Dede Korkut Stories are a national cultural heritage that narrates about events and challenges of Oghuz Turks in 10th-11th centuries. This period of time is important, as it was the times when Turks became Muslims. In this work, heroism, customs, habits and traditions, socio-cultural and moral life of the Turks before and after becoming Muslims are analysed. One of the topics addressed in this work is religious beliefs and worships of the Turks after became Muslims. In this context, the belief (...) in Allah appears to be the most emphasized type of belief in the stories. The theme of fate, which is included in the subjects of Tawḥīd (oneness of Allāh) is another theme mentioned in the stories. The stories also includes some expressions regarding particularly the Prophet Muḥammad as well as some other prophets. Jibrīl and ʿAzrāʾīl angels are also mentioned. As for the Divine Books, only the Qur’ān is namely addressed and other divine books are not mentioned. The beliefs regarding afterlife, such as death, resurrection, heaven, hell, pool of al-Kawthar (abundance) are also referred to in the stories. The Book of Dede Korkut is not a didactic work written to teach Islam. On the contrary, in the stories, Islam is discussed as an element of the spirit/essence of individual and society. The aim of this study is to investigate the representations of the beliefs of tawḥīd, prophecy and hereafter of the Turks, especially the Oghuz Turks with reference to narrations in Dede Korkut stories. It aims to discuss them in the context of six pillars of faith and evaluate from the Islamic belief point of view.Summary: The Book of Dede Korkut consists of twelve epic stories created within the oral tradition of Turkish Folk Literature. It is said that the origins of these stories, which are one of the oldest works of Turkish Folk Literature, went as far as 7th century. It is generally accepted that the Book of Dede Korkut, which narrates about Oghuz Turks who lived in 10th-11th centuries was transferred to writing after 15th century. There is no information found about writer/s of the Book. Dede Korkut, who considered being the narrator of the stories, is in fact a character in the stories. Dede Korkut plays qobuz, reads poetry, names children, mediates in marital affairs, resolves disputes, and leads religious rituals in the stories. Therefore, he stands out as a saint figure and considered to be wise man of the Oghuz Turks in almost every story, especially regarding social events. In this work, there are many expressions about heroism, customs, habits and traditions, socio-cultural and moral experiences of the Turks before and after becoming Muslims. The stories bear many traces from the earlier Turkish beliefs. However, these are not the issues of this study. The dates of the emergence of the stories, 10th and 11th centuries, coincides with the times when the Turks became Muslim. This situation makes the stories more important as they include rich narratives about the fundamental beliefs of Islam. Especially the belief in Allāh, which is one of the six pillars of faith, appears to be the most emphasized in the stories. In these stories, Turkish and Persian names of Allāh as well as His Arabic names and attributes are mentioned directly or indirectly.The belief in predestination and casualty related with Allāh's eternal knowledge and determination is another faith object that takes place in the stories. The issues regarding the predestination discussed in the stories as follows: the deeds occur with the wish of Allāh; Allāh decides whether the child male or female; Allāh predestines human lifetime, livelihood, time of death and calamities.There are also narrations about the belief in the prophets in the stories. Particularly the Prophet Muhammad's prophecy is prioritised. Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Moses are the other prophets mentioned in the stories. The successive authority of Adam and His story with Iblīs; the wife and donkey of Noah, not burning of Abraham when he was thrown into the fire, the speaking of Allāh with Moses and the staff of Moses are some of the expressions related with prophecy in the stories. Nimrod against Abraham and Pharaoh against Moses are described as negative personalities in the stories. In the stories, the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) is handled in a position that intercession is demanded from Him. Greetings and prayers are read for Him. His intercession is sought for forgiveness of sins and acceptance of prayers. He is exalted with some attributions, such as the holly Prophet Peace be upon Him, friend of Allāh, the leader of religion and the headman of religion. When the Prophet Muhammad is mentioned, it is felt that there is a high respect and an enthusiastic love. When he is addressed, the expressions indicating respect and affection, such as "His name is magnificent Muhammad" and "His name is magnificent Muhammad Mustafa" are used in the stories.In the stories, only the Qur’ān is mentioned among the divine books, none of the Torah, the Zabūr and the Injīl is mentioned. It is referred that the Qur’ān descended from the heavens and it is the word of Allāh and His knowledge, and it was copied (collected) by Uthman. It is described as "Magnificent Qur’ān".It is seen in the stories that there is also a place for the belief in angels and only two of the four great angels are mentioned. One of them is ʿAzrāʾīl, the death angel. It is one of the main heroes in the story of Deli Dumrul. ʿAzrāʾīl is described as an angel from the sky, who has red-winged, who takes the souls of living beings by the command of Allāh and kill them. It is also narrated that ʿAzrāʾīl takes the form of human and pigeon, and the struggle of ʿAzrāʾīl with Deli Dumrul. The other great angel mentioned in the stories is Jibrīl. In the story of Emre, the Son of Begil, it is described as an angel fulfilling the commandments of Allāh. Apart from these, there is no information about other angels and their characteristics, such as not being gendered, not to sin, and being created from light. Within the scope of invisible beings, the Devil is also narrated in the stories as it did not prostrate itself to Adam, and therefore it was repelled and cursed.The principle of the belief in Hereafter, which is one of the pillars of faith, is also dealt with in the stories. The ending, death, resurrection, reckoning, Heaven, Hell, seeing Allāh's face in Heaven, drinking water from the pool of al-Kawthar are some of the topics addressed in relation to this principle. While talking about Heaven in the stories, the words "Uçmak" (flight) in Turkish and "Behesht" (paradise) in Persian are mentioned in addition to Arabic "Jannah" (heaven).The Book of Dede Korkut is not a religious book written to teach the ʿaqāʾid (beliefs) of Islam or its practices. On the contrary, it is a work that narrates about people’s lives and social experiences. There is neither any specific verse from the Qur’ān nor sayings or the deeds of the Prophet (ḥadīth) included in the stories. However, the contents of many issues stated in the Qur’ān and ḥadīth are expressed in the stories. For instance, the statements from the surah (chapter) al-Ikhlāṣ (sincerity), such as al-Aḥad (the one), Allāh begets not, nor was He begotten, and not being any equivalent to Him are mentioned in the stories. Likewise, not burning of the Prophet Abraham when thrown into the fire, speaking of Allāh with Moses and giving the stuff to him as a miracle are also stated in the Qur’ān. As for the pool of al-Kawthar, the believers’ seeing Allāh in Heaven, ineffectiveness of the deeds without saying in the name of Allah are mentioned in ḥadīths. However, some information that is not rooted in the Qur’ān and ḥadīths, such as the stinging of Nimrod's arrow is also encountered in the stories. Based on the narrations in the stories, it seems possible to draw the conclusion that the Oghuz Turks mentioned in the Book of Dede Korkut adopted Ahl al-Sunnah (people of Sunnah) interpretation of Islam. However, it should be reminded that this implication will lose its meaning if it is proved that the original versions of the stories were redesigned according to the interpretation of Ahl al-Sunnah in the process of transferring them into writing. (shrink)

