In her book, Geraldine Brooks fails to distinguish between what Islam says and what Muslims do.

Abdel-Hakim Ourghi's Reform of Islam is an open indictment of prevailing conservative Islam which insists on the absolute subjugation of the body and mind of all Muslims. The author seeks a humanist understanding of Islam and aims to interpret Islam in today's terms. He argues against the historical alienation and transfiguration that still shape the collective consciousness of Muslims in the 21st Century. Using critical analysis and logic, the author aims to reveal the true core of Islam. His 40 (...) Theses include: The freedom of the individual to interpret the Qur'an No scholars as mediators between God and man Islam does not claim to possess the absolute truth Only a reformed and open Islam is a religion of peace The Qur'an as the basis of a contemporary humanist ethics. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Ethical leaders can influence followers’ ethical behaviors by establishing an ethical climate. However, followers’ responses to an ethical climate may also differ according to the amount of attention they devote to moral questions. This study analyzes whether moral attentiveness augments the positive effect of an ethical climate on employees’ ethical behaviors, as well as the indirect effect of ethical leadership on employee ethical behavior through an ethical climate. Data from 270 employees in the Malaysian manufacturing industry indicate that the (...) positive impact of an ethical climate on ethical behavior is greater among employees who exhibit high rather than low moral attentiveness; this moderating role also applies to the relationship between ethical leadership and employee ethical behavior through the ethical climate. This study thus sheds new light on the notable role of moral attentiveness in ensuring that ethical leadership and ethical climate enhance ethical behavior in the workplace. (shrink)

"Yoga and life are journeys, and this book is a wonderful guide along the path!"—Greg Louganis, four-time Olympic gold medalist Holistic wisdom for sustained peace Ally Hamilton changed her life with the eight limbs of yoga, a spiritual tradition first recorded in the Yoga Sutras 1,600 years ago. Join Ally as she shows you how to apply the wisdom of this honored tradition to your modern-day life. Physical poses—asanas—are the best-known aspects of yoga, but in the eight limbs (...) practice, healing comes through exploring your relationship to the world and to yourself while learning to recognize the obstacles that block your path. Yoga's Healing Power shows how to create the life you want from the inside out, working with your mind and emotions, your body and breath, your memories and your pain. With hands-on exercises, meditations, journaling prompts, and stories of healing, this book helps you uncover your particular gifts and begin to feel joy. Praise: "Ally is really onto something fantastic with Yoga's Healing Power...We're not talking just physical yoga; this is yoga as a way of life."—Kathryn Budig, author of Aim True "I was deeply humbled and greatly inspired by Ally Hamilton's courageous take on life, love, loss, and surrender."—Claire Bidwell Smith, author of The Rules of Inheritance. (shrink)

Sporadic efforts have been made to introduce computational thinking methods into K-12 education in Palestine, but these have been held back by the challenging educational environment. However, a recent in-service training initiative, funded and organized by the Ministry or Education of Palestine, constitutes a significant effort to embed computational thinking in K-12 practice. The middle school teachers who participated in the training course were invited to participate in the present study, and 38 did so. A qualitative approach involving both interviews (...) with teachers and classroom observations was used in data collection. All the teachers agreed to be observed in their classrooms, while 20 of the 38 also agreed to participate in the interviews. The findings showed that teachers of a range of topics, including social sciences and languages, employed computational thinking skills in teaching their students, but they were confronted by a number of challenges, including technical infrastructure and support, and a lack of time to prepare CT classes and space in the curriculum to deliver them. The results indicate that the most appropriate action to support teachers’ delivery of CT would be to provide peer exchanges and expert coaching in the integration of CT in the curriculum. (shrink)

The teachings, style and impact of the Qur'an have always been matters of controversy, among both Muslims and non-Muslims. But in a modern context of intercultural sensitivity, what the Qur'an says and means are perhaps more urgent questions than ever before. This major new book by one of the world's finest Islamic scholars responds to that urgency. Building on his earlier groundbreaking work, the author challenges misinterpretations of particular Qur'anic verses from whatever quarter. He addresses the infamous 'sword' verse, frequently (...) cited as a justification for jihad. He also questions the 'tribute' verse, associated with the Muslim state subjugating Jews and Christians; and the idea of Paradise in the Qur'an, often viewed by the West as emphasising merely physical pleasures, or used by Islamic fighters as their just reward for holy war. The author argues that wrenching the verses out of the context of the whole has led to dangerous ideologies being built on isolated phrases which have then assumed afterlives of their own. This nuanced, holistic reading has vital interfaith ramifications. (shrink)

al-kitāb 1. Madkhal li-ʻilm al-qānūn (2. v.).

