The purpose of this study is to offer a brief biography of Mr. M.H. Panhwar and Dr. Nabi Bux Khan Baloch, as well as their work in Sindhological studies along with a brief description of their literary differences on the origin of Sindhi language and history. A systematic literature review methodology was used to explore the contribution and contradiction of both the scholars. The study found that both the scholars were renowned researchers who worked in the fields of history, archaeology, (...) sociology, literature, and language. Both were up-to-dated academics, but their scholarly interests in history, archaeology, language, and literature were diametrically opposed. The study revealed that M.H. Panhwar was a rigorous researcher who conducted studies using scientific techniques and with the assistance of archaeological and geographical evidence. The study further explored that Dr. N. A. Baloch was a folklorist, educationist and extensive writer whose ideological hypotheses were primarily based on mythology and preserved folk literature. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence techniques in general and convolutional neural networks in particular have attained successful results in medical image analysis and classification. A deep CNN architecture has been proposed in this paper for the diagnosis of COVID-19 based on the chest X-ray image classification. Due to the nonavailability of sufficient-size and good-quality chest X-ray image dataset, an effective and accurate CNN classification was a challenge. To deal with these complexities such as the availability of a very-small-sized and imbalanced dataset with image-quality (...) issues, the dataset has been preprocessed in different phases using different techniques to achieve an effective training dataset for the proposed CNN model to attain its best performance. The preprocessing stages of the datasets performed in this study include dataset balancing, medical experts’ image analysis, and data augmentation. The experimental results have shown the overall accuracy as high as 99.5% which demonstrates the good capability of the proposed CNN model in the current application domain. The CNN model has been tested in two scenarios. In the first scenario, the model has been tested using the 100 X-ray images of the original processed dataset which achieved an accuracy of 100%. In the second scenario, the model has been tested using an independent dataset of COVID-19 X-ray images. The performance in this test scenario was as high as 99.5%. To further prove that the proposed model outperforms other models, a comparative analysis has been done with some of the machine learning algorithms. The proposed model has outperformed all the models generally and specifically when the model testing was done using an independent testing set. (shrink)

How is the burden of proof to be distributed among individuals who are involved in resolving a particular issue? Under what conditions should the burden of proof be distributed unevenly? We distinguish attitudinal from dialectical burdens and argue that these questions should be answered differently, depending on which is in play. One has an attitudinal burden with respect to some proposition when one is required to possess sufficient evidence for it. One has a dialectical burden with respect to some proposition (...) when one is required to provide supporting arguments for it as part of a deliberative process. We show that the attitudinal burden with respect to certain propositions is unevenly distributed in some deliberative contexts, but in all of these contexts, establishing the degree of support for the proposition is merely a means to some other deliberative end, such as action guidance, or persuasion. By contrast, uneven distributions of the dialectical burden regularly further the aims of deliberation, even in contexts where the quest for truth is the sole deliberative aim, rather than merely a means to some different deliberative end. We argue that our distinction between these two burdens resolves puzzles about unevenness that have been raised in the literature. (shrink)

J.L. Schellenberg’s Argument from Divine Hiddenness maintains that if a perfectly loving God exists, then there is no non-resistant non-belief. Given that such nonbelief exists, however, it follows that there is no perfectly loving God. To support the conditional claim, Schellenberg presents conceptual and analogical considerations, which we subject to critical scrutiny. We also evaluate Schellenberg’s claim that the belief that God exists is logically necessary for entering into a relationship with the Divine. Finally, we turn to possible variants of (...) Schellenberg’s case, and argue that the modifications necessary to accommodate our criticismas leave those variants with much less of a sting than originally suggested by his provocative formulation. (shrink)

In this paper, I give an account and critique of what I call ‘Traditional Islamic Exclusivism’ – a specific Islamic interpretation of religious exclusivism. This Islamic version of religious exclusivism rests on exclusivist attitudes towards truth, epistemic justification and salvation. After giving an account of Traditional Islamic Exclusivism by explaining its theological roots in the Qur’an and ahadith, I proceed to critique it. I do so by arguing that Islamic epistemic exclusivism, which forms the main core of Traditional Islamic Exclusivism, (...) is implausible. This criticism subsequently opens up further lines of criticism and discussion of both salvific and alethic exclusivism in an Islamic context. I conclude with some remarks about the implications and significance of my criticisms of Traditional Islamic Exclusivism. (shrink)

