This chapter aims to lay out a map of the diverse epistemological perspectives within the Islamic theological tradition, in the conceptual framework of contemporary analytic philosophy of religion. In order achieve that goal, it aims to consider epistemological views in light of their historic context, while at the same time seeking to “translate” those broadly medieval perspectives into contemporary philosophical language. In doing so, the chapter offers a succinct overview of the main epistemic trends within the Islamic theological tradition concerning (...) religious epistemology. The chapter is divided into two main sections designated for discussions of differing accounts found in distinct trends of the tradition, namely the Rationalist and Traditionalist trends. The discussion concerning the Rationalist trend focuses on the philosophical-theologians of the dominant Mu’tazilite, Ash’arite, and Maturidite schools. The section on Islamic Traditionalism focuses on the Atharite scripturalism of Ibn Qudāma, and in particular the thought of Ibn Taymiyya. In order to map out these historic positions in light of contemporary religious epistemology, reference is made to a threefold typology of current views in the literature: (1) theistic evidentialism, (2) reformed epistemology, and (3) fideism. As such, the remainder of the chapter will attempt to outline the different approaches toward religious epistemology in the Islamic theological tradition with this threefold typology in mind. (shrink)

Çağdaş fizik evrenimizin yaşam için hassas ayarlı olduğunu göstermiştir. Evrenin yaşam için hassas ayarlı olması demek fizik yasaları, başlangıç koşulları ve temel fizik sabitlerinin alabileceği muhtemel değerlerden çok azı yaşama izin vermesi demektir. Bazı teist düşünürler hassas ayarın Tanrı’nın varlığı lehinde geliştirilebilecek Tasarım kanıtlarında öncül görevi görebileceğini iddia etmişlerdir. Diğer taraftan bazı felsefeci ve bilim insanları hassas ayar gözlemenin birden fazla evrenin var olduğunu savunan çok evrenler hipotezini desteklediğini iddia etmişlerdir. Bu iki yaklaşım da hassas ayarın bir açıklamaya muhtaç olduğunu (...) varsayımını yapar. İlk bakışta bu varsayım makul gözükse de bazı felsefeci ve bilim insanları hassas ayarın bir açıklamaya muhtaç olduğu iddiasını reddetmişlerdir. Bu yaklaşımı savunanlar ya evrenin yaşam için hassas ayarlı olmadığını ya da evrenin hassas ayarlı olmasına şaşırmamamız gerektiğini, dolayısı ile hassas ayarın bir açıklamaya ihtiyaç duymadığını iddia etmişlerdir. Bu makalemizde bu iddialarının bir kısmını ele alarak değerlendirecek ve hassas ayarın açıklamaya muhtaç olmadığını temellendirmede başarısız olduklarını göstermeye çalışacağız. (shrink)

Müslüman bağlamında bilim-din etkileşiminde muhtemelen en can alıcı konu, İslam ve Neo-Darwinci evrim teorisi arasındaki ilişkidir. Müslüman alimler iki ana kampa ayrılır. Bir yandan, daha geleneksel eğilimlere sahip Müslüman düşünürler, İslam'ın evrimle çeliştiğini düşünüyorlar. Diğer tarafta, evrim teorisinin İslam'la tamamen uyumlu olduğunu düşünen daha bilimsel yönelimli Müslüman düşünürlerimiz var. Başta bilim insanları olmak üzere bu düşünürler, genellikle Kuran ayetlerinin bazılarının mecazi bir okumasını sunarlar ya da onları yeniden yorumlarlar. Bu makalede, ben orta yolcu bir yaklaşım tercih edecek ve mecazi okumaya (...) ya da yeniden yorumlamaya başvurmadan, geleneksel Kuran okumasının Neo-Darwinci evrim teorisi ile uyumluluğunu göstermeye çalışacağım. Standart bilimsel anlatıyı da herhangi bir çarpıtmaya maruz bırakmadan kabul edeceğim. İlk olarak, kutsal kitaptaki yaratılış anlatısının evrim teorisiyle bağdaşmadığı iddiasının kötülük sorununa, yani kötülüğün klasik Teizm'in Tanrısı ile bağdaşmadığı iddiasına, benzediğini savunacağım. Bu analojiyi kullanarak hem Kuran anlatısının hem de evrim teorisinin nasıl doğru olabileceğine dair eksiksiz ve makul bir açıklama bulmaya çalışmak yerine, sadece bu iki açıklamanın birbiri ile çelişmediğini göstermeyi amaçlayan daha mütevazı yaklaşımlar aramamız gerektiğini iddia edeceğim—yani kötülük sorunu bağlamındaki savunmalara benzer bir yaklaşım geliştirmeye çalışacağım. Hem bilimsel yaratılış anlatısı hem de Kuran’daki yaratılış anlatısı özetledikten sonra ve olası tek çelişkinin ortak ata tezinde olduğunu savunduktan sonra, Kuran anlatımının evrim teorisiyle uyumluluğunu göstermeyi amaçlayan bu tür iki savunma sunacağım. Birinci savunma, "çifte yaratılış savunması", Adem'in, kutsal kitapların tarif ettiği Cennet'te ve evrim biliminin tarif ettiği Dünya'da olmak üzere iki kez yaratıldığı senaryoları içerir. Bu nedenle, her iki yaratılış anlatısı da aynı anda doğru olabilir ve bu nedenle ikisi bir biri ile tutarlıdır. İkincisi, "çoklu ata savunması", Tanrı'nın Adem'i doğrudan topraktan yaratmış olabileceğini ve onun soyundan gelenlerin evrimleşmiş homo sapiens ile ürediğini öne sürer. Bu nedenle, her iki yaratılış anlatıları da tutarsızlık olmadan bir arada kabul edilebilir. (shrink)

