time and place and incomplete understanding of human beings about the entirety of place, considers the feeling of time as a result of limitations of the human mind for perceiving the ‘Fourth Dimension’. On the basis of this, time would be the barrier of place feeling in a creature with certain psychological and physiological structures. Parallel with the expansion of the creatures’ cognitive insight and awareness, the characteristics and dimensions of their place, as well as their understanding of temporal phenomena, change. From this point of view, movement and matter, as logical concepts, are nothing but projections of the passive and active states of our minds in the framework of the three-dimensional world. This innovative and worth-contemplating viewpoint, while being congruent with some of our intuitive and deductive concepts, gets entangled in a type of ontological vicious circle in defining the barriers of place since it does not present any irrefutable reason for the end of the place dimension in certain barriers.

As a Golden Law, Kant’s “Categorical” is a concept which is rooted in the history of human thought. This principle which has the most important role in regulating the social relations in the world’s nations and its traces can be found in all religious and humane schools and branches, is stated and explained by Kant in a short sentence: “Always follow a rule that you will it to be a general law”. This rule underpins an important ethical school which is known as “Obligationism”. Although this school has attracted many scholars of ethics philosophy, there are also many critiques against it. This article aims to study and analyze “the critique of maximal categorical” in such school with regard to Islamic ethics in order to show that the attempts of those who have tried to prove the compatibility of this rule with Islamic ethics are in vain and lead to no result.