Journal of Existence and Knowledge
Year:2014 | Volume:1 | Issue:1 |Papers Count:8

An established view may naively regard growth of natural sciences bonded in a predetermined order. In Crisis of European Science, Edmund Husserl suggests a totally different view. Applying a method based on his phenomenology, he tracks back the basic concepts of modern science to their historical origin. Through examining the case of generation of Galilean physics against the background of renaissance period, he offers his unique interpretation of status and meaning of science in modern man’s life. In this paper, I will shed some lights on Husserl’s phenomenological method. I will estimate critically Husserl’s judgment about the role of science in the life of contemporary Human.

Boris Hessen (1893-1936) presented his paper on the role of social and ideological parameters in history of science in which he asserted that Isaac Newton's most famous work was created to cater to the goals and desires of 17th century industry and economy. Hessen asserted that Newton's work was inspired by his economic status and context, that the Principia was little more than the solution of technical problems of the bourgeoisie. Just in a short while after him another Marxist mathematician who is called Grossmann published two papers on a similar and complement thesis about Cartesian mechanism. Though Hessen’s work is now easily dismissed as "vulgar Marxism", the composition of these two theses can present a better story of how the external parameters influences over history of science.

(Dis) continuity of scientific development, as a controversial debate in historiography of science, has adherents in both Western and Islamic camps. There are historians, following Duhem, attempting to show continuity in the course of scientific development. In this line of thought, we are to examine this debate in the Islamic natural philosophy context by discussing some of their explanations that are compatible with modern scientific theories. However, we shall emphasize that such continuity should not be interpreted is such a way that Islamic theories turn out to be the limiting case of modern theories.

Kant presents a novel interpretation of the concept of substance. Contrary to the traditional conception of substance in terms of being the object of thought and predication, he advances a functional interpretation of it in terms of construction of experience, necessary connection of qualities in the objects, and enduring identity of things. In this paper, I want justify these functions and compare them with new theories in Analytic Philosophy.

In the [Critique of the Power of Judgment], Kant introduces a new division of judgments. After dividing judgment into determinative and reflective judgments, he says that in the first we have a concept to subsume the particular under it while in the second we do not have such a concept. This definition of reflective judgment is not obvious. Most of the interpreters think that we cannot understand such a judgment, especially in accordance with Kantian principles in the first Critique. In this article we try to understand what constitutes a reflective judgment and what it would mean in the light of Critique of Pure Reason. First, we look at the definition of judgment, reflection and transcendental reflection in the first Critique. Transcendental reflection, as we will see, is only a necessary part of what we can call it now "determinative judgment". Then in the third Critique we find that not only the reflective judgment is not consistent with first Critique’s principles but also its meaning is not fully intelligible. However, it has an important and functional role to play in the third Critique.

Kant's short article “On a Supposed Right to Lie from Altruistic Motives” (1798) was published in response to Benjamin Constant's criticism of his rigor ban of lying. Both Constant's essay, in which he had claimed a “Right to Truth”, and Kant's response has been subject of debate and controversy in philosophical literature about lying and Kantian ethics. In this paper I will first try to give an exposition of what Constant says and how Kant responds to him. Then I will focus on the contemporary literature about Kant/Constant debate and I will try to categorize kinds of approaches to this debate. At last, I will try to formulate my own approach to the debate and the way we can reframe the controversy, which has been emerged out of this debate about Kantian ethics.

There is no doubt that the relation between philosophy and religion has been one of the most important theoretical challenges in the history of thought. The main argument of this article is to demonstrate that important principles of the political theology of Christianity, like divine system of the universe, logos, etc., that are rooted in the Greek and Roman views. So, stoic philosophy has been transferred many progressive principles of the Greek political philosophy to the political thought of Christianity. This article has been written based on the theoretical subject matter of Augustine and Aquinas thoughts.

The proof for the existence of God and the possibility of the knowledge of his attributes is a major problem of philosophy. Among the various proofs, the proof of the righteous is a prominent and enduring proof in Islamic philosophy. In the following we present Avicenna's formulation and the later development of it.