Huduth argument (in contemporary Western philosophy known as Kalam Cosmological argument) is an argument for the existence of God which rests on the idea that the universe has a beginning in time. Some theists have claimed that modern science, particularly modern cosmology and second law of thermodynamics supports the key premise of the argument which argues that universe began to exist. On the other hand, some atheists have claimed that Quantum Mechanics have demonstrated that particles can be created without cause (...) falsifying the causal principle of the Kalam cosmological argument which states that everything that begins to exist has a cause. In this article we will evaluate these claims and try to determine what modern science has to say about this argument developed by medieval Muslim theologians. (shrink)

Cet article aborde l’écriture à partir de la configuration actuelle de l’espace urbain, avec ses ensembles résidentiels sécurisés qui redistribuent et donnent sens à l’espace des villes, en provoquant une raréfaction des pratiques de sociabilité. Partant du principe qu’il est impossible de penser le fonctionnement du langage en le séparant de ses conditions matérielles et de la conjoncture dans laquelle celles-ci surgissent, il analyse le lien entre l’écriture urbaine et la façon dont cet espace de signification s’organise matériellement. L’analyse se (...) fonde sur la pratique des tags à Campinas, au Brésil. L’article aborde également le rapport de la population à l’école en tant que lieu d’institutionnalisation de l’écriture. (shrink)

Parmi les nombreuses réflexions consacrées à l’espace de la ville et à sa condition contemporaine, certaines considèrent que les relations à l’intérieur des villes sont décisives pour penser aujourd’hui le fonctionnement social. Ces relations, en tant que productrices de signification, sont l’objet des sciences du langage, en particulier lorsque celles-ci estiment que le sens se constitue socialement et historiquement. Les cinq textes réunis ici se rattachent au thème de recherche Savoir urba..

The paper analyses Ukraine’s geopolitical position and argues that Ukraine is slowly gravitating towards West. The paper gives a small hint of approximation process of Ukraine within EU and NATO, and argues how this approximation process is opposed by Russia, who wants Ukraine back to its influence. Occupation off Crimea by Russia violated international order, opening way to unstructured international ties out traditional UN bodies. The Ukraine’s destiny is unclear, Dnieper River may divide country in two, and the West faces (...) biggest security and political threat after WWII. (shrink)

Petro Marko (1913-1991) was an Albanian journalist, writer and communist activist, who volunteered in the International Brigades during the Spanish Civil War. Afterwards, he was imprisoned in the island of Ustica by the Italian occupiers of Albania during the Second World War and was briefly imprisoned by the communist regime of Albania in the late 1940s. Afterwards he worked as a journalist and a writer, being closely surveyed by the communist regime. The Spanish experience was the most important formative period (...) throughout Marko’s stormy life, through which he was able to stay faithful to his communist and internationalist beliefs in the face of fascism and one of the most totalitarian and isolationist regimes in Europe. Marko wrote about the International Brigades in his most prominent novel, Hasta la Vista, and in his posthumously published autobiography. This paper will investigate these works by putting them in the historical context of the events themselves and of the time of the writing process. The aim is to look into how internationalism moulded his own identity, but also how this ideal was presented publicly under a communist regime that was becoming more and more isolated and xenophobic. (shrink)

