۱.
کلیدواژهها:
Hologram Universality superpositions History retroactivity
In recent quantum mechanics, the notion of hologram plays an important role: the image of an object which catches not only its actual state but also its interference pattern with other options that were lost when the actual state imposed itself. It is very productive to apply this notion to human history, and, perhaps the supreme example of holographic history is provided none other than by Marx. Marx is not an evolutionist, he writes history “top-down,” i.e., his starting point is the contemporary global capitalist order, and from this point he reads the entire history as a gradual approximation to capitalism. This is not teleology: history is not guided by capitalism as its telos, but once capitalism emerges, it provides the key to the entire (pre)history – here enters Marx’s well-known story (in Grundrisse) of linear development from prehistorical societies through Asiatic despotism, Antique slavery, and feudalism to capitalism. There is no teleological necessity in this development, it results from a series of contingent collapses of superpositions
۲.
کلیدواژهها:
Plato Hegel Reason Idea form
Hegel uses a Platonic terminology, though in German, to explain his understanding of God in philosophy. As such, it is of interest, whether the usage of the terms rather describes a 19th century reading of Plato or whether it explains a unique understanding of God. The author argues that Hegel’s explanation of God as Geist is Platonic because, for Plato, reason is ultimately connected to the Divine; thus, the logistikon possesses a spiritual dimension. On the other hand, Hegel derives the divine attributes from the Bible where God is described as the logos. By combining these two teachings, Hegel uniquely emphasizes the special importance of reason as a reference point to reality. The Biblical-Platonic notion of reason as appearance in the finite which can never be dissolved or distinguished from reason in the infinite is brought to light in Hegel’s philosophy.
۳.
کلیدواژهها:
Unity soul Plato Rational Part Moral Condition
In my study, I investigate aspects of Plato’s analysis of the kinds of unity of the individual soul. The text to which I shall refer in my essay is Plato’s Republic. Throughout Plato’s Republic, the soul is represented as a composite entity. Since any soul is composed of different parts, namely the rational part, the spirited part and the appetitive part, the soul can have different developments. On the one hand, the parts of the soul are given; on the other hand, the development of the parts of the soul is not given but depends on education and on the influence exercised by society. Thus, the kinds of unity of the individual soul can be different from each other depending on the part of the soul which leads the whole soul. Only the unity produced by the rational part corresponds to a morally healthy condition of the soul, whereas the prevalence of the other parts brings about unhealthy conditions of the soul.
۴.
کلیدواژهها:
Rutger Bregman Hobbes Kant Rousseau Human Nature dignitarianism humanism
This essay is a critical study of Rutger Bregman’s 2020 book, Humankind: A Hopeful History, from a broadly Kantian point of view. I present and defend the main points and arguments of the book, and on that basis, articulate a doctrine in social and political philosophy, which I call realistic-optimist dignitarian humanism, aka RODH, that I think captures the essence of what Bregman is driving at. Among its various theoretical and practical virtues, RODH gets constructively and creatively between Hobbes’s excessive pessimism about human nature on the one hand, and Rousseau’s unrealistic optimism about human nature on the other.
۵.
کلیدواژهها:
Africa African Traditional Religion religion Westernization
This paper explores the nature of African religion and the role of the role of Western misconception in influencing it. Historically, African religion has served as a yardstick of the values, principles, and philosophies that shape the daily lives and ethical frameworks guiding the African societies. It embodies a unique belief system, a reverence for a Supreme Being, and a deep connection to community and nature, among many others. However, the advent of Western institutional religion significantly altered this dynamic. Western thought systems often dismissed African religious practices as fetishistic, primitive, and inhumane among many other negative attributes, thereby marginalizing their religious practices and replacing them with Western Christian practices. Hence, this influence has as a result alienated and marginalizing the African people from their indigenous religion, which as well alters their Identity. Ironically, these Western practices promoted values and principles similar to those inherent in African philosophy but classified superior, so as to strip the Africans of their identity for easy control. In it on this note that this seminar paper critically examines these narratives, highlighting the authenticity, richness, and sanctity of African religion. With the intension of exposing the original nature of African religion, employing the method of conceptual and critical analysis, this seminar paper argues that African religion, far from being fetishistic embodies the totality of the reality of the African people; it is a sophisticated embodiment of moral principles, belief systems, spirituality, and a deep connection to the world.
۶.