This article offers an account of the responsibility that individuals bear by virtue of their national belonging alone. Via their national pride, the living connect themselves actively with select actions performed by others who might long be dead. They imagine themselves as having won past wars, built ancient empires and the like. This same feat of their imagination imposes on them a responsibility for the bad outcomes that were brought about through their imagined exploits. Their national responsibility for the "sins (...) of the fathers" however lends itself only to the kinds of responses that these living agents can demand of themselves. While their national responsibility can be captured by either the vocabulary of guilt or that of shame, the latter turns out to be more promising as it better accounts for the strong hold that the national idea has on contemporary political thinking. (shrink)

Big Data is a large-sized and complex dataset, which cannot be managed using traditional data processing tools. Mining process of big data is the ability to extract valuable information from these large datasets. Association rule mining is a type of data mining process, which is indented to determine interesting associations between items and to establish a set of association rules whose support is greater than a specific threshold. The classical association rules can only be extracted from binary data where an (...) item exists in a transaction, but it fails to deal effectively with quantitative attributes, through decreasing the quality of generated association rules due to sharp boundary problems. In order to overcome the drawbacks of classical association rule mining, we propose in this research a new neutrosophic association rule algorithm. The algorithm uses a new approach for generating association rules by dealing with membership, indeterminacy, and non-membership functions of items, conducting to an efficient decision-making system by considering all vague association rules. To prove the validity of the method, we compare the fuzzy mining and the neutrosophic mining. The results show that the proposed approach increases the number of generated association rules. (shrink)

This article offers an account of the responsibility that individuals bear by virtue of their national belonging alone. Via their national pride, the living connect themselves actively with select actions performed by others who might long be dead. They imagine themselves as having won past wars, built ancient empires and the like. This same feat of their imagination imposes on them a responsibility for the bad outcomes that were brought about through their imagined exploits. Their national responsibility for the “sins (...) of the fathers” however lends itself only to the kinds of responses that these living agents can demand of themselves. While their national responsibility can be captured by either the vocabulary of guilt or that of shame, the latter turns out to be more promising as it better accounts for the strong hold that the national idea has on contemporary political thinking. (shrink)

L'objet de l'ouvrage est de déterminer les conceptions épistémologiques qui sous-tendent la "Théorie pure du droit". La pensée de Kelsen peut-être rattachée à la philosophie analytique et au positivisme logique du Cercle de Vienne; pour arriver à cette thèse, on a notamment procédé à une comparaison des concepts de science chez Kelsen, Russell, Schlick et Carnap.

This study presents an Islamic conception of sovereignty from mainstream Sunni theology by closely examining Ghiyāth al-umam fī iltyāth aẓ-ẓulam, the major political work of Abū al-Ma‘ālī al-Juwayn...

Background: The Bene-Anthony Family Relations Test is one of the most widely used measures of family dynamics seen from a child’s perspective. However, the most common issue surrounding this test is the lack of accurate normative scores for use with non-white ethnic groups. The purpose of this study was to examine the BAFRT’s reliability and validity for use with Arab children, as well as to provide normative data for this group. Methods: The BAFRT was translated into Arabic and back-translated to (...) ensure accuracy. The test was administered to a cohort of 394 Arab children, consisting of both cognitively normal children and children diagnosed with a psychological disorder, all aged 5–8 years old. Test-retest reliability was assessed using a sub-set of children and validity was tested against clinical status as well as CBCL and SDQ measures. Normative measures were calculated after examining the impact of influencing variables such as age and gender. Results: Statistical analyses showed that in our cohort of Arab children the BAFRT has good test-retest reliability, correlates well with measures of emotional and behavioral adjustment, and discriminates accurately between clinical and non-clinical children. Age, gender, and clinical status all significantly impacted upon BAFRT scores and therefore normative values are presented from our cohort when considering these variables. Conclusion: The normative scores we present will provide researchers and clinicians an appropriate reference point for the comparison of scores from Arab children and a starting point for future research into this area. (shrink)

