Wisdom and Philosophy
Year:2014 | Volume:10 | Issue:3 (39)|Papers Count:14

Kant, aware of the difficulty of the epistemological rational of religion which brings about religious experience, followed a new path in philosophy and, instead of beginning from the method of obtaining certain knowledge, started from the possibility of certain knowledge. He was deterred by research in the method of certain knowledge, which was the destination of rational religion, and therefore went beyond the epistemological limits. Instead, he went on a search for a foundation regarding epistemology and achieved this feat via a transcendental method. The transcendental method, which in general considers as its axis investigating the possibility of a priori certain epistemology, though it resolved the lacks of epistemology, had its own weaknesses which brought about the protest of Kant followers who, though loyal, breached their promise and though close, put distance between themselves and Kant. Fichte transformed the transcendental method by dialectic, and Schopenhauer, by returning to Barkley, ruined Kant’s transcendental method. The present paper reviews Schopenhauer’s passage through Kant’s method and shows that Schopenhauer, though he accepts Kant’s transcendental conditions, he opposes Kant’s transcendental reasoning, which Kant claims to have derived from purely transcendental sources. He also challenges the self-proclaimed object and the exemplification object and, eventually, chooses Barkley’s direct method in experimental idealism.

When Nietzsche creates a contrast between Heraclitus’s philosophy and philosophical tradition, interprets it based on game and admires it, one must wait for this concept to perform a role in Nietzsche’s own philosophy. After this introduction, we will refer to some of Nietzsche’s thoughts based on which he puts himself in front of the metaphysical tradition, and we will show how these thoughts related to game. Becoming and the necessity of being appropriate, game-oriented view to the world, thought as game, opposing the metaphysical view based on dice games, and a view based on the immaculacy of game in a morality beyond good and evil are all evidences of Nietzsche’s use of this concept to oppose metaphysics. We are also witness to the presence of game in fundamental thoughts such as Will of Power and Eternal Return of the Same. From another viewpoint, the issue of interpreting and understanding Nietzsche's philosophy is still an unraveled mystery. Heidegger's metaphysical interpretation of Nietzsche has overlooked his concept of game in thought, and Jasperes also deems impossible any final interpretation of Nietzsche. But it is Derrida who interprets Nietzsche under the concept of Game of Symbols. In the end, we aim to show how understanding the concept of game in Nietzsche's philosophy can shed light on understanding the gist of his thought.

Hirsch is of the belief that Gadamer’s hermeneutics theory leads to pluralism and relativism. Following romantic hermeneutic scholars, Hirsch believes the aim of reading a text to be achieving the goal of the author. Gadamer, however, believes that understanding is to reach an agreement and compatibility with the other, not to reach his or her intention. Therefore, Hirsch believes that the meaning of text is predetermined and the aim of reading is to discover this meaning. Gadamer, however, believes that meaning is produced as result of dialog between an interpreter and the text, and, therefore, there’s no such thing as a predetermined text. Based on this view, Gadamer regard language and its tools as the conditions of determining meaning, but Hirsch believes that language is merely an instrument of revealing meaning. From another point of view, Hirsch accuses Gadamer of lacking criteria. When meaning is an undetermined concept, there will be no criteria to distinguish correct interpretation from an incorrect one. In this paper, we aim to introduce Hirsch’s three main criticisms against Gadamer and also provide responses to these criticisms based on the views of Gadamer’s advocates.

Regarding Wittgensteinian view towards fideism, two questions have been left unanswered: Firstly, has Wittgenstein explicitly defended fideism? And secondly, can fideism be deducted from his thoughts? In the present paper, after a research into the nature of fideism, it has been shown that relating fideism to Wittgenstein has mostly been based on a special interpretation of part of his Philosophical Investigations. Attention to and reflection in Wittgenstein’s collection of ideas, especially in Culture and Value and Lectures and Conversations shows numerous reasons and evidence exist which reject Wittgenstein’s fideism and can be substituted for the common existing hypothesis. Moreover, it should be remembered that inducing fideism from the distinction between language-game of religion and that of other entities is somehow the mixing of the language-game as meaning and understanding hypothesis and the induction and judgment hypothesis, and, eventually, following the path of religious thinking of Wittgenstein somehow challenges the view of dividing his realms of thought into two periods.

When one hears Ibn Arabi’s name, theoretical mysticism comes to the listener’s mind, and the individual will think that the collection of his famous works revolve around explaining the Islamic mysticism, with subjects such as ecstatic punishment of the Hereafter, the caliphate, the Imamate, government etc. However, after focusing deeply in his works, one understands that subjects of discourse and jurisprudence are mentioned by this author which have been mixed with mystic topics. The subject of punishment in the Hereafter and its being eternal or not is one of the controversial subject in the science of discourse, on which different schools of discourse in Islam have proposed different opinions based on their own mindset. Nonetheless, none of these groups have cast doubt on the eternity of this punishment in Hell for some of the sinner. On the other hand, they have ruled this punishment as certain and have stayed strictly committed to the texts of Quranic verses.Similarly, Ibn Arabi has discussed this subject with a mystic style. However, he has not stayed committed to the hundreds of verses and rational proofs and has clearly opposed the eternality of punishment, the realization of punishment and divine promises regarding these issues. He has also claimed that all humans will eventually enjoy God’s gifts in the eternal Hereafter, though the quality of these gifts differs between those who go to Heaven and those who go to Hell. The author of the present article has criticized Ibn Arabi’s viewpoint and, based on citations from the Quran and rational proofs, has reprobated this perspective.

Not only did Newtonian physics make a fundamental evolution in the realm of physics but the methodology utilized by Newton became the prevalent model for the researchers in the field of natural sciences. The pivotal point in Newtonian methodology is an emphasis on experiment and induction and limiting the realm of science to a phenomenal realm. Emmanuel Kant, due to the brilliant practicality of Newtonian physics, tried to reinforce, from one viewpoint, the theoretical basis of Newtonian physics so that it could stand criticism, and, from another viewpoint, presented the idea of limiting scientific research to the realm of phenomenon in the principle framework of the human cognition’s being limited to the realm of phenomena. Kant efforts towards reinforcing the bases of Newtonian physics are considered as the initial serious and systematic endeavors to create a foundation for the philosophy of science.

Free will, as the most pivotal human feature, on the one hand, has been considered, in the West, as the most fundamental condition of moral responsibility, and, on the other, based on the world being deterministic, has opposed determinism. A group of morality philosophers, believing in this opposition, have given the verdicts of exclusiveness to these two concepts, and another group, aiming to solve or repulse this opposition, have tried, with different methods, to make free will and determinism compatible, and they have proposed different statements regarding compatibility. The most important statement has been put forward by John Martin Fisher who suggests semi-compatibility. In his works, he regards free will in moral responsibility as a guiding control and does not consider alternative possibilities. The example of Frankfurt and other similar ones have been highly useful to Fisher in rejecting alternatives. In this paper, after briefly explaining the example of Frankfurt, Fisher’s semi-compatibility will be elaborated. Eventually, it appears that, although Fisher’s understanding has many advantages compared to other statements of compatibility, his ideas are more inclined toward determinism.