Bu çalışmada, bitkibilimde kullanılan bir terim olan liken kelimesine, kök anlamına sadık kalarak Türkçe yeni bir karşılık önerilmektedir. Bu önerinin mantıksal çerçevesi, Antik Yunancadan, Orta Çağ Arapçasına, Orta Çağ Latincesine ve nihayetinde de Türkçeye kadar uzanan bir yelpazede, konuya esas teşkil eden tarihî metinlere ve onların kaydedildiği elyazmalarına dayanmaktadır. Türkçe metinlerde liken terimi yerine yalaç teriminin kullanımı öneri lmektedir. Bu öneri ülkemizdeki dilbilim, onomastik ve bitkibilim uzmanlarının eleştirel dikkatine sunulmaktadır.

In this study, the tahrîj method, which is used in answering contemporary Fiqh issues throughout the history of Fiqh, will be described and some sample fatwas given by the High Board of Religious Affairs based on this method will be analysed. Tahrîj is firstly to define the procedural and legal principles on which the singular views of a madhhab imam is based on, and then to determine the verdict of the issues in which an opinion from that imam is not (...) conveyed, according to the rules reached. Firstly the High Board of Religious Affairs will be introduced briefly highlighting issues such the effort put forward by the Board in the answering current fiqh issues, its contributions to the unity of fatwa and that it is a continuation of the Islamic Meşîhat-ı İslamiyye in the Ottoman Empire. Tahrîj, will be defined and its types, history, and its role in the development of fiqh and in solving current fiqh issues will be explained. Among the issues resolved by the High Board of Religious Affairs by applying the Tahrîj method or by making use of this method; commercial insurance, organ transplantation, gold-based lease certificate and the effect of injection/vaccine on fasting will be analysed. Given these exemplary fatwas, it will be tried to show that the method of Tahrîj is important today as it was in the past, both in terms of maintaining the consistency of fiqh and its contribution to the development of fiqh. (shrink)