This article explains how we ordinary subjects of a state who are neither political leaders nor functionaries are responsible for outcomes that are properly attributed to that state and that took place during our adult lifetime. Its focus is on the connection we forge to those outcomes via our obedience alone. If our responsibility as subjects is justified, it would apply under all regime types including oppressive and authoritarian ones. The argument is that this responsibility can only be justified within (...) a minimal account of agency and a bare-bones account of responsibility. Thus, while we incur a burden of responsibility for the state via our obedience alone, that burden does not suffice to either blame us or extract remedies from us for state injustices. For us obedient subjects, however, it is important that we be cognizant of this burden as it marks the most minimal agency we exercise in the state. (shrink)

In the paper below the authors describe three super-tasks. They show that although the abstract notion of a super-task may be, as Benacerraf suggested, a conceptual mismatch, the completion of the three super-tasks involved can be defined rather naturally, without leading to inconsistency, by means of a particular kinematical interpretation combined with a principle of continuity.

In this paper, Taylor series is used to solve neutrosophic multi-objective programming problem (NMOPP). In the proposed approach, the truth membership, Indeterminacy membership, falsity membership functions associated with each objective of multi-objective programming problems are transformed into a single objective linear programming problem by using a first order Taylor polynomial series. Finally, to illustrate the efficiency of the proposed method, a numerical experiment for supplier selection is given as an application of Taylor series method for solving neutrosophic multi-objective programming problem (...) at end of this paper. (shrink)

This 1983 book is a lively and clearly written introduction to the philosophy of natural science, organized around the central theme of scientific realism. It has two parts. 'Representing' deals with the different philosophical accounts of scientific objectivity and the reality of scientific entities. The views of Kuhn, Feyerabend, Lakatos, Putnam, van Fraassen, and others, are all considered. 'Intervening' presents the first sustained treatment of experimental science for many years and uses it to give a new direction to debates about (...) realism. Hacking illustrates how experimentation often has a life independent of theory. He argues that although the philosophical problems of scientific realism can not be resolved when put in terms of theory alone, a sound philosophy of experiment provides compelling grounds for a realistic attitude. A great many scientific examples are described in both parts of the book, which also includes lucid expositions of recent high energy physics and a remarkable chapter on the microscope in cell biology. (shrink)

In this paper, we propose a new hybrid neutrosophic multi criteria decision making (MCDM) framework that employs a collection of neutrosophic analytical network process (ANP), and order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) under bipolar neutrosophic numbers. The MCDM framework is applied for chief executive officer (CEO) selection in a case study at the Elsewedy Electric Group, Egypt. The proposed approach allows us to assemble individual evaluations of the decision makers and therefore perform accurate personnel selection. The outcomes of (...) the proposed method are compared with those of the related works such as weight sum model (WSM), weight product model (WPM), analytical hierarchy process (AHP), multiobjective optimization based on simple ratio analysis (MOORA) and ANP methods to prove and validate the results. (shrink)

In his recent work, Jürgen Habermas signals the abandonment of his earlier claims to justify human rights and universalist morality. This paper explains the above shift, arguing that it is the inescapable result of his attempts in recent years to accommodate pluralism. The paper demonstrates how Habermas’s universal pragmatic justification of modern normative standards was inextricably tied to his consensus theory of validity. He was compelled by the structure of that argument to count on the current or future availability of (...) a unified framework within which all can potentially articulate their needs and interests. With his abandonment of the justification Habermas has rid discourse theory of this controversial assumption. In weakening its defense of human rights and universalist morality against the charge of ethnocentrism, he has strengthened his theory’s foothold in the lived pluralist world. Key Words: argumentation • ethnocentrism • Habermas • human rights • justification • legitimacy • pluralism • rational consensus • Rehg. (shrink)