کلیدواژهها:
Hume’s Guillotine Is-Ought Problem Naturalism moral philosophy John Searle
This paper undertakes a comprehensive examination of Hume's Guillotine, a perennial problem in moral philosophy first identified by David Hume. The central objective of this inquiry is to explore potential solutions to this conundrum, grounded in a naturalistic framework. The paper is divided into four sections. The paper provides an overview of general naturalistic claims in ethics, establishing the foundational context for the subsequent discussion, delves into the 'is-ought' problem, a fundamental challenge in moral philosophy, and examines Hume's perspective on this issue & presents a critical analysis of various naturalistic approaches to addressing the 'is-ought' problem, with a focus on their strengths and limitations. The paper concludes with a synthesis of the key findings, offering a philosophical reflection on the implications of naturalistic solutions to Hume's Guillotine with special reference to John Searle
۷.
کلیدواژهها:
Zarathustra Buddha Nietzsche superman Nihilism
The profundity of an idea, philosophy, or doctrine is often revealed by how it is accepted or rejected by others. Buddhist philosophy demonstrates this dynamic in its reception in the West. There are several illuminating perspectives on how Nietzsche interpreted Buddha, and on how these interpretations were received in both the West and the East. The claim that Nietzsche misinterpreted Buddha—similar to the way Schopenhauer and others interpreted Indian philosophical traditions—often overshadows Nietzsche’s more sympathetic engagement with Buddhism. However, the questions that concerned both thinkers cannot be fully addressed or resolved within a single generation, nor can we easily simplify their shared concerns. This paper focuses on critics’ portrayals of Nietzsche as having misinterpreted Buddha. Amidst various philosophical and existential issues, the paper seeks to foster a degree of sympathy for Nietzsche, and thus for Buddha as well, by exploring their concepts of ‘impermanence’ in relation to suffering and the relief from suffering. The shared element is the imperative ‘to overcome’: for Nietzsche, this concerns humanity; for Buddha, it concerns the self. The underlying hypothesis is that Gautama Buddha may be seen as Nietzsche’s Overman (Übermensch).
۸.
کلیدواژهها:
Heart Western philosophy affective states Stoicism Objective Values
The heart is the moral and affective center of the person, and plays a crucial role in spirituality. I examine the work of Dietrich von Hildebrand on the heart, in particular his call to restore the heart after its millennia-long neglect by Western philosophy. Von Hildebrand accounts for the neglect of the heart in terms of a Stoicism that views it as non-intentional, i.e. as disclosing nothing about reality. Instead of responding to objective values, the heart delivers an internal turbulence that distracts from the intellectual task of cognizing what is truly good. Stoicism reduces affective states to a preliminary sensation (propatheia) and a propositional belief that the intellect must evaluate. There is no disclosive capacity intrinsic to affective states that is untranslatable to intellectual propositions. Stoics stress conformity to an objective teleology of the person rather than feeling, through the cultivation of logic. The Epicurean embraces the opposite extreme, giving internal sensations of pleasure and pain pre-eminence over logic. Feeling pleasure supersedes any conformity to an objective standard. The binary of Stoicism and Epicureanism is a lens to understand the neglect of the heart, and to restore the heart. The heart both generates internal sensations, but also provides an evaluative disclosure of reality that is not translatable to intellectual propositions, and so the heart can unite both the objective and subjective domains emphasized by Stoicism and Epicureanism.
۹.
کلیدواژهها:
Vico Hobbes Aquinas sensus communis dialogical comunication
This article examines E. Sergio’s studies on the concept of sensus communis as developed by Giambattista Vico, highlighting its historical and philosophical significance. The analysis positions Vico as a pivotal figure bridging medieval and modern thought: he inherits the intellectual legacy of the past while reinterpreting its core elements through a distinctly modern sensibility. Within this framework, sensus communis emerges as a key concept for understanding human social action—a perspective that, drawing from Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas (whose approaches modernity often rejects), finds its fullest expression in Vico’s system. By privileging language as a primary mode of communication, Vico is shown to transcend the Hobbesian conception of human nature specifically through the lens of sensus communis.
۱۰.
کلیدواژهها:
Meditation practice Thoughts morality Divinity Mind-body interaction healing
This paper explores how human thoughts shape individual realities across different contexts and concepts. Individuals develop unique thought patterns based on sensory perceptions, past experiences, and anticipated futures derived from collective lived experiences. The layering and accumulation of these diverse thought patterns presents a significant challenge for those seeking to achieve “a state of thoughtlessness”—a state that many spiritual traditions associate with divine connection. The research examines how thought patterns influence moral frameworks within society, demonstrating that negative thought cycles often produce corresponding negative outcomes in behavior and decision-making. Meditation emerges as a critical practice for analyzing and deconstructing these thought patterns, particularly negative ones that impede moral development. Through systematic meditation practices, individuals can progressively strip away layers of “wandering thought” to ultimately reach a thoughtless state where authentic moral decision-making becomes possible. Drawing from ancient philosophical traditions, this study investigates three specific methodologies—assimilation, reduction, and surrender—as pathways toward thoughtlessness and divine connection. Various meditation techniques will be examined, with particular emphasis on how these practices contribute to the cultivation of moral behavior, by working on the cognitive and affective processes of mind, and ultimately, the experience of transcendence. By examining the interconnectedness between thought dissolution, meditation practice, and moral development, this research offers insights into accessing higher states of consciousness and authentic living.
