In this chapter we extend earlier work (Vinuesa et al., Nat Commun 11, 2020) on the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) proposed by the United Nations (UN) for the 2030 Agenda. The present contribution focuses on three SDGs related to healthy and sustainable societies, i.e., SDG 3 (on good health), SDG 11 (on sustainable cities), and SDG 13 (on climate action). This chapter extends the previous study within those three goals and goes (...) beyond the 2030 targets. These SDGs are selected because they are closely related to the coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) pandemic and also to crises like climate change, which constitute important challenges to our society. (shrink)

In recent years, the genetic testing and selection of IVF embryos, known as preimplantation genetic testing (PGT), has gained much traction in clinical assisted reproduction for preventing transmission of genetic defects. However, a more recent ethically and morally controversial development in PGT is its possible use in selecting IVF embryos for optimal intelligence quotient (IQ) and other non–disease-related socially desirable traits, such as tallness, fair complexion, athletic ability, and eye and hair colour, based on polygenic risk scores (PRS), in what (...) is referred to as PGT-P. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning–based analysis of big data sets collated from genome sequencing of specific human ethnic populations can be used to estimate an individual embryo’s likelihood of developing such multifactorial traits by analysing the combination of specific genetic variants within its genome. Superficially, this technique appears compliant with Islamic principles and ethics. Because there is no modification of the human genome, there is no tampering with Allah’s creation (_taghyīr khalq Allah_). Nevertheless, a more critical analysis based on the five maxims of Islamic jurisprudence (_qawa'id fiqhiyyah_) that are often utilized in discourses on Islamic bioethics, namely _qaṣd_ (intention), _yaqın̄_ (certainty), _ḍarar_ (injury), _ḍarūra_ (necessity), and _`urf_ (custom), would instead reveal some major ethical and moral flaws of this new medical technology in the selection of non–disease-related socially desirable traits, and its non-compliance with the spirit and essence of Islamic law (shariah). Muslim scholars, jurists, doctors, and biomedical scientists should debate this further and issue a fatwa on this new medical technology platform. (shrink)

The construction of theoretical models in biology, situated at the cross-roads of biology, mathematics and computer science, often leads to a tool as final product. Its genesis can be named Infogenesis. The procedure of the resolution of theoretical problems is analyzed on examples of practical purposes taken from plant biology.The first example deals with mineral plant nutrition, explaining a way to go from theoretical ionic balances to the experimental realization of nutritional solutions with macro-element components.

Guidelines for a model bride in Islam based on Islamic teachings; includes stories of six exemplary Muslim wives during Prophet Muhammad's time.

A New Philosophy of History for our age of transition from the Christian era to the period of world-unity, combined with a penetrating analysis of our present situation, is offered by Karl Jaspers' Vom Ursprung und Ziel der Geschichte. Jaspers is, however, more post-Hegelian than post-Christian, and in fact anti-Hegelian, but pro-Christian. Rejecting Hegel's dictum that the appearance of Christ is the “axis of world history,” i.e. the aim of the preceding, and the origin of the subsequent, centuries, Jaspers tries (...) to discover the real axis of history empirically at about 500 b.c. Eager to find a common historical origin for East and West, he claims the time from 800 to 200 b.c. as axis-time. He believes that in these centuries, man as we know him to-day, with his religion, art, philosophy, and science, emerged in China, India, Iran, Palestine, and Greece. He further believes that a new axis-time is approaching, and the analysis of the three tendencies leading to it, i.e. of socialism, world-unity, and faith, forms one of the most valuable parts of the book. Like Toynbee he believes that a return to a transformed Biblical faith is necessary, if the West is to be saved. Pessimistic about the immediate future, he is optimistic concerning the remote future. History, as the history of single nations, states, or civilizations, is at an end. World History is only just now beginning. This is a book of European importance. It formulates the crucial question, whether Europe has still the spiritual strength to avoid a relapse into its Asiatic background with its despotism, uniformity and loss of personal liberty. In Jaspers' development, it marks a transition from reflecting upon mere possibilities to a consideration of historical reality. His booklet, The Spiritual Situation of our Time concluded with a chapter on “What may become of Man,” but what really did happen to man in the meantime proved that reality is much richer in possibilities than the liveliest imagination could possibly foresee. Does he now actually reach reality, or rather a “possible” History, as the stage on which man reveals himself in all his potentialities, and which moves from one fictitious axis-time to another equally fictitious? Jaspers' Einführung in die Philosophie, most enjoyable and a masterpiece of book-production, is the best introduction to his own philosophy. It emerges here as a possible form of philosophizing in an age of transition; original, sincere, cultivated and stimulating. His method is still the way of reflection, but this now includes meditation and self-examination. Jaspers rightly demands of-a philosopher a thorough knowledge of one special science, an equally penetrating knowledge of at least one great philosopher, and sincerity in his daily conduct and acceptance of responsibility for whatever he is doing. Should he succeed in educating a generation of philosophers on these lines, that would indeed give new hope for the future of European philosophy. Jaspers' Inaugural Lecture, Philosophic und Wissen-schaft, discusses in a clear and competent manner this important problem and clearly exposes the confusion of some contemporary conceptions of science, e.g. in Marxism. His lecture, Unsere Zukunft und Goethe, rejects a Goethe cult, but stresses the new manner in which Goethe could be appreciated by the present generation. All in all, Jaspers represents the best in German tradition, and is now one of the leading European philosophers. (shrink)