Islam as a religion and a way of life guides millions of people around the world and has a significant impact on worldly affairs. To many Muslims, however, a philosophical understanding or assessment of Islamic belief is seen as a feeble and religiously inappropriate attempt to understand matters that are beyond rational comprehension. Islam: A Contemporary Philosophical Investigation explores this issue in detail, by guiding readers through a careful study of the relationship between faith and reason in Islam. In particular, (...) it pays close attention to religious objections to philosophizing about Islam, arguments for and against Islamic belief, and the rationality of Islamic belief in light of contemporary philosophical issues, such as problems of religious diversity, evil and religious doubt. (shrink)

Traditional Islamic theism gives us a certain picture of the world, in which the concepts of belief, providence and eschatology are involved. According to the traditional picture, belief in God is a universal phenomenon. This is because God has providentially arranged the world in such a manner that the signs of God are everywhere and which lead to knowledge of His existence. And, because the world is ‘providentially unambiguous’, those who do not have faith in God are culpable for their (...) lack of it, and therefore deserve eternal punishment in hell. In this paper, I argue that this traditional picture is simply false, or at the very least seriously contestable. I also explore the implications of my argument for those who might be interested in assessing the viability of some form of (Islamic) ‘revisionary theism’, in which the concepts of belief, providence and eschatology feature. (shrink)

Since its first delivery in 1993, J.L. Schellenberg’s atheistic argument from divine hiddenness keeps generating lively debate in various quarters in the philosophy of religion. Over time, the author has responded to many criticisms of his argument, both in its original evidentialist version and in its subsequent conceptualist version. One central problem that has gone undetected in these exchanges to date, we argue, is how Schellenberg’s explicit-recognition criterion for revelation contains discriminatory tendencies against mentally handicapped persons. Viewed from this angle, (...) our present critique imparts Schellenberg’s position with a philosophical dilemma: (1) endorsing divine discrimination to the effect that God does not love ‘cognitive-affective outsiders’ or (2) giving up on explicit recognition. Either way, the hiddenness argument does not succeed. (shrink)

In this article, I will examine Aristotle’s protreptic argument for the necessity of philosophy as it was deployed by Al-Kindi. I will show how a Muslim critic of philosophy, primarily one who is aligned with the theological outlook of Ibn Hanbal, can reasonably reject the protreptic argument as Al-Kindi presents it. The argument can, however, be reworked in a way to circumvent common criticisms of it presented by Hanbalī-style opponents of philosophy. Indeed, I will argue that, once the argument is (...) properly clarified with reference to what constitutes ‘philosophy’, its soundness is incontrovertible. In closing, I will briefly discuss why Muslim critics of philosophy need not see the protreptic argument as threatening, as the inevitability of philosophy does not necessitate a commitment to all sorts of philosophical positions, however problematic these may be for Islamic doctrine. (shrink)

U ovom ću članku razmotriti Aristotelov protreptički argument za nužnost filozofije kako ga je postavio Al-Kindi. Pokazat ću kako muslimanski kritičar filozofije, prvenstveno onaj koji je usklađen s teološkim stajalištima Ibn Hanbala, može s razlogom odbaciti protreptički argument kako ga predstavlja Al-Kindi. Međutim, argument se može preraditi na način da se zaobiđu uobičajene kritike koje iznose protivnici filozofije u stilu Hanbalīja. Dapače, tvrdit ću da je njegova ispravnost neupitna jednom kad se argument pravilno razjasni s obzirom na to kako se (...) treba shvatiti 'filozofiju'. Na kraju ću ukratko raspravljati o tome zašto muslimanski kritičari filozofije ne moraju smatrati protreptički argument problematičnim, budući da neizbježnost filozofije ne zahtijeva privrženost svim vrstama filozofskih pozicija, koliko god one bile problematične za islamsku doktrinu. (shrink)

In this brief reply I argue that criticisms of the hiddenness argument recently published in this journal by Imran Aijaz and Markus Weidler are without force. As will be shown, their critique of my conceptual version of the argument misses the mark by missing crucial distinctions. Their critique of my analogical version of the argument misunderstands that argument and also misapplies the work of W. H. Vanstone. And their critique of my view that belief is necessary for a certain (...) kind of relationship with God overlooks both some central features of that kind of relationship and some good reasons for not accepting acceptance or anything similarly nonbelieving as a substitute for belief in this context. (shrink)