Following the rift with China, Albania found itself on a lonely road towards pretending to protect the purity of the Marxism-Leninism in Europe. Although diplomatic relations with the West were restricted only to trade, the Albanian Communist leader, Enver Hoxha, was interested in recent developments inside Western Communist parties. Through Eurocommunist theorizations, the parties in Italy, France and Spain abandoned revolutionary aims, incorporated democracy in their ideology and tried to build electoral coalitions with socialist parties and other left-wing forces. By (...) contrast, the Albanian Enver Hoxha considered that Communist revolution was still possible in the world, and the Communist parties still acted as Leninist revolutionary vanguards. From this perspective, he denounced Eurocommunism as a continuation of “revisionism”. This paper will present the attitude of the Party of Labour of Albania about Western Communism by placing it in its historical context and framing it in light of broader debates inside the European Communist movement. (shrink)

Students’ protests in 1968. were a traumatic topic for the entire later period of Yugoslav socialism. Firstly, because somebody for the first time en masse challenged exclusive monopoly of the Communist Party by using Marxist phraseology. Secondly, because protesters openly spoke, concerning serious and painful structural problems. Thirdly, because authorities euthanized students’ movement with repression and demagogy. Fourthly, because the issues students spoke of were not solved until the collapse of Yugoslav socialism, and to the extent, they contributed to that (...) collapse. The phenomenon of 1968 is part of the certain unclean conscience of the Yugoslav Communist nomenclature, and in this context, we need to understand direct and soft repression over the participants and sympathizers of 1968, including the “case” of the dissolution of the editorial board of the Zagreb Studentski list in 1978. (shrink)

Data on advance directives in Brazil are lacking. This study aims to assess the understanding of oncologists regarding advance directives and the frequency with which they discuss advance directives and advance care planning with their patients in Brazil. This is an observational, descriptive and cross-sectional study, conducted with cclinical oncologists associated with the Brazilian Society of Clinical Oncology. Participants were invited to answer a questionnaire prepared by the authors. In total, 72 physicians answered the questionnaire, of which 73% were under (...) 45 years old and 56% worked in oncology for less than 10 years. Regarding the limits of intervention and end-of-life care during treatment, 54.2% of respondents reported not discussing it. Although 67% of oncologists know the term advance directives, they do not develop them with their patients and 57.2% do not perform advance care planning. Most oncologists in this study do not set advance care planning and advance directives for most patients. (shrink)

Using a nationwide survey of randomly selected manufacturing firms in representative Chinese cities, we examine how firms’ compliance with social insurance policies is shaped by their historical imprinting, by their founding ownership structures, as well as by massive institutional changes. Our empirical results suggest that firms founded in the state socialist era and firms founded as Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) were infused with socialist institutional logics of labor relations, and they tended to comply with social insurance policies even in the (...) present market socialist era. Chinese SOEs restructured into private and joint-ventured firms attenuated the lingering effect of organizational imprinting and provide social insurances for fewer workers. This research is among the first to probe the historical influence on labor protection in contemporary society. Through studying the stability and changes of socialist institutional logic of labor relations, our research leads to a better understanding of the situation of labor relations in contemporary China. (shrink)

This chapter aims to draw on the critical threads of those vibrant theological conversations within the formative years of Islamic thought in considering the different theological models of the Divine within the broader Islamic tradition under the purview of classical theism as it is understood today in the contemporary philosophy of religion. In doing so, it makes reference to the major strands within the theological (‘ilm al- kalām & atharī scripturalism) and philosophical (falsafa) schools of the Islamic tradition. It aims (...) to consider how these different trends, schools, and thinkers construct a model of God in light of the classical and neo-classical theistic model of God. (shrink)

ABSTRACTWe used an immersive virtual environment to examine avoidance learning in spider-fearful participants. In 3 experiments, participants were asked to repeatedly lift one of 3 virtual boxes, under which either a toy car or a spider appeared and then approached the participant. Participants were not told that the probability of encountering a spider differed across boxes. When the difference was large, spider-fearfuls learned to avoid spiders by lifting the few-spiders-box more often and the many-spiders-box less often than non-fearful controls did. (...) However, they hardly managed to do so when the probability differences were small, and they did not escape from threat more quickly. In contrast to the observed performance differences, spider-fearfuls and non-fearfuls showed equal competence, that is comparable post-experimental knowledge about the probability to encounter spiders under the 3 boxes. The limitations and implications of the present study are discussed. (shrink)

