The
seminar was run under the leadership of Jafar Aghaei Chavoshi. Ten lectures
were delivered by philosophy scholars in the seminar.
The
first speaker was Ayatollah Sayyed Hassan Saadat Mostafavi who is a member of
the scientific board of Imam Sadegh University. "Avicenna was a pure
intellectual philosopher: he accepts whatever he understands mentally and
whenever there is something he does not understand, he frankly says he doesn't
know", he said. "there is no one philosopher like him that would
clearly say 'I don’t know'."
"It would be right to say that intellect is not an end in
itself, but it cannot be overlooked. When intellectuality rules in a society,
people would not be easily fooled! As Avicenna notes, intellect cannot say that
corporal resurrection is impossible; in its highest level it may say that it is
unlikely. This means that it does not comprehend its necessity and therefore
cannot prove it."
Later
in his speech, Mostafavi compared Avicenna's adaptive monotheism with that of
Qoran. "Avicenna has told a lot about monotheism in his works."
Early
Islamic philosophy, imbued as it is with Islamic theology, distinguishes more
clearly than Aristotelianism the difference between essence and existence.
Whereas existence is the domain of the contingent and the accidental, essence
endures within a being beyond the accidental. The philosophy of Ibn Sīnā,
particularly that part relating to metaphysics, owes much to al-Farabi. The
search for a truly definitive Islamic philosophy can be seen in what is left to
us of his work.
Following
al-Farabi's lead, Avicenna initiated a full-fledged inquiry into the question
of being, in which he distinguished between essence (Mahiat) and existence
(Wujud). He argued that the fact of existence can not be inferred from or
accounted for by the essence of existing things and that form and matter by
themselves cannot interact and originate the movement of the universe or the
progressive actualization of existing things. Existence must, therefore, be due
to an agent-cause that necessitates, imparts, gives, or adds existence to an
essence.
To
do so, the cause must be an existing thing and coexist with its effect.
Avicenna’s
consideration of the essence-attributes question may be elucidated in terms of
his ontological analysis of the modalities of being; namely impossibility,
contingency, and necessity. Avicenna argued that the impossible being is that
which cannot exist, while the contingent in itself (mumkin bi-dhatihi) has the
potentiality to be or not to be without entailing a contradiction. When
actualized, the contingent becomes a ‘necessary existent due to what is other
than itself’ (wajib al-wujud bi-ghayrihi). Thus, contingency-in-itself is
potential beingness that could eventually be actualized by an external cause
other than itself. The metaphysical structures of necessity and contingency are
different. Necessary being due to itself (wajib al-wujud bi-dhatihi) is true in
itself, while the contingent being is ‘false in itself’ and ‘true due to
something else other than itself’. The necessary is the source of its own being
without borrowed existence. It is what always exists.
The
Necessary exists ‘due-to-Its-Self’, and has no quiddity/essence (mahiyya) other
than existence (wujud). Furthermore, It is ‘One’ (wahid ahad) since there
cannot be more than one ‘Necessary-Existent-due-to-Itself’ without differentia
(fasl) to distinguish them from each other. Yet, to require differentia entails
that they exist ‘due-to-themselves’ as well as ‘due to what is other than
themselves’; and this is contradictory. However, if no differentia
distinguishes them from each other, then there is no sense in which these
‘Existents’ are not one and the same. Avicenna adds that the
‘Necessary-Existent-due-to-Itself’ has no genus (jins), nor a definition
(hadd), nor a counterpart (nadd), nor an opposite (did), and is detached
(bari’) from matter (madda), quality (kayf), quantity (kam), place (ayn),
situation (wad’), and time (waqt).
Avicenna
discussed the topic of logic in Islamic philosophy extensively in his works,
and developed his own system of logic known as "Avicennian logic" as
an alternative to Aristotelian logic. By the 12th century, Avicennian logic had
replaced Aristotelian logic as the dominant system of logic in the Islamic
world. After the Latin translations of the 12th century, Avicennian logic was
also influential in Europe.
Ibn
Sina developed an early theory on hypothetical syllogism, which formed the
basis of his early risk factor analysis. He also developed an early theory on
propositional calculus, which was an area of logic not covered in the
Aristotelian tradition. The first criticisms of Aristotelian logic were also
written by Ave Sina, who developed an original theory on temporal modal
syllogism.
Avicenna
also contributed inventively to the development of inductive logic, being the
first to describe the methods of agreement, difference and concomitant
variation which are critical to inductive logic and the scientific method.
The
seminar was pursued by the speaking of other philosophic scholars.
Source:
IBNA News Agency