Many philosophers have claimed that normative error theorists are committed to the claim ‘Error theory is true, but I have no reason to believe it’, which to some appears paradoxical. Case (2019) has claimed that the normative error theorist cannot avoid this paradox. In this paper, we argue that there is no paradox in the first place, that is once we clear up the ambiguity of the word ‘reason’, both on the error theorist’s side and those that claim that there (...) is a self-defeat problem. Upon clarification, we also raise scepticism to what exactly the nature of self-defeat is meant to be. (shrink)

This paper theoretically and experimentally investigates the behavior of asymmetric players in guessing games. The asymmetry is created by introducing r>1\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$r>1$$\end{document} replicas of one of the players. Two-player and restricted N-player cases are examined in detail. Based on the model parameters, the equilibrium is either unique in which all players choose zero or mixed in which the weak player (r=1\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$r=1$$\end{document}) imitates the strong (...) player (r>1\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$r>1$$\end{document}). A series of experiments involving two and three-player repeated guessing games with unique equilibrium is conducted. We find that equilibrium behavior is observed less frequently and overall choices are farther from the equilibrium in two-player asymmetric games in contrast to symmetric games, but this is not the case in three-player games. Convergence towards equilibrium exists in all cases but asymmetry slows down the speed of convergence to the equilibrium in two, but not in three-player games. Furthermore, the strong players have a slight earning advantage over the weak players, and asymmetry increases the discrepancy in choices (defined as the squared distance of choices from the winning number) in both games. (shrink)

