The regional brain networks and the underlying neurophysiological mechanisms subserving the cognition of visual narrative in humans have largely been studied with non-invasive brain recording. In this study, we specifically investigated how regional and cross-regional cortical activities support visual narrative interpretation using intracranial stereotactic electroencephalograms recordings from thirteen human subjects (6 females, and 7 males). Widely distributed recording sites across the brain were sampled while subjects were explicitly instructed to observe images from fables presented in “sequential” order, and a set (...) of images drawn from multiple fables presented in “scrambled” order. Broadband activity mainly within the frontal and temporal lobes were found to encode if a presented image is part of a visual narrative (sequential) or random image set (scrambled). Moreover, the temporal lobe exhibits strong activation in response to visual narratives while the frontal lobe is more engaged when contextually novel stimuli are presented. We also investigated the dynamics of interregional interactions between visual narratives and contextually novel series of images. Interestingly, the interregional connectivity is also altered between sequential and scrambled sequences. Together, these results suggest that both changes in regional neuronal activity and cross-regional interactions subserve visual narrative and contextual novelty processing. (shrink)

The intensity and prevalence of viral infections are typically higher in males, whereas disease outcome can be worse for females. Females mount higher innate and adaptive immune responses than males, which can result in faster clearance of viruses, but also contributes to increased development of immunopathology. In response to viral vaccines, females mount higher antibody responses and experience more adverse reactions than males. The efficacy of antiviral drugs at reducing viral load differs between the sexes, and the adverse reactions to (...) antiviral drugs are typically greater in females than males. Several variables should be considered when evaluating male/female differences in responses to viral infection and treatment: these include hormones, genes, and gender‐specific factors related to access to, and compliance with, treatment. Knowledge that the sexes differ in their responses to viruses and to treatments for viral diseases should influence the recommended course of action differently for males and females.Editor's suggested further reading in BioEssays X‐chromosome‐located microRNAs in immunity: Might they explain male/female differences Abstract. (shrink)

Islamic education has been regarded as a thorn in the side of religious minority community integration into the nation state, and consequently to the expression of citizenship. Expressions of citizenship are associated with public participation while Islamic education is more readily associated with retreat and isolation of religious communities. At the same time the pervasiveness of religion in public life has led to calls for the post-secular—that is where religious communities are present in secular society. Habermas demonstrates that a public (...) which is literary constituted through critical rational communication is an effective means with which individuals can participate in the public sphere of modern society. Literary publics get constituted when three features are satisfied; writing, reading and discussing matters of common interest. The article considers the features of a literary public in relation to a review of some literature on the Deobandi education movement. The article argues that Islamic education at Deobandi institutions is able to constitute a literary public through the use of common texts in vernacular languages which are accessible to individuals who can then read and discuss them. The article suggests, then, that Islamic education within the Deobandi network of institutions opens up fascinating possibilities for expressing of post-secular citizenship requiring further research. (shrink)

Religion moves into the realm of the rational the moment when specific and specified texts are generated, reproduced and disseminated according to Weber. As such, the capacity to generate, reproduce and disseminate concepts from texts is shown to be consequential. In Weber’s work, the presence of women is not overt. Scholarship has explored how women are positioned in religious texts, but comparatively little scholarship has engaged with how they generate, reproduce and disseminate texts. This article interrogates the position of women (...) in relation to a religious textual generation, reproduction and dissemination within an Islamic tradition. Ethnographic data from a Deobandi-aligned education institution or madrasa was drawn on. Data were analysed with regard to how the texts used in the institution of Islamic learning are generated, reproduced and disseminated and the position of women in this regard. Contribution: Findings illustrated that women are key disseminators of particular forms of Islamic (religious) texts. As such, there are opportunities for women to generate and reproduce their own meaning of the texts. The article enhanced scholarship with regard to how women are able to maintain, extend and expand theologies. In this way, it demonstrated how women might be empowered to do so. (shrink)

