This paper is going to re-read Imam Mohammad al-Ghazali’s moral ideas in order to find the responses to the questions of moral psychology. Al-Ghazali, following the Greek and Islamic philosophers, relates each virtue or vice to a particular faculty in man’s soul. Moreover, following the Asharites, he considers the basis of moral good and badness to be religious. Furthermore, having mentioned al-Ghazali and Hume’s opinions as well as their similarities, this writing explains why al-Ghazali’s view on the moral motivation has (...) not encountered Hume’s objections. And finally, it presents the differences between al-Ghazali and the Greek philosophers’ views on virtues and vices as well as evaluates al-Ghazali’s psychological opinions in ethics. (shrink)

The present paper mainly seeks to elaborate on how the problem of soul and its temporality or eternity occupied Mulla Sadra and Plato's minds. What reasons made Plato to believe in eternity of soul? Why Muslim philosophers, especially Mulla Sadra, did not face such constraints in spite of the fact that they did not accept these reasons? To this end, the present paper reviews not only these two thinkers' works but also their social status and intellectual concerns, which resulted in (...) developing their specific thoughts. It seems that the problems related to the issue of soul cannot be solved except with Muslim philosophers' existential view and particularly with Mulla Sadra's innovations in philosophy. (shrink)

Hedgehog is an important morphogenic signal that directs pattern formation during embryogenesis, but its activity also remains present through adult life. It is now becoming increasingly clear that during the reproductive phase of life and beyond it continues to direct cell renewal (which is essential to combat the chronic environmental stress to which the body is constantly exposed) and counteracts vascular, osteolytic and sometimes oncological insults to the body. Conversely, down‐regulation of hedgehog signalling is associated with ageing‐related diseases such as (...) type 2 diabetes, neurodegeneration, atherosclerosis and osteoporosis. Hence, in this essay we argue that hedgehog signalling is not only important at the start of life, but also constitutes an important anti‐geriatric influence, and that enhanced understanding of its properties may contribute to developing rational strategies for healthy ageing and prevention of ageing‐related diseases.Also watch the Video Abstract. (shrink)

Respect for personal autonomy in decision making is one of the four ethical principles in medical circumstances. This paper aims to present evidence that can be considered good exemplars in the clarification of the ethical viewpoints of the western and Shi’i Islamic perspectives on this issue. The method followed was originally a search in international indexing services in April 2016. Our findings point towards various controversies on individuals’ autonomy lead to different decision making outcomes by health workers in both different (...) traditions. We concluded that although Shi’i Islamic jurisprudence does not seem to allow for personal autonomy in the sense it is understood in a western context, evidence indicates that Shi’i Islamic jurisprudence respects personal autonomy. (shrink)

In an increasingly complex military operating environment, next generation wargaming platforms can reduce risk, decrease operating costs, and improve overall outcomes. Novel Artificial Intelligence enabled wargaming approaches, based on software platforms with multimodal interaction and visualization capacity, are essential to provide the decision-making flexibility and adaptability required to meet current and emerging realities of warfighting. We highlight three areas of development for future warfighter-machine interfaces: AI-directed decisional guidance, computationally informed decision-making, and realistic representations of decision spaces. Progress in these areas (...) will enable development of effective human-AI collaborative decision-making, to meet the increasing scale and complexity of today’s battlespace. (shrink)

The report of the Treadway Commission suggests that all public companies should establish effective written codes of conduct in promoting honorable behavior by corporations. The need for written "codes of conduct" for businesses is evident in the current literature. However, there is not sufficient evidence regarding the implication of codes of conduct in a college. Academic dishonesty has become an important issue in institutions of higher education. Codes of conduct can also provide a basis for ethical behavior in colleges and (...) universities. Survey respondents were generally supportive of the concept of codes of ethical conduct in colleges and universities. The results of this study indicate that college codes of conduct tend to follow a "low road" approach. The results also suggest the following needed improvements in college and university codes of conduct: (1) greater emphasis on preventing financial, scientific, and academic fraud; (2) more inclusion of the faculty in the process; and (3) establishment of a proper process for implementation of the code. (shrink)