The Synoptic Problem is a puzzle that scholars have desired to solve since the 18th century. The discussion has a religious background, because it is about the first three canonical Gospels of the Church, namely Matthew, Mark and Luke, which came to be called the Synoptic Gospels. The discussion, in the most basic context, concentrates on the point that there is a possible relationship or connection between the Synoptic Gospels and that each one is substantially similar to another but at (...) the same time includes different aspects. This theoretical discussion separates the Gospel of John from the Synoptic Gospels and does not see it as a main source for the history of Jesus. The method of discussion is based on the reading of the Synoptic Gospels from a birds-eye-view, as seen together, and as comparatively in relation to each other. The aim of the discussion is to reach accurate historical information about Jesus and the birth of Christianity by analyzing the possible relationship between the Synoptic Gospels through their sources. Several hypotheses have been proposed for the solution of the Synoptic Problem. However, all the modern studies in the context of the problem are carried out by Western scholars. In other words, Synoptic Problem is a relatively unknown subject in the Turkish academic circles. So in this paper the aim is to draw the attention of the Turkish academy to the substance and framework of the Synoptic Problem through an introductory survey. In addition, some results that can be reached in this context will be exemplified by getting help from the redaction criticism. Summary: The Synoptic Problem is a puzzle that scholars have been trying to solve since the 18th century. The discussion has a religious background, for it is about the first three canonical Gospels of the Church (namely Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which are called the Synoptic Gospels). The discussion, in the most basic context, concentrates on a possible relationship or connection between the Synoptic Gospels and that each one is substantially similar to another one, but at the same time including different aspects. This theoretical discussion separates the Gospel of John from the Synoptic Gospels, and does not see it as a main source for the history of Jesus. The method of this discussion is based on the broad reading of the Synoptic Gospels as well as a comparison in relation to each other. The aim of the discussion is to reach accurate historical information about Jesus and the birth of Christianity by analyzing the possible relationship between the Synoptic Gospels through their sources.The traditional four Gospels have been debated since ancient times. There have been many dimensions of these discussions. However, whether the Gospels contain contradictory information or not has always been at the forefront. Pagan writers, such as Celsus or Porphyry, criticized the Gospels in this respect. Christian writers, such as Marcion or Tatian who lived in the second century when the Gospels were not seen as canon yet, raised some suggestions based on the doubts that the Gospels were incompatible with the Jewish scriptures and contained contradictions among themselves. Marcion included a single Gospel that was close to the Gospel of Luke in his New Testament canon. Tatian made a mixed version of the four Gospels. In the next stage, the contradictions in the Gospels were explained by the Christian writers, such as Origenes or Augustine. However, the four Gospels were more prominent in this new era and they were regarded as canons by the Church. Therefore, the Christian writers’ approach to the Gospels also began to change. Origen emphasized allegorical interpretation which had been known since the Jewish philosopher Philo (d. 50) in Alexandria. Thus, he wanted to protect the contradictory texts from being seen as the source of the problem. He argued that the problem was the human mind that could not grasp the allegorical mystery of the text or the narrative in the text. Augustine had a similar approach with the suggestion that the Gospels should be read by a faithful heart. According to Augustine, it is natural that the Gospels reflect different characters because the Gospel writers describe Christ differently. In order to be able to comprehend the divine meaning in these texts, the Gospels must be read in a spiritual mood. After all, all these Christian writers aimed to respond to the criticism by the pagan writers regarding the Gospels, as well as the current suspicions in the minds of Christians.Origen was the first Christian thinker to devote an effort to solve the debates on the Gospels in a logical and systematic way. As for Augustine, he was the starting point of the Synoptic Problem since Augustine was the first to mention the links between the Gospels texts, namely the idea that the authors of the Gospels may have used each other as sources. However, in the modern sense, the Synoptic Problem has been transformed into an academic discipline by the intellectuals who followed the path of Enlightenment thinkers, such as Reimarus (1684-1768), Lessing (1729-1781), Griesbach (1745-1812), and Eichhorn (1752-1827). Because modern researchers differ from old writers based on Church ideologies, they began to demolish traditional beliefs about the Gospels. Thus, the effort to harmonize incompatible narratives in the Gospels is left aside. Indeed, the ancient writers put a lot of effort into it. Now, in the places where indirect relations can be established between the Gospels, the idea of finding the common hypothetical sources of these Gospels is prominent. The claim that the Gospels were directly connected to Jesus as a historical figure has been gradually faded away. The basis of the Synoptic Problem is the comparative reading of the Synoptic Gospels. In the modern sense, this comparison and its interpretation was made by J. J. Griesbach (1745-1812) for the first time. Griesbach was the first scholar to compare Matthew, Mark, and Luke in a way to create a synopsis. His comparison is based on a reading done by placing several passages or narratives from the Gospels side by side.Many hypotheses have been put forward for the solution of the Synoptic Problem. Two-Source Hypotheses, Four-Source Hypotheses, and Farrer Theory are the most popular ones among researchers. These views are based on Marcan Priority. In this context, independently from each other, Matthew and Luke used Mark’s text as their sources. Also, according to the Two-Sources and Four-Source Hypotheses, the authors of Matthew and Luke used another written document as their sources. This document is named the “Q” which derives from the German word “Quellen.” In this way, it is assumed that the Q-document and the Gospel of Mark are the sources of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.The writers of the Gospels wrote their own texts by using written and oral sources. One of the scholarly methods is the redaction criticism that explores how the Gospel writers shaped the old literary documents by arranging, re-shaping, and revising them. This theory looks at whether the source used by an author is known and available today in order to understand whether how the author used his sources would provide important clues about his tendencies or ideologies. In this regard, the theory of the Marcan priority can be rendered functional along with the redaction criticism. In doing so, it is possible to reach important conclusions about Jesus and the birth of Christianity, as well as the theological and ideological ideas of the unknown authors of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. First of all, the authors of Matthew and Luke used Mark’s text as their sources. Secondly, we have these three Gospels today. And finally, the ways in which the writers of Matthew and Luke shaped the text, phrases, or expressions of Mark reveal important results about their thoughts. The analysis shows that the authors of Matthew and Luke sometimes made additons that could be called interpolation to Mark’s text; sometimes they wanted to censor some statements in Mark; sometimes they tried to explain or clarify some statements in the Mark, or sometimes they tried to blur clear expressions and expositions in Mark's text. These authors did not do such things without a reason. They wanted to reshape Mark’s text in accordance with their theological understanding of Jesus as Christ. In this context, according to some expressions in Mark, Jesus' power had a limit. The authors of Matthew and Luke did not find these statements appropriate, because they changed Mark’s some statements to create an impression that Jesus’ power was not limited. This proves that the authors of Matthew and Luke re-arranged their resources to present Jesus as a superhuman being. Similarly, in Mark, there are lines in which Jesus declares his loyalty and servitude to the God of Israel. In such passages, he presented his personality in a low Christology context against God. However, the authors of Matthew and Luke were disturbed by such statements, because they intervened in these statements in Mark. They wanted to change some of the meanings and contexts in Mark’s text through such interventions and presented Jesus as Christ in a high Christological context to their readers. In the end, all these researches also responded to the question of to what extent the Gospels provide reliable information on a historical basis. (shrink)

