PHILOSOPHICAL INVESTIGATIONS
Year:2009 | Volume:5 | Issue:15|Papers Count:8

How soul perceives universal concepts is one of the epistemological problems that have been discussed by great Islamic philosophers like MullaSadra and Avicenna. These philosophers have offered totally different theories in this respect. Avicenna and his followers believe that soul perceives universal concepts through extraction by omitting accidental things (abstraction theory). This cognition, as he says, is achievable only through a kind of relationship with active intellect .On the other hand, Mullasadra believes that soul can perceive universal concepts not through extraction but through rational laboring and developing particular concepts into universal ones (transcendence theory).

MacIntyre, the contemporary Scottish philosopher, in chapter fifteen of his book, Who’s Justice? Which Rationality? (1988), has developed a theory on rationality that accordingly not only the traditions have not been considered as a treat to rationality but also they are the principal constitutes of rationality. On the one hand, he offered some arguments against relativism and perspectivism and, on the other hand, he didn’t take of rationalists. Later, he became nearer to the rationalist camp in Dependent Rational Animals (1999), but not so near that could be called a full blooded rationalist. This article has a review on this modification of his ideas on rationality.

It is a common view that, most of the elements of Copenhagen interpretation, as the first and the most famous interpretation of quantum mechanics, is rooted historically and philosophically, logical positivism. The aim of this paper is to show that, philosophically, pragmatism supports Copenhagen interpretation more intensively, whether or not the initiators of the interpretation, such as Niels Bohr as the most important figure of the interpretation, were aware of that. We proclaim that some elements of the interpretation, which are consistent with logical positivism, are perfectly supported by pragmatism. Some of these elements are: weak objectivism, senselessness of the concept of “thing in itself”, instrumentalist approaches to theories, and the avoidance to deal with ontological issues irrespective of experiment. Furthermore, and more particularly, it is argued that pragmatism espouses some of other fundamental and important elements of Copenhagen interpretation such as holism, uncertainty principle, and complementarity.

It is, here, presented the two conceptions of human being which are in contrast with each other: postmodern conception of contemporary human being is the first one and the other is the Mulla Sadra’s conception which is based on Islamic text. In postmodern conception, human being is a spiritless body who is narcissistic charm and endeavors to accomplish his pleasures maximally. In the second conception, man is a passenger who has an end and begins to journey from mondial world enthusiastically and moves every moment toward his end. The first conception is the actual model of modern human being and the second is the model of human being as human beings.

This paper is aimed at, first to provide a short background on the history of the concept of phenomenon among the pre Husserl philosophers and second to make a comparative study among Greek philosophers, Kant, Hegel, and Husserl views on this concept. In order to make such comparison, first, their ideas on phenomenon are illustrated and then the similarities and differences of their description about this concept have been articulated. By pointing out the differences and also by concentration on their similarities between these philosophers, I am of the opinion that this concept should study historically. It is followed that we should otherwise distinguish between the concept of phenomenon and phenomenology. The concept of phenomenon among these philosophers is common but the concept of phenomenology is so different. Kant used “phenomenology” as a science in which we can know the appearances of things. Hegel understood phenomenology as a science in which we explain the experience of consciousness, and Husserl claimed that phenomenology is a method for finding out the essence of things in the consciousness.

J. Rawls is the most prominent political philosopher in 20th century. He has two periods in his works and thoughts. Kant has influenced him on first period which is evolved in A Theory of Justice. Kant claims that human being is autonomous, thus every person based on his reason makes choices. The person ought to act only based on his principles which are made choice by himself. In Kant, person’s decision fallowing the desire, rather fallowing the reason which is a clear example of heteronomous. Rawls, in A Theory of Justice, introduces the initial position in which any person is ignorance of his interests. The principle of justice is determined via this position. The person who is in Rawls initial position and veil of ignorance is similar with Kantian autonomous person. Both of them, once, would make decision on principles of justice consider the conditions such as: neutrality, free from interest, autonomy, all in all, in two theories, the principle is selected by rational agents and such agents follow the laws which are selected by themselves.

This paper introduces the sociological approach in studying the Engineering as a social organization and evaluating the relationship between engineering and society. The focus, here, is on qualifying engineering education and training the engineers sensitive to social values. First, I explain the relationship between engineering and society in such extent that interacting each other. Then, it is claimed that the role of engineering is illustrated in details in the modern society rather than the traditional society. Introducing 14 social problems shows that engineering is redefined more irrefrangibly to the social context. It flows that most important achievements of the sociological approach will be educating and training “engineer-sociologist”. The idea engineer-sociologist is preferred as a strategic policy in the engineering education by which is introduced the humanistic, ethical and social values promotion in variety technologies and their applications in artifacts production and development. Teachers and students are the main practitioners in this education and research program. It is thus recognized that interdisciplinary studies of the engineering and sociology as an independent and necessary filed where the social problems of the technologies and the engineering enterprises would be investigated.