نادیا مفتونی

Developing the empirical method based on observation and experiment, Alhazen is considered the greatest Muslim physicist and the most significant figure in the history of optics between antiquity and the seventeenth century. Inventing a camera obscura, Alhazen rebuilt our conception of eyesight. His theory of vision was enormously prominent and much of our understanding of optics and light is based upon his groundbreaking discoveries. He began his criticism of emission by describing what happens when people are exposed to bright lights. No matter what the light source, the effect of bright lights was always the same. What this indicates to Alhazen is that light entering into the eye from an external source had some serious function in eyesight. Respecting observation, experiment and empirical method, Suhrawardi, the father of Illumination School, argues all theories of vision and rejects them just by mere reasoning. Suhrawardi validates his own Illuminationist method by scientists’ empirical method. So, I will argue, he is not to deny empirical aspect of Alhazen’s theory of vision. In an allegory, I will use the camera, representing the whole process of a human vision, while I use “beyond camera” for the embodiment that allows for the unfolding of a human soul’s position in the process of vision. What Alhazen is speaking of, we might call the process within the camera; while what Suhrawardi is speaking of, we could name the process behind the camera.

Maintaining strong flavor of Aristotelian theory of perception, Farabi as well as Avicenna have appended new phases to the theory. Depicting imaginary perception with its crucial jobs, Farabi explains these three activities: storing sensory forms, composing and decomposing sensory forms, as well as imagery. What Farabi names the imaginary faculties, is conceptualized as three inner perceptions, i.e., imagination, estimative and memory faculties in Avicenna’s works. Evolving existing theories of perception, Avicenna delivers an account of five inner perceptions. Beforehand Farabi did not consider any difference between imaginary perception and motekhayelah. However, he mentioned one faculty doing both activities and was usually calling it motekhayelah and sometimes imaginary perception. Conceptualizing imaginary perception with its functions, Farabi deals with three primary activities: storing sensory forms, composing and decomposing sensory forms, and imagery. In other words, Avicenna defines what Farabi calls the imaginary faculties as three inner perceptions, i.e., imagination, estimative and memory faculties.

Ibn Ṭufayl and Kierkegaard share existentialist elements around nature. Ibn Ṭufayl believes in nature as the best teacher of philosophy and philosophical reasoning. For Kierkegaard, being human means being dependent on and embedded in nature. This makes Kierkegaard a highly relevant interlocutor for contemporary Eco philosophy and ecocriticism. Ibn Ṭufayl’s opinion on the subject is discernible in his novel called Ḥayy Ibn Yaqẓān. Pursuing the truth of life, Ḥayy, the main personage of Ibn Ṭufayl’s novel, finds his way through four travels of mind. Nature is the context of his travels, so determined to protect nature, Ḥayy takes considerable care of fauna and flora as he steps into the highest levels in his ascent. In the first travel, Ḥayy begins from nature from which is created and in which is raised by a roe mother. In the second travel, he figures out all of natural affairs insofar as becoming a leading scientist. In the third travel resulted in the former travel, Ḥayy becomes successful in philosophical analysis. In the fourth travel, Ḥayy goes forward with philosophical analysis and reaches mystical level. The mystical experiences go on so that through all natural beings and events Ḥayy conveys to God. In this last pace, Ḥayy returns to nature and becomes a nature protectionist. At the end of story, Ḥayy faces a religious stranger showed up from another island. Ḥayy finds his beliefs thoroughly in accordance with his own opinions.

Rationality or relativity? In which one does Farabi believe? How does it relate to imagination and the permanent, if at all? For Farabi, people come to grasp rational truths mostly through the use of their imagination. Furthermore, the arousal of people’s feelings and emotions often originates in their imagination via imagery forms. The ultimate utopian goal is to drive the public to achieve rational happiness. Since the public, based on their nature and general habits, in effect cannot perceive the rational truths, the path to rational happiness must be represented via their imagination. Moreover, their imaginary concepts and forms should be made the permanent. So bringing rational happiness to people's minds through their imagination, the media of each society should represent rational truths through the sensory and imagery forms familiar to that society. The Farabian theory of cognition shares aspects of relativity as well as rationality. To Farabi, rational truth and rational happiness is fixed and one, having only one denotation, while its connotations, say, images and imagery forms are various and sundry. That being the case, different communities can have different ways to perceive the same truth, working toward the same goal.