This essay works at the intersection of two trends, one longstanding and one relatively more recent. First, it takes place against the background of the overwhelming influence that the category of ‘identity’ exercises on both contemporary knowledge production and political practice. Second, it responds to what has been called the ‘decolonial turn’ in theory. We compare the work of Gayatri Spivak, Aijaz Ahmad, and Walter Mignolo in terms of the following question: What kind of reflexive method do they deploy (...) in response to their recognition of the politics of knowledge production, that is, the existence of a relationship between social position and epistemic position? We then develop a novel distinction between post-colonial, anti-colonial, and de-colonial perspectives, one based not on backward-looking intellectual genealogies but on forward-looking political practices. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Diacritics 31.1 (2001) 56-72 [Access article in PDF] Deconstruction and ZionismJacques Derrida's Specters of Marx Christopher Wise No differance without alterity, no alterity without singularity, no singularity without here-now. —Jacques Derrida, Specters of Marx Introduction Following Jacques Derrida's first sustained critique of Marx and Marxism in Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning, and the New International (1994), an expanded version of his lectures (...) delivered at the University of California, Riverside, in May 1993, numerous "Marxist" theorists have responded to his provocative (and, for some, "untimely") intervention. Several of these critical responses have been gathered in Michael Sprinker's volume Ghostly Demarcations: A Symposium on Jacques Derrida's "Specters of Marx" (1999), which includes contributions from such diverse theorists as Pierre Macherey, Antonio Negri, Fredric Jameson, Terry Eagleton, Aijaz Ahmad, and many others. Important omissions from Sprinker's book include Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's "Ghostwriting" (1995), an essay that Derrida nonetheless comments upon in his response "Marx & Sons," or any other feminist analysis of Specters of Marx, a curious absence in a text so riveted by questions of patriarchal affiliation. An even more startling omission from Sprinker's book is any analysis of Derrida's discussion of the Middle East, especially his remarks on the State of Israel and "a certain Jewish [i.e. Zionist] discourse on the Promised Land" [Specters of Marx 60] ("un certain discours juif de la Terre" [Spectres de Marx 104]). The myopic range of Marxist critiques of Specters of Marx is regrettable insofar as both Derrida and his Marxist critics ostensibly offer "radical" or "oppositional" perspectives on George H. W. Bush's New World Order while ignoring imperialist practices in places like Jerusalem, Golan Heights, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip. In The End of the Peace Process (2001), Edward W. Said observes, "[w]hen one considers the broad lines of Jewish philosophy from [Martin] Buber to [Emmanuel] Levinas and perceives in it an almost total absence of reflection on the ethical dimensions of the Palestinian issue, one realizes how far one has to go" [208]. Said does not include Derrida in this trajectory of Jewish philosophers, possibly because Derrida has repeatedly disavowed any explicit affiliation with Judaism as religion, but I will argue here that Derrida's disavowal is implausible if not altogether disingenuous. In Ghostly Demarcations, Marxist responses to Derrida reveal how little real progress has been made in Western literary theory since the early 1980s, when now-tired debates about the Yale School echoed in nearly every humanities' corridor in the [End Page 56] United States. There are surely more compelling reasons to read Derrida today than to settle old scores with Ithaca-Irvine varieties of deconstruction. A key goal of this article is to enunciate Derrida's elision of the Palestinian question, not so much to undermine Specters of Marx, but to extend its power by venturing into domains that Derrida himself refuses to explore, a factor that weakens without totally disabling his deconstruction of Marxist theory. 1 The Rhetoric of Alterity In Specters of Marx, Derrida offers a complex, challenging, and virtuostic evaluation of Marx, focusing largely on "The Communist Manifesto" and The German Ideology. In particular, Derrida fixes his attention upon Marx's hostile and allegedly "obsessive" critique of Max Stirner, a rival Hegelian and "egological" anarchist. Derrida's criticisms of Marx turn on questions of spectrality, a suggestive way of describing the process whereby alienated or reified objects project illusory autonomy back upon the human subject. For purposes of the present essay, I draw attention to the rhetorical dimensions of the exchange between Derrida and his Marxist interlocutors, rather than the many subtleties implied by their respective analyses of this "new" concept formation. Such a strategy is useful not only because Derrida himself relies upon it in his essay "Marx & Sons," but also because it reveals key assumptions held by Derrida about deconstruction's political value, especially in the Middle East. Various contributors to Sprinker's volume do an impressive job of analyzing Derrida's critique of spectrality, especially Jameson, Warren Montag... (shrink)