Islamic sociologist Ali Shariati is a leading figure of the reconstruction of religious thought in the Islamic world known especially for his anti-capitalist stance and leftist reading of Islamic history. In the philosophy of history that he developed, he classified religions as religions of tawheed and religions of shirk. According to this new reading of history, the main struggle is not between religion and secularism but between religions of tawheed and of sheerk. The issue of the gaining and the distribution (...) of the property is central to his classification. Shariati argued that followers of tawheed and of sheerk can be found in all religions including Islam. To support his argument Shariati explored how capitalistic understanding of Islam has been developed and legalised while anti-capitalist messages and orders of Islam were marginalised and illegalised just after the death of the Prophet Mohammed. He analysed the rivalry between his close companions over the content of a proper Islamic economic order and how this rivalry gave way to two contradicting understanding of Islam, marks of which can be seen today in the contemporary Muslim world. He coined the term ‘abluted capitalism’ to define the economic policies of Muslim sovereigns to make Islam compatible with capitalist economic principles. (shrink)

In the report the parity of true and knowledge on the basis of reconsideration of communication of true opinion and knowledge, and also interpretation of the term "opinion" in Plato’s gnosiology is considered. Described Set of cognitive procedures of the subject of the knowledge in it, necessary for reception of knowledge from true, is comparable to functions and results of influence of criterion of true in cognitive process. The importance of these efforts of the subjectguarantees Plato and Aristotle theory of (...) knowledge against suspicions of poststructuralists and postmodernists in «decentralization, « death of «subject».Thus the author finds out not only discrepancy, but also the certain continuity of gnosiological ideas of postmodernism with the standard concept of knowledge, which basis were put in pawn by Plato. In opinion of the author, such comparative analysis allows to reconsider settled representations on communication of categories «true» and «knowledge», and also to narrow an empirical field of «false knowledge» due to introduction of the term «imaginary knowledge». The parity of trueproved in given clause and knowledge to some extent reflects metamorphosises of true which in postmodernism are designated as «game of true». In the report statements from Plato's works «Menon», «Teatet», «Timaeus», «Pir», and also from Hegel, Heidegger's works, Deleuze, Badiue, Denete and other philosophers are used. (shrink)

The history of European western philosophy.

This article presents four analyses of an interaction between the middle-Bronze Age Pharaoh Nibmuarea and the Babylonian king Kadashman-Enlil as described in the Amarna letters (Moran [1992] The Amarna Letters, The Johns Hopkins Universiy Press, Baltimore, Maryland). Intent on denying the Pharaoh his daughter in marriage, the Babylonian king was faced with the choice of sending messengers who could (''dignitaries'') or could not identify (''non-dignitaries'') his missing sister in the Pharaoh's court. Intent on marrying the king's daughter, the Pharaoh was (...) faced with the choice of showing the sister or showing someone else. Based on the assumption of complete information (game 1), the analysis revealed a dominant-strategy equilibrium: Nibmuarea shows the sister and Kadashman-Enlil sends non-dignitaries. Based on the assumption of one-sided incomplete information (Pharaoh's misperception; game 2), the analysis revealed that the Pharaoh had a dominant strategy of showing the sister irrespective of whether the king is keen or reluctant to learn about his sister's fate. Based on the assumption of one-sided incomplete information (Kadashman-Enlil's misperception; game 3), the analysis revealed that if non-dignitaries are sent, the Pharaoh prefers showing someone other than his sister. Based on the assumption of two-sided incomplete information (game 4), the Pharaoh finds it more beneficial to present the sister irrespective of whether his intentions are genuine or feigned. With incomplete information, it is difficult to judge the other's intentions; the cost of being caught cheating by not showing the sister to knowledgeable messengers was quite high. These analyses highlight the strategic uncertainty that characterized this Bronze-Age interaction. (shrink)