Religion moves into the realm of the rational the moment when specific and specified texts are generated, reproduced and disseminated according to Weber. As such, the capacity to generate, reproduce and disseminate concepts from texts is shown to be consequential. In Weber’s work, the presence of women is not overt. Scholarship has explored how women are positioned in religious texts, but comparatively little scholarship has engaged with how they generate, reproduce and disseminate texts. This article interrogates the position of women (...) in relation to a religious textual generation, reproduction and dissemination within an Islamic tradition. Ethnographic data from a Deobandi-aligned education institution or madrasa was drawn on. Data were analysed with regard to how the texts used in the institution of Islamic learning are generated, reproduced and disseminated and the position of women in this regard. Contribution: Findings illustrated that women are key disseminators of particular forms of Islamic (religious) texts. As such, there are opportunities for women to generate and reproduce their own meaning of the texts. The article enhanced scholarship with regard to how women are able to maintain, extend and expand theologies. In this way, it demonstrated how women might be empowered to do so. (shrink)

Challenges the picture according to which Islamic culture during the European middle ages served as a passive conduit of ancient Greek sources to the Latin West, along with the conjoined conception that the Islamic achievement in science was a mere reflection, and perhaps a dim one, of earlier Greek achievements. Against this view, this article argues for the "naturalization" of science in the classical Islamic context in a way that allowed for distinctive achievements in their own right.

The undoubted truth is that there exist for the planetary motions true and constant configurations from which no impossibilities or contradictions follow; they are not the same as the configurations asserted by Ptolemy; and Ptolemy neither grasped them nor did his understanding get to imagine what they truly are.

The "Text" and the "Commentary" mentioned in the title of this essay are, respectively, the "Kitāb al-Manāẓir", or "Optics", of al-Ḥasan ibn al-Haytham, composed in the first half of the fifth/eleventh century, and the "Tanqīḥ al-Manāẓir li-dhawī l-abṣār wa l-baṣā'ir", written by Abū l-Ḥasan (or al-Ḥasan) Kamāl al-Dīn al-Fārisī in the second half of the seventh/thirteenth century. It is known that, so far, only the first five of the seven "maqālāt"/Books that make up the Arabic text of IH's "Optics" have (...) been published, and that the "Tanqīḥ" was published in two volumes. I shall be concerned with certain episodes in the lives of these two works, my aim being to shed light on their transmission within the Islamic Arabic and Persian worlds. -/- . (shrink)

La insistencia de Ibn Hazm en la interpretación literal del Corán y la Sunna ha llevado frecuentemente a los investigadores modernos a concluir que él es un pensador conservador o dogmático. En realidad, no es ninguna de las dos cosas. El zahirismo de Ibn Hazm enfatiza el alcance limitado de la ley religiosa islámica, e intenta reducir las pretensiones de los juristas musulmanes de hablar en nombre de la ley de Dios. Esta metodología le lleva a apoyar el racionalismo, el (...) individualismo y el anticlericalismo. Ibn Hazm argumenta con consistencia a favor de estos principios en sus trabajos sobre teoría legal islámica, entre los que se incluye el texto al-Nubdha al-kafiya fi usul ahkam al-din que traducimos aquí. Esta propuesta implica socavar todo el sistema del madhhab, lo que explica la reacción negativa que recibió del sistema religioso establecido. En lugar del madhhab, Ibn Hazm intenta hacer valer la responsabilidad individual de cada musulmán en la obediencia a la ley de Dios, tal y como se revela claramente en el texto sagrado del Islam. (shrink)

La insistencia de Ibn Hazm en la interpretación literal del Corán y la Sunna ha llevado frecuentemente a los investigadores modernos a concluir que él es un pensador conservador o dogmático. En realidad, no es ninguna de las dos cosas. El zahirismo de Ibn Hazm enfatiza el alcance limitado de la ley religiosa islámica, e intenta reducir las pretensiones de los juristas musulmanes de hablar en nombre de la ley de Dios. Esta metodología le lleva a apoyar el racionalismo, el (...) individualismo y el anticlericalismo. Ibn Hazm argumenta con consistencia a favor de estos principios en sus trabajos sobre teoría legal islámica, entre los que se incluye el texto al-Nubdha al-kafiya fi usul ahkam al-din que traducimos aquí. Esta propuesta implica socavar todo el sistema del madhhab, lo que explica la reacción negativa que recibió del sistema religioso establecido. En lugar del madhhab, Ibn Hazm intenta hacer valer la responsabilidad individual de cada musulmán en la obediencia a la ley de Dios, tal y como se revela claramente en el texto sagrado del Islam. (shrink)

ʿUthmān ibn Ibrāhīm al-Nābulusī. The Sword of Ambi- tion: Bureaucratic Rivalry in Medieval Egypt. Edited and translated by Luke Yarbrough. Library of Arabic Literature. New York: New York University Press, 2016. Pp. xliv + 261. $40.