Objective: The objectives of this study are to understand the current functions, structure and operation of hospital ethics committees (HECs) in Shanghai and to facilitate their improvement. Methods: (1) A questionnaire survey, (2) interviews with secretaries and (3) on-site document reviews of HECs in Shanghai were used in the study, which surveyed 33 hospitals. Results: In Shanghai, 57.56% of the surveyed hospitals established HECs from 1998 to 2005. Most HECs used bioethical review of research involving human subjects as well as (...) bioethical review or consultation regarding medical care services and administrative decision- making. Of the surveyed HECs, 14.3% did not provide any formal bioethical training to the HECs’ members and many HECs had no standard operating procedures. Some HECs had no clear definition of what was “conflict of interest” that should be considered by the HECs, while 44.4% of the HECs did not perform continuing review. Discussion: After the issues of related national regulations, more and more hospitals established HECs in Shanghai, but the functions of HECs need to be further developed and formal training on bioethics should be provided to HEC members. To assure the independence and good performance of HECs, the conflict of interest procedure, the standard operating procedures and bioethical review should be improved. Conclusion: HECs in Shanghai had developed in the preceding 10 years and they played great roles in protecting the rights and welfare of human subjects and patients; some areas need improvement. (shrink)

In this article, I examine Luhmann’s, Bunge’s and others’ views on emergence, and argue that Luhmann’s epistemological construal of emergence in terms of Totalausschluss (total exclusion) is both ontologically flawed and detrimental to an appropriate understanding of the distinctive features of social emergence. By contrast, Bunge’s rational emergentism, his CESM model, and Wimsatt’s characterization of emergence as nonaggregativity provide a useful framework to investigate emergence. While researchers in the field of social theory and sociology tend to regard Luhmann as the (...) sole representative of systems theory, the latter has been characterized by its diversity, and the writings of such systems theorists as Mario Bunge deserve more (critical) attention from social researchers than they receive at present. Finally, this article suggests that the perennial debate over methodological individualism and holism in social science may make real progress if such ambiguous terms as reduction and reductionism are elucidated before they are employed. (shrink)

Innovation is necessary to deal with challenges that climate change brings for agriculture, such as droughts, floods, pests and pathogens that enter new climatic regions, and challenges relating to the labour force. There is a dominant narrative that science and technology are the locus of innovation, and that the solutions developed can change systems. Indeed, history shows how the Green Revolution started a massive change in practices worldwide and gave science and technology the main role. Innovation, however, also happens outside (...) universities or industry research. Particularly in agriculture, it happens in the field through farmers’ experimentation. This opens up the idea of who is an innovator, and it is crucial to tackling climate challenges to agriculture. In this paper, we investigate the role of curiosity as a virtue of innovators. Instead of looking at systems of innovation, or at innovations themselves, we add to the growing scholarship on virtues of innovators. Among those virtues, curiosity is prominent. We argue that different contexts require different forms of the innovator virtues, and we conceptually investigate how such virtues ought to be cultivated in order to contribute to solving 21st century challenges for agriculture. (shrink)

This article attempts to assess Mario Bunge’s important but widely neglected criticisms of dialectics. It begins by providing a contextualized interpretation of Friedrich Engels’s metaphysics of the dialectics of nature before embarking on a detailed discussion of Leon Trotsky’s and contemporary “dialectical” scientists’ views on materialist dialectics. It argues that while some of Bunge’s criticisms are eminently sensible, the principles underlying the works of dialectical scientists are compatible with Bunge’s emergentist and systemic approach and can shed light on such issues (...) as the levels of organization, the diachronic and synchronic aspects of emergence, and the individualism-holism-systemism trilemma. This article also submits that dialectics is best interpreted as a guideline for a philosophy of change instead of a magical wand that liberates the investigator from study of facts. Understood as something that serves heuristic purposes, dialectics can be sensibly utilized by scientists to shore up or refine their methodological principles and thereby to facilitate empirical research. (shrink)