Semiotics constitutes an untapped and interdisciplinary source of enrichment for the discipline of International Relations theory. We propose two visual metaphors to that effect to interpret the figure depicting the central claim of structural realism offered by late Kenneth Waltz who is one of the most disputed, read, and inspiring IR theorists. The figure is the tenor of both metaphors. The vehicles are two paintings by Mark Rothko, namely, “Green and Tangerine on Red” and the “Number 14.” The metaphors generate (...) innumerable meanings for the tenor and eliminate the criticism that SR is a static and an ahistorical theory. Thus, they benefit the Discipline characterised by academic cleavages on the meaning of theory, science, and production of knowledge. (shrink)

We focus on a key IR Theory article by Alexander Wendt (1992) and two Jackson Pollock paintings. Our aim is to identify meanings Pollock’s art communicates and reveals for Wendt (1992). It derives from an appeal to visual imagination and a desire for semiotic interpretation of Constructivist view of anarchy. The visual sign is an association such that there is Wendt’s theoretical claim on the one hand and an abstract painting on the other. We do not gaze at Wendt’s claim, (...) we read it. We do not read a painting, look at it. This remark does not imply a one-way relationship. We can argue that a specific painting comes to life in our mind where colored movements are inextricably mixed up when we read the constructivist claim. Both Pollock paintings selected for our sign-making effort confirm the dynamic character of Constructivism and reveal not only three but countlessly many anarchies in international relations. They foment our assessments of abrupt changes of intersubjectivity among states. Cyclicality of dripped paints provides an anchor to fix Wendt’s anarchy conceptualization in these structural-abstract paintings. As to Wendt’s concept of anarchy, it acts as a helper, as a standard, against which interpretations of Pollock’s artwork construct meanings. (shrink)

All democratic constitutions feature "the people" as their author and ultimate source of legitimacy. They claim to embody the political form that citizens are in some sense supposed to have given themselves. But in what sense, exactly? When does a constitution really or genuinely speak for the people? Such questions are especially pertinent to our present condition, where the voice of "the people" turns out to be irrevocably fragmented, and people themselves want to speak and be heard in their own (...) voices. _Founding Acts_ explores the relationship between constitutional claims of popular sovereignty and the practice of constitution-making in our pluralistic age. Serdar Tekin argues that the process of making a constitution, or its pedigree, is as morally and politically significant as its content. Consequently, democratic constitution-making is not only about making a democratic constitution but also about making it, as much as possible, democratically. Tekin develops two overarching arguments in support of this claim. First, citizen participation in the process of constitution-making is essential to the democratic legitimacy of a new constitution. Second, collective action, that is, the political experience of constructing public life together, is what binds diverse people into a democratic peoplehood. Bringing into dialogue a wide range of canonical and contemporary thinkers, Tekin examines historical realities extending from revolutionary America and France to contemporary South Africa and Germany. (shrink)

In this study, it is tried to put forth some explanations on the definition of vitality referring to the historical definition of biology that can be considered as thestudy of life. In accordance with the explanations, the necessity of revision and distinction of some terms in the contemporary biology is also mentioned. The first among which is the updating of the term known as homeostasis into homeokinesis. For this reason, a number of propositions are emphasized in order to clarify the (...) distinction of meaning. The following three questions were repeated in the process and structure of the article: 1) What is vitality? 2) Does it have any degrees or grades? 3) If so, what is the basic-vitality? In the search for an answer to these questions, different topics of biology are cited as references. At the same time, by claiming that vitality is an emergent process, it is proposed to follow the emergentist view, rather than the reductionist view on the statements of biological facts and phenomena. As a result, the cell level in the hierarchy of the biological organization is discussed first and a threefold-vitality view emergent in the levels of cell, organ and organism is put forth. Consciousness and memory are immanent in every level of the proposed threefold-vitality. -/- Keywords: Life, Cell, Homeokinesis, Consciousness. (shrink)