Ethical research conduct is a cornerstone of research practice particularly when research participants include vulnerable populations. This study mapped the extent of reporting ethical research practices in studies conducted among refugees and war-affected populations in the Arab World, and assessed variations by time, country of study, and study characteristics. An electronic search of eight databases resulted in 5668 unique records published between 2000 and 2013. Scoping review yielded 164 eligible articles for analyses. Ethical research practices, including obtaining institutional approval, access (...) to the community/research site, and informed consent/assent from the research participants, were reported in 48.2, 54.9, and 53.7% of the publications, respectively. Institutional approval was significantly more likely to be reported when the research was biomedical in nature compared to public health and social, when the study employed quantitative compared to qualitative or mixed methodologies, and when the journal required a statement on ethical declarations. Institutional approval was least likely to be reported in papers that were sole-authored, when these did not mention a funding source, or when published in national journals. Similar results were obtained for access to the community site and for seeking informed consent/assent from study participants. The responsibility of inadequacies in adherence to ethical research conduct in crisis settings is born by a multitude of stakeholders including funding agencies, institutional research boards, researchers and international relief organizations involved in research, as well as journal editors, all of whom need to play a more proactive role for enhancing the practice of ethical research conduct in conflict settings. (shrink)

By reaching perfection and closeness to God and reaching the source of the light of existence, man can benefit from his endless mercy. Almighty God is absolute perfection, and nearness to absolute perfection is the main goal of creation. Considering that those who are not God do not have anything of their own, and whatever perfection God’s servants have is originally from God and belongs to him, the closer people get to God, the more they will benefit from God’s mercy. (...) Therefore, in the work environment, this perfection appears in the form of spiritual intelligence and spiritual health based on Islamic teachings and affects organisational variables such as occupational stress. Today, the role of spiritual intelligence is considered an important issue in improving spiritual health, reducing occupational stress and effective social functioning, especially in an Islamic environment, which leads to a better understanding of employees about their job. Therefore, the present study aims to evaluate the effect of spiritual intelligence of Muslim managers on the spiritual health and occupational stress of employees in Islamic organisations in Iraq. The statistical population includes 3422 Muslim managers and employees of 50 service organisations (including finance, education and tourism) in Iraq in 2022. The results of the hypothesis test in Linear Structural Relations (LISREL) shows, spiritual intelligence has a significant effect on spiritual health ( P = 0.885; T = 11.058). On the other hand, spiritual intelligence has a negative and significant effect on occupational stress ( P = -0.763; T = -7.854). Finally, spiritual health also has a negative and significant effect on occupational stress ( P = -0.912; T = -10.134). Contribution: The findings of the research indicate that spiritual intelligence leads to the improvement of spiritual health and as a result reduces occupational stress, especially in an Islamic environment. Therefore, it should be taken into consideration by the managers of the organisations in order to achieve the maximum benefit in light of Islamic teachings. (shrink)

This paper examines the reasons for the high level of unmet needfor contraception in rural Egypt, using data from the individual survey andservice availability module of the 1988Ð89 Egypt Demographic and HealthSurvey. Two broad sets of potential factors are considered: characteristics ofa woman which influence her desire for children and thus her propensity touse contraception, and factors relating to the family planning serviceenvironment in which she lives. The results from a multivariate analysis showthat certain individual characteristics, such as family composition (...) andeducation, have a strong impact on the level of contraceptive use and on theproportion of total demand for spacing or limiting childbearing that is metby use of family planning. Unmet need, however, remains fairly constantacross demographic and socioeconomic subgroups of the population. Thelargest variations in unmet need are regional, but elements of the familyplanning services, namely the provision of a community-based nurse whodistributes family planning and female doctors at clinics, also play animportant role. (shrink)