فصلنامه نقد و نظر
سال هجدهم شماره 3 (پیاپی 71، پاییز 1392)

The traditional tripartite analysis of knowledge is “Justified True Belief”. On the other hand, the concept of “al-tasdiq al-yaqini” – i.e. propositional certainty- in Avicenna, known as “al-ilm al-yaqini” has components very similar to those of propositional knowledge in current epistemology. According to Avicenna, “al-tasdiq al-yaqini” is the confirmation of the truth of a given proposition in virtue of knowing the necessitating cause of that proposition. Therefore, the cause of the truth of a certain self-evident proposition is inside the proposition, and that of a certain theoretical proposition is something outer. Also in the case of “Tasdiq Al Yaqini”, he has his own explanation of the structure of justification- which is one of the three conditions of knowledge. Justification in Avicenna is an ilk of infallibilism in a way that justified false beliefs are not, in his view, instances of "al-ilm al-tasdiqi".

Simplicity is one of the most important criteria for the evaluation of scientific theories in the philosophy of science. Today some philosophers of religion, such as Swinburne, have retreated from deductive arguments for God and sought to appeal to inductive arguments for theism. Thus they have employed the criterion of simplicity for the evaluation of theism in contrast with rival theories such as naturalism or humanism. In this paper, I criticize such attempts—I have categorized the objections into three groups. There is no doubt that such attempts are still in their beginnings and they might be improved in order to resist the objections.

Considering the scope of the epistemic capacities of intellectual intuitions in Ibn Sina's Oriential Essays (Al-rasaʾil al-mashriqiyya), we seek to show why group of people possess the epistemic capacity of intellectual intuition (and to use Ibn Sina's own words in Risala al-tayr) count as "Brothers of the Truth", and what group of people lack such a capacity. We first seek to identify the addressees of the Oriental stories and then show that in Oriental essays, only the mysticists count as possessors of such an epistemic capacity and the rest of people are ruled out from the domain of the "Brothers of the Truth".

There are works created and being created as works of art that are neither numerable, nor anyone's life is long enough to read, see and listen to all of them. The philosophy of art and aesthetics studies the art and the beautiful with respect to their nature, origin, influences, essential conditions and commitment to the reality of the subject-matter.In this paper, I shall briefly consider philosophical theories concerning art. Tolstoy, Kant, Hegel, Heidegger, and Adorno have adopted various approaches to the art and the beautiful. Some of them take the art to be autonomous, and some take it to be a sensed spirit. Heidegger emphasizes on the appearance of reality in a work of art, and Tolstoy calls the art to a certain mission. A comparative review of these approaches paves the path for an answer to the question whether the art in itself determines the reality in a sensuous form? I defend the view that if the philosophy of art is concerned with works of art and takes them as its criterion, the answer shall be negative. In fact, artists do not listen much to philosophical and aesthetic theorizations. They share their ways of expressing the art, to wit, in addressing the perception, but they remain non-committal in the themes, except in virtue of an outer demand (such as Socialist art). Freedom is the origin of innovation in art. Finally it will remained to be judged by the readers whether we can theorize about the art without concerning ourselves with works of art themselves?

One of the most important issues throughout the history of human thought is religion, and one of the most influential philosophers in the Western tradition is Imanuel Kant. Kant has been influential in many fields, including religion. His religious views have been interpreted in ways that have sometimes been surrounded with misunderstandings. In this paper I will review Kant's philosophical system, showing that his religious thought has two stages: negative and positive. In the First Critique and Prolegomena, Kant presents his epistemological view and seeks to limit the scope of reason in order to find room for religion—this is the negative stage at which he takes the basic notions of God, soul and will to be unprovable by reason, but in the Second Critique, Kant concerns himself with morality—this is the second stage at which he subjects religion to morality. This approach, in my view, has led him to secularism and the suspension of reason in religious matters. Thus, I seek to undermine the principles on which he criticized religion.

While Albert Camus takes human beings to be the only valuable beings, he defines a limited viewpoint and a restricted epistemic scope for them. For Camus, the human reason cannot legitimately deal with some issues, especially the metaphysical world. In his view, the world is absurd and the life of modern humans is worthless and meaningless. With assuming the nonexistence of God, the limits of reason and the absurdity of life, Camus comes to an epistemic horizon that is, in his view, the best way to give meaning to life. In this paper, we review some approaches to the meaning of life, and then formulate Camu's view under 4 theses, and finally we shall criticize his view. The most important foundation of Camu's view is his empiricist, materialist point of view leading to ontological and epistemological limits in human thought. Thus, on the ontological side, Camus has denied the existence of a world beyond the material one, and on the epistemological side, he has denied non-sensuous knowledge. In criticizing his view, we will focus on such foundations.

Imam Khomeini's pan-animism can account for the flow of life, cognition, motion, volition and rationality in all entities in the world, even the solids. Imam's principles about the language of the Quran-according to which words are used for the spirits of meanings, can lead to certain exegetical interpretations establishing the entitie's lives and rationality-they might count as Quranic evidence for his pan-animism. On the other hand, Imam's philosophical and mystical principles, such as the identity of life with knowledge and power, substantial motion, expansive existence (al-wujud al-munbasit), and the flow of love throughout the world underlie his pan-animism.