Using intelligent software agents in the world of e-commerce may give rise to many difficulties especially with regard to the validity of agent-based contracts and the attribution of liability for the actions of such agents. This paper thus critically examines the main approaches that have been advanced to deal with software agents, and proposes the gradual approach as a way of overcoming the difficulties of such agents by adopting different standards of responsibility depending whether the action is done autonomously by (...) an unattended software, or whether it is done automatically by an attended software. Throughout this paper, it is argued that the introduction of “one size” regulation without sufficient consideration of the nature of software agents or the environments in which they communicate might lead to a divorce between the legal theory and technological practice. It is also concluded that it is incorrect to deal with software agents as if they were either legal persons or nothing without in any way accounting for the fact that there are various kinds of such agents endowed with different levels of autonomy, mobility, intelligence, and sophistication. However, this paper is not intended to provide the final answer to all problematic questions posed by the emergence of intelligent software agents, but is designed to provide some kind of temporary relief until such agents reach a more reliable and autonomous level whereby law begins to regard them, rather than their users, as the source of the relevant action. (shrink)

Especially troublesome in this dispute is the status of the natural sciences, and this is where Hacking finds some of his most telling cases, from the conflict ...

In an earlier paper the authors discussed some super-tasks by means of a kinematical interpretation. In the present paper we show a semi-formal way that a more abstract treatment is possible. The core idea of our approach is simple: if a super-task can be considered as a union of (finite) tasks, it is natural to define the effect of the super-task as the union of the effects of the finite tasks it consists of. We show that this approach enables us (...) to handle two of the three super-tasks that we discussed earlier. We also argue that recent objections against our original kinematical interpretation do not hold water. One of our arguments is based on the construction of an elegant correspondence between the first of those three super-tasks and Zeno's Achilles and the Tortois. (shrink)

The Holy Quran and the Sunnah provide the Islamic approach to a complete food system, regulating the consumption of food and drinks, clarifying permissibility and prohibition, to protect human health. This analytical study aimed to explore various categories and benefits of food in Islam derived from plants and animals, focusing specifically on how Islamic Shariah advocates halal food consumption, and what permissions or prohibitions are granted, highlighting the underlying religious evidence and reasoning. The data was collected through both inductive and (...) deductive approaches; the inductive method gathered literature on the topic from the Quran, Sunnah, and Hadith commentaries, while the deductive approach classified plant-based and animal-based foods and elaborated on the benefits of halal items versus the harms of prohibited ones. The study found the plant foods endorsed in Islam include fruits, vegetables, grains, and nuts like dates, beans, olives, and ziziphus, while the permissible animal foods comprise seafood, fish, beef, dairy products, and honey. These foods assist in the growth and repair of body tissues, digestion, energy, metabolism, and overall wellbeing. Meanwhile, prohibited foods contained toxins, germs, and substances that lead to obesity, cancer, blood issues, and more. The implications of this study lie in showcasing how Islam forbids monopoly control of commodities and encourages activities like land rehabilitation for farming and public cultivation. Islam also advises only consuming foods from permitted animals while emphasizing sustenance provisions for milk-producing animals to avoid wastage, as commanded by Allah. (shrink)

The selected papers of William Phelps Allis are gathered here in celebration of his elevation from Professor to Professor Emeritus of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This gathering was arranged as a surprise tribute to Professor Allis and was prepared under conditions of conspiring silence. The presentation was held at M.I.T. on May 10, 1967. The papers selected here are a worthy extension of the man himself, in their directness and essential simplicity. And in their abiding value. In (...) the words of his editor, student, and colleague Sanborn C. Brown, "he has succeeded in leading a whole generation of Physicists with such a timeless approach that this volume should be considered not as a look backward but as a compilation of fundamental insights upon which to build future progress.". (shrink)

A tension between perspectives that emphasize deterministic versus stochastic processes has sparked controversy in ecology since pre-Darwinian times. The most recent manifestation of the contrasting perspectives arose with Hubbell’s proposed “neutral theory”, which hypothesizes a paramount role for stochasticity in ecological community composition. Here we shall refer to the deterministic and the stochastic perspectives as the niche-based and neutral-based research programs, respectively. Our goal is to represent these perspectives in the context of Lakatos’ notion of a scientific research program. We (...) argue that the niche-based program exhibits all the characteristics of a robust, progressive research program, including the ability to deal with disconfirming data by generating new testable predictions within the program. In contrast, the neutral-based program succeeds as a mathematical tool to capture, as epiphenomena, broad-scale patterns of ecological communities but appears to handle disconfirming data by incorporating hypotheses and assumptions from outside the program, specifically, from the niche-based program. We conclude that the neutral research program fits the Lakatosian characterization of a degenerate research program. (shrink)