This study will examine how Dāvūd al-Qarṣī, an 18th-century Ottoman scholar, resolved the paradox between human freewill and God being the creator of everything in his work Risālâh fi’l-ikhtiyārāt al-juzʾiyyah wa’l-irādāt al-qalbiyyah. In addition, in this study, the critical edition and translation of the risālah will also be provided. The treatise which is the subject of the present study is a link in the series of works written under the title of human acts in the Islamic thought tradition regarding al-irādah (...) al-juzʾiyyah, afʿāl al-ʿibād, khalq al-aʿmāl, qaḍā, and qadar. This risālah is one of the rare examples prepared with the method of “mamzūj annotation (sharḥ)”, which is a method in which “text” and “annotation” are intertwined. Qarṣī examines in detail a total of seven views, four of which are famous (mashhūr) and three of which are non-famous, about voluntary acts. Qarṣī interprets the approaches and views of the non-famous sects and includes them in the famous sects and allocates approximately 4/3 of the work to these sects. In the final stage of the work, the author states that the view of Māturīdīs is parallel with the predecessor’s (Salaf) view of “Neither jabr nor tafwīḍ; rather, it is merely a situation between these two approaches.” Qarṣī, who was inspired by Athīrī Maḥmad Afandī (d. 1092/1681), says that voluntary acts come about by the sum of “two powers (qudrat)”, “two wishes (mashīʾat)” and “one taqwīn”. Also, according to this, the first four of them are proximate causes, while the attribute taqwīn is the influencing factor. Qarṣī acts from the meanings of the term action (fiʿl) and the “theory of state (ḥāl)” in order to prove that human beings are true agents (fāʿil) on the one hand and to protect God’s attribute of creation on the other. In fact, the concept of “state (ḥāl)”, used in understanding divine attributes and some ontological issues, was applied to acts by the Māturīdī mutakallim Ṣadr al-Sharīʿa al-Thānī (d. 747/1346). Thus, a doctrine of action was developed, and this doctrine was accepted and used by the later period Māturīdī mutakallims. With reference to Ṣadr al-Sharīʿa, Qarṣī tries to justify the issue based on the meanings of the the term action and the modes of existence of these meanings. He says that action has two implications; one of them is the “infinitive meaning” (al-maʿnā al-maṣdarī) and the other is “the thing that comes with this infinitive meaning (al-ḥāṣıl bi-maṣdar)”. The infinitive meaning of the act constitutes the “non-thing aspect” of the action, and the meaning of the action that is created with the infinitive indicates “the thing aspect” thereof. Thus, because the aspect of the action that is not existentand therefore not a thing is not subject to creation, the agency and responsibility of human beings are grounded. Similarly, Qarṣī maintains that the mashīʾat, which means will, qaṣd and al-irādah al-juzʾiyyah, was not created because its existence in humans is in the form of succession and it is of a state-like (ḥāl) existenceOn this account. Qarṣī manages to preserve both human freewill and the absolute creativity of God due to the non-existent and non-thing aspect of the act on the one hand, and will (irādah), mashīʾat and qaṣd not being subjected to creation on the other. (shrink)

The recent revival of the theme of hospitality in the humanities and social sciences reflects a shared concern with issues of belonging, identity and placement that arises out of the experience of globalized social life. In this context, migration — or spatial dislocation and relocation — is often equated with demands for hospitality. There is a need to engage more carefully with the ‘proximities’ that prompt acts of hospitality and inhospitality; to attend more closely to their spatial and temporal dimensions. (...) Is the stranger or the Other primarily one who is recognisably ‘out of place’? Or is there more to being estranged than moving from one territory to another? This brings us to the question of human finitude, and to the possibility of encounters with others that do not simply only occur in time or space, but are themselves generative of new times and spaces. (shrink)

In Nicomachean Ethics X.7, Aristotle argues that perfect happiness consists in contemplation alone. The question that I want to take up in this essay is whether the superiority of contemplative life fits with Aristotle’s argument for the self-sufficiency of the political life, according to which politics can lead us to happiness without being guided by philosophical knowledge of the highest sort. My basic argument is that, paradoxical as it may seem, Aristotle is led to acknowledge that contemplative life is superior (...) to political life by the same strand of argumentation which makes him plea for the self-sufficiency of the political life in the first place. In order to show how this argument unfolds, I take my point of departure from Aristotle’s analysis of phronēsis as stated in Nicomachean Ethics VI and bring it to bear on his discussion of the respective virtues of the contemplative and political ways of life in Politics VII. (shrink)