۱۱.
کلیدواژهها:
Analogy Equivocity Imago Dei Theological Language Univocity
The following article discusses the problem of univocity in theology. It considers the classical dilemma that univocal terms used of God and human beings compromise God’s mystery while terms used equivocally of each compromise knowledge of God. One solution is that all terms used of both are analogous. Critical arguments against univocity, equivocity, and analogy are considered. Modern analysis of analogy identifies significant problems with the theory, prompting reconsideration of arguments against univocity since equivocity holds no promise for theological knowledge. Our thesis is that these arguments have plausible responses and propose a way of conceiving univocity in theology.
۱۲.
کلیدواژهها:
induction Deduction Syllogism Greco-Islamic Averroë Aristotle liminal medieval
This article examines a particularly influential development in medieval political philosophy. This development ensued during the liminal period of the late medieval era’s transition to the modern era. In the Greco-Islamic tradition of this transition, the Arab philosopher and theologian Averroës (Ibn Rushd) wrote insightful commentaries on the works of logic in Aristotle’s Organon. From his scholarly studies, Averroës developed a unique approach to advancing the use of inductive logic in dialectical syllogisms. Among his discoveries, Averroës had identified a rather vague reference in one of Aristotle’s works that suggested the possibility of modifying the logically deductive structure of demonstrative syllogisms. After further reflection on Aristotle’s reference, Averroës developed the possibility of an “inductive turn” to transform the syllogistic structure of deductive logic into the syllogistic structure of inductive logic. Averroës contended that an interchange of the major premise with the conclusion of a logically deductive structure of a demonstrative syllogism would result in the transformation of the logically deductive structure into a logically inductive structure and thus into a dialectical syllogism. By the end of the liminal period, Averroës’s inductive turn had been influential with many scholars in the Latin West, including Christian theologian Thomas Aquinas, analytical philosopher John Buridan in his approaches to understanding science, and the acceptance of the hypothetico-deductive analyses of natural philosophy of Francis Bacon and Thomas Hobbes.
۱۳.
کلیدواژهها:
Matthew of Acquasparta Franciscans Intellect soul Body Gnoseology Anthropology
The present study addresses the problem of the relationship between mind and body in the thought of the Italian Franciscan philosopher Matthew of Acquasparta (1240–1302). In Question 10 of the Questions on Faith and Knowledge, titled “Whether the Intellect, with Regard to Its Act, Is Bound by the Weakness and Ineptitude of the Body,” Matthew argues that bodily dispositions influence the actuality of the intellect. His reflection is guided by various authorities (auctoritates), foremost among whom is Augustine of Hippo, a general point of reference that the thinker of Acquasparta adopts for his theorization. However, Matthew develops a rigorous line of reasoning in which Aristotle—through whom he also implicitly reinterprets Augustine—as well as Avicenna and al-Ghazālī play crucial roles. The Franciscan philosopher maintains that the body can distract the intellect from properly exercising its function, impairing both the soul’s inward focus and the tranquility required for intellectual activity due to external disturbances. Furthermore, the compromised sensory organs of a sick, aged, or wounded body will provide confused images to the mind, thereby clouding its capacity for understanding. The strong connection between body and mind clarifies the unity of the human person as a composite of soul and body, with significant implications both in anthropology and soteriology, particularly concerning the prospect of the unity between the soul and a finally glorified body, which Christian doctrine awaits in the resurrection at the end of time.
۱۴.
کلیدواژهها:
Badiou Lacan truth Event Void Discourse structure
Truth, ethics, and Evil are significant concepts for philosophy and Alain Badiou attempted to approach them with a new perspective. However, he reconsidered these concepts in engagement with Lacanian psychoanalysis. This study aims to shed light more on Badiou’s ideas of situation, knowledge, event, void, truth, Evil, and ethics, with a focus on meeting points with Lacanian terms and theory. The first six terms are examined concerning Lacanian theory of four Discourses in order to represent how truth changes a situation and frameworks of knowledge through the appearance of the event and in what way a philosopher or analyst can approach them through truth-procedures. On the other hand, Badiou elaborates on Evil with respect to ethics and truth. This study also introduces neurosis, pervert, and psychosis as structures to analyze Evil since they might be involved in it as simulacrum, betrayal, and disaster, respectively. Ultimately, this exploration contributes to a deeper understanding of the complexities of truth, ethics, and Evil, emphasizing the need for critical inquiry and ethical reflection in navigating the challenges of a situation and knowledge.