The article argues that youth’s exposure to thin-idealizing content posted by their adored celebrities on interactive and highly engaging social networking sites poses potential challenges for these young people. Celebrity SNS presence responds to youth’s desire for social connectedness, public approval, and fame, which are highlighted at the time of their identity search and establishment. SNS content likely interacts with teens’ unique developmental characteristics, personal background, and interests to propel processes such as identification and social comparison with famous personae leading (...) to negative body image perceptions. The article suggests that even ostensibly “innocent” SNS content that presents thin-idealizing images and messages about the body may place pressures on youth and encourage a preoocupation with and risky behaviors associated with body image even unintentionally. The article further recognizes that netusers, readers, and social networking sites all share in the responsibility to minimize the risks posed to youth in this context. (shrink)

Objective: Body checking (BC) and avoidance (BA) form the behavioral component of body image disturbance. High levels of BC/BA have often been documented to hold a positive and potentially reinforcing relationship with eating pathology. While some researchers hypothesize, that patients engage in BC/BA to prevent or reduce levels of anxiety, little is known about the mediating factors. Considering the great comorbidity between eating disorders and in particular social anxieties, the present study investigated whether socially relevant types of anxiety mediate the (...) relationship between eating pathology and BC/BA. Method: 83 participants reporting an eating disorder and 323 healthy participants (14-25 years) took part in an online survey. Eating pathology was measured with the Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire and Body Checking and Avoidance Questionnaire. Trait and social anxiety were assessed by means of the State Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-T), the Fear of Negative Evaluation (FNE) and the Social Appearance and Anxiety Scale (SAAS). Separate mediation analyses were carried out with eating pathology as independent variable, BC/BA as dependent variable and STAI, FNE and SAAS as mediating variables. Results: Anxieties correlated highly positive with eating pathology in both groups. SAAS mediated the relationship between ED pathology and BC/BA in participants with ED and mediated the relationship between ED pathology and BA in healthy participants. FNE mediated the relationship between eating pathology and BA for participants with eating pathology. Discussion: SAAS mediated the relationship between eating pathology and BC/BA. Being afraid of bodily evaluations may represent a particular relevant fear that triggers safety behaviors. (shrink)

Cognitive models propose that both, negative interpretations of ambiguous social situations and ruminative thoughts about social events contribute to the maintenance of social anxiety disorder. It has further been postulated that ruminative thoughts fuel biased negative interpretations, however, evidence is rare. The present study used a multi-method approach to assess ruminative processing following a social interaction and negative interpretation bias in a student sample screened for high and low social anxiety. Results support the hypothesis that group differences in negative interpretations (...) of ambiguous social situations in HSAs vs. LSAs are mediated by higher levels of post-event processing assessed in the questionnaire. Exploratory analyses highlight the potential role of comorbid depressive symptoms. The current findings help to advance the understanding of the association between two cognitive processes involved in social anxiety and stress the importance of ruminative post-event processing. (shrink)

ABSTRACTWhen processing information about human faces, we have to integrate different sources of information like skin colour and emotional expression. In 3 experiments, we investigated how these features are processed in a top-down manner when task instructions determine the relevance of features, and in a bottom-up manner when the stimulus features themselves determine process priority. In Experiment 1, participants learned to respond with approach-avoidance movements to faces that presented both emotion and colour features. For each participant, only one of these (...) two features was task-relevant while the other one could be ignored. In contrast to our predictions, we found better learning of task-irrelevant colour when emotion was task-relevant than vice versa. Experiment 2 showed that the learning of task-irrelevant emotional information was improved in general when participants’ awareness was increased by adding NoGo-trials. Experiment 3 replicated these results... (shrink)

ABSTRACTMemory bias is a risk factor for depression. In two independent studies, the efficacy of one CBM-Memory session on negative memory bias and depressive symptoms was tested in vulnerable samples. We compared positive to neutral CBM-Memory trainings in highly-ruminating individuals and individuals with elevated depressive symptoms. In both studies, participants studied positive, neutral, and negative Swahili words paired with their translations. In five study–test blocks, they were then prompted to retrieve either only the positive or neutral translations. Immediately following the (...) training and one week later, we tested cued recall of all translations and autobiographical memory bias; and also measured mood, depressive symptoms, and rumination. Retrieval practice resulted in training-congruent recall both immediately after and one week after the training. Overall, there was no differential decrease in symptoms or difference in autobiographical memory bias between the tra... (shrink)