Economic punishments and sanctions have been used against the Islamic Revolution of Iran as well as some other countries. But their efficacy is usually in dispute among politicians and economists. Current research reports the results of a randomized experiment that seeks to identify the cause of the failure of broad political punishments and sanctions. Most sanctions and political punishments are ultimately employed as a psychological-economic device. They are meant to adversely affect the opinion of the people of a country, thereby putting pressure on the government to change course. We propose and empirically test the hypothesis that a reduction of welfare has a different effect when it is attributed to an out-group versus an in-group agent. We find that when economic failure is believed to have been brought about by an outsider, it actually solidifies the position of the leader. There is, moreover, no statistically significant difference in the reactions across sexes. The study draws on insights from the sociology of group identity to propose an answer to an old question in political economy. There is, moreover, no statistically significant difference in the reactions across sexes. The study draws on insights from the sociology of group identity to propose an answer to an old question in political economy.

Does it sound plausible to obtain a strategy for global peace in Farabi’s political philosophy? Put another way, could we procure a common language leading to peace among all cultures and religions, according to Farabi? Farabi’s utopia (al-madīnat al-fāḍila), literally meaning ‘the excellent state’, consists of five levels. On the first level stands the philosopher (fīlsūf) or the prophet (nabī). The second level includes poets (shuʿarā), music composers (mulaḥḥinūn), writers (kuttāb) and the likes. Farabi strongly believes in the power of imagination (khīyāl) and that most people are under the influence of their imaginative faculty (al-quwwat al-mutakhayyila). This faculty has an important outcome which influences his view on religion (milla), prophet, and their relation with the public (jumhūr): imagination, in his view, is the most powerful tool of influencing the public. Regarding this principle, it could be concluded that there is a shared function between the poet and the prophet. Farabian theory of peace may well be identified, based on the shared function between the poet and the prophet. In other words, for Farabi rational truth and rational happiness is fixed and one, having only one denotation, while its connotations, that is, sensory images and imagery forms are more than one—possibly many more. That being the case, various and sundry cultures and religions might well have different ways to pursue the same knowledge, truth, and contentment.

Abu Nasr Farabi focuses on influence of the music on emotions and emotional problems including extreme emotions and moods. But how effective is music in changing a specific emotional issue? This essay reports what is probably the first scientific study of the effect of music on a precise extreme mood. Using a randomized experiment, we measure how a music affects sexism. More specifically, the experiment measures the extent to which a piece of music that we have created weakens the belief among some Muslims that women are not as suitable as men for positions of chairmanship. We find that the music reduces sexism by 22.48 percent, compared to a control treatment that presents the same argument and story verbally. Results, moreover, indicate that prejudice against women is not an inherent feature of Islam and is rather a function of the descriptive beliefs that prevail in some Islamic societies regarding women’s capabilities.

The law legitimate power. Over the 20th century, constitutions have been an essential part of the dynamic. ‘How can be the Iranian constitution assessed over the long term?’ ‘How do people evaluate their legitimacy?’ ‘Does the issue matter at all for theoreticians at the leading edge of science?’ Iranian revolutionary constitutionalism has an essential role in Bruce Arnold Ackerman's thesis of contemporary legitimacy. Avoiding the pitfalls of Weber's thesis, which accounts for legality to tradition, charisma, and bureaucratic rationality, Ackerman holds that modern notions over the legitimacy based on constitutions. This paper tends to analyze the position of the Iranian revolutionary structure in the mentioned theory. The first scenario in Ackerman's trichotomy is "Revolutionary Constitutionalism," whereas "the insider-establishment providing modest outsiders with strategic concessions" constitutes the second, followed by a third "elite construction constitutionalism." As an example of the first scenario, he mentions the constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran as well as France, Italy, India, and South Africa. While Mao's and Stalin's periods regarded as two negative examples of the thesis, Iranian revolutionary constitutionalism represents positive revolutionary constitutionalism and democratic government.

Considered the second face of Illumination philosophy after the Shaykh al-Ishraq Suhrawardi (1154-1191), Muhammad Ibn Mahmud Shams al-Din al-Shahrazuri (d. after 1288), in most part, hold fast to Suhrawardi’s illuminationist doctrines. As a case study on celestial bodies, the allegiance may well be at question level.The nine celestial spheres and sublunary world held managed by ten separated intelligences. Suhrawardi depicted the celestial spheres in his allegorical works. Suhrawardi usually speaks of eleven symbols, for instance, eleven mountains in “The Red Intellect” and the eleven layers of a basin in “The Sound of Gabriel’s Wing”. But the eleven celestial bodies, including ether and zamharir rule out Divine Pedestal (al-kursi) and Divine Throne (al ’arsh) of Muhyiddin al-Andalusi. Surprisingly, in his mystic work called Kitab al-Rumuz wa-l-Amthal al-Lahutiyya fil-Anwar al-Mujarradat al-Malakutiyya, Shams al-Din al-Shahrazuri nor except in passing has considered the celestial bodies. In al-Rumuz of Shahrazuri, the number of celestial beings has not been mentioned. Speaking of Divine Pedestal (al-kursi) and Divine Throne (al ’arsh) of Ibn Arabi, Shahrazuri does not consider zamharir and ether.