Robert M. Adams (1979, 1987a, 1987b) defends a modified variant of the divine command theory (hereafter MDCT) to the effect that he proposes a moral argument for God’s existence driven in the form of practical reasoning with respect to rational moral agents’ beliefs in the adequacy of MDCT. For Adams, one’s commitment to MDCT as the most adequate theory legitimately provides her a practical reason for why she ought to believe in God’s existence which MDCT implies. In this paper, I (...) criticize the viability of Adams’ moral argument considering its argumentative structure and strategy. Adams’ strategy behind his moral argument, i.e. mediating theistic beliefs with deontic ones, seeks out a non-decisive medium that might be used to ubiquitously generate equally plausible arguments for/against God’s existence based on distinct sorts of allegedly adequate theories of some subject matter. Thus, his argument does not seem to distinctively ground God’s existence in comparison with a myriad of practical arguments which might follow the same argumentative strategy on the same practical grounds. More significantly, there seems to be coherent no way for Adams to disambiguate his argument on theoretical grounds. (shrink)

The divine command meta-ethics (hereafter, DCM) promote non-naturalist realism about the ontological status of moral properties while depending on this ontological status on a such-and-such divine being’s moral roles derived from some relevant divine characteristics. As DCM typically contends, our moral discourse depends on God’s commands and prohibitions to the effect that an action A is morally right if and only if God commands A. Robert M. Adams (1979, 1987a) offers a modification that explicates the dependency relation between a loving (...) God’s commands and moral properties on metaphysical grounds to the effect that some action A is morally right if and only if it is not logically but metaphysically necessary for a loving God to command A. In this paper, I discuss whether Adams’ modification stands for a cogent account of DCM in a few respects. Firstly, Adams fails to provide robust reasons for grounding moral realism so that his commitment to the reality of moral properties merely expresses a theoretically unwarranted assumption hinging on a presumptive case in our moral discourse. Particularly, his assumption on the pervasiveness of strongly held moral beliefs is unwarranted and it inherits a vague notion of certainty. Secondly, Adams' response to the Euthyphro dilemma does not satisfactorily sort out the concerns accompanying this dilemma, mainly because his response relies on a vague notion of divine love that allegedly necessitates God commanding morally permissible acts while this notion cannot be trivially reducible into a moral aspect. (shrink)

Sosyal medya, insanları alış veriş alışkanlıklarından yatırım kararlarına kadar birçok ticari niyetleri üzerinde yüksek etki düzeyi olduğu güncel birçok çalışmada araştırılmaya başlanmıştır ve bu ilişki ortaya konmuştur. Bu ilişki üzerine inşa edilerek geliştirilen güncel analiz yöntemleri yatırım araçlarının gelecek değerlerini tahmin ederek yatırım kararları almada bir destek mekanizması olarak kullanılması çok cazip bir konudur. Bu sebeple bu ilişki yatırımcı ve analistlerden akademisyenlere kadar güncel bir ilgi konusu olmuştur. Bu çalışmanın amacı da sosyal medya ile yatırım kararları arasındaki ilişkiyi metinsel ve (...) finansal analiz aracılığı ile görmeye çalışmaktır. Bu çalışmada Twitter üzerinden metin madenciliği ile veri çekilmiş ve sentiment(duygu) analizi ile yorumların olumlu ya da olumsuz olma durumu incelenmiştir. Sentiment analizinden elde edilen sayısal değerler ile güncel ve küresel bir yatırım aracı olan Bitcoin fiyatları arasındaki ilişkinin varlığını sorgulamak adına Granger Nedensellik analizi gibi finansal analizler kullanılmıştır. (shrink)

Many moral realists have employed a strategy for arguing for moral realism by claiming that if epistemic normativity is categorical and that if this epistemic normativity exists, then categorical normativity exists. In this paper, we will discuss that argument, examine a way out, and respond to the objections people have recently raised in the literature. In the end, we conclude that the objections to our way out will do little in the way of motivating those who already do not believe (...) in categorical normativity, thereby severing the power the aforementioned parity argument is designed to possess. (shrink)