Keywords
a posteriori
neo-Sadraian
essentialism
universal theory
laws of nature
How to Cite
Abstract
To differentiate between the laws of nature and accidental generalizations, we must adopt a view of necessity that is capable of being realized in relationships existing among natural objects. In neo-Sadraian Islamic philosophy, metaphysical necessity is accepted as part of the cause-effect relationship. This paper compares the neo-Sadraian interpretation of necessity and necessitarian theories about the laws of nature, particularly essentialism and universal theory. By resorting to specific forms al-shûrat al-naw’iyyah, the origin of the essential properties of natural objects, I argue that neo-Sadraians have proposed a perspective on metaphysical necessity that is epistemologically a posteriori.
References
Al-Ghazali. The Incoherence of the Philosophers. Brigham: Brigham Young University Press, 2000.
Aristotle. Physics. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1995.
Armstrong, David. “Laws of Nature As Relations Between Universals, and As Universals.” Philosophical Topics 13, no. 1 (1982): 7–24.
Armstrong, David. What Is a Law of Nature?? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983.
Avicenna. Kitab Al-Najat [The Book of Deliverance]. Tehran: University of Tehran, 2001.
Armstrong, David. The Metaphysics of The Healing. Brigham: Brigham Young University Press, 2005.
Beebee, Helen. “The Non-Governing Conception of Laws of Nature.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 61, no. 3 (2000): 571–94.
Bird, Alexander. Nature’s Metaphysics: Laws and Properties. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007.
Bird, Alexander. “The Dispositionalist Conception of Laws.” Foundations of Science 10 (2005): 353–70. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-004-5259-9.
Ellis, Brian. The Philosophy of Nature: A Guide to the New Essentialism. Stocksfield: Acumen Publishing Limited, 2002.
Faruque, Muhammad U. “Mullā Sadrā on the Problem of Natural Universals.” Arabic Sciences and Philosophy 27, no. 2 (2017): 269–302.
Feser, Edward. “From Aristotle to John Searle and Back Again: Formal Causes, Teleology, and Computation in Nature.” Nova et Vetera 14, no. 2 (2016): 459–94. https://doi.org/10.1353/nov.2016.0039.
Fraassen, Bas C van. Laws and Symmetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989. https://doi.org/10.1093/0198248601.001.0001.
Ha’eri yazdi, Mehdi. Heram e Hasti [Pyramid of the Universe]. Tehran: Institute of Cultural Studies and Research, 1982.
Ha’eri yazdi, Mehdi. Sharḥ-i Ḥarakat-i Asfār [Explanation of Motin in Asfar]. Tehran: Hekmat, 2015.
Hume, David. A Treatise of Human Nature. Waiheke Island: The Floating Press, 2009.
Kalin, Ibrahim. Knowledge in Later Islamic Philosophy: Mulla Sadra on Existence, Intellect, and Intuition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.
Khayyat, Abu-l-Husain Abd al-Rahman. Kitab Al-Intisar Wa-l-Radd Ala Ibn Al-Rawandi Al-Mulhid. Cairo: Maktabah al-Saqafah al-Diniah, 1988.
Kim, Jaegwon. “The American Origins of Philosophical Naturalism.” Journal of Philosophical Research 28 (2003): 83–98. https://doi.org/10.5840/jpr200328supplement28.
Kripke, Saul A. Naming and Necessity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1972.
Lewis, David. “New Work for a Theory of Universals.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 61, no. 4 (1983): 343–77. https://doi.org/10.1080/00048408312341131.
Loux, Michael J., and Thomas M. Crisp. Metaphysics: A Contemporary Introduction. Teaching Philosophy. New York: Routledge, 2017. https://doi.org/10.5840/teachphil201740374.
Motahari, Morteza. Majmue Asar-e Ostad Motahari [The Collected Works of Motahari]. Vol. 1. Tehran: Sadra, 2005.
Motahari, Morteza. Majmue Asar-e Ostad Motahari [The Collected Works of Motahari]. Vol. 6. Tehran: Sadra, 2005.
Motahari, Morteza. Majmue Asar-e Ostad Motahari [The Collected Works of Motahari]. Vol. 10. Tehran: Sadra, 2005.
Papineau, David. “Naturalism.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University, 1997–. Article published September 15, 2015. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/naturalism.
Putnam, Hilary. Philosophy of Logic. New York: Routledge, 2010.
Putnam, Hilary. “The Meaning of ‘Meaning.’” In Language, Mind, and Knowledge, edited by Keith Gunderson, 131–93. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1975.
Sadr al-Din al-Shirazi, Mohammad Ibn Ibrahim. Al-Hikma Al-Muta‘aliya Fi-l-Asfar Al-‘aqliyya Al-Arba‘a. Vol. 2. Beirut: Dar ehya al-torath al-arabi, 1981.
Sadr al-Din al-Shirazi, Mohammad Ibn Ibrahim. Al-Hikma Al-Muta‘aliya Fi-l-Asfar Al-‘aqliyya Al-Arba‘a. Vol. 3. Beirut: Dar ehya al-torath al-arabi, 1981.
Swartz, Norman. “Laws of Nature,” In Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Article published 1995. http://www.iep.utm.edu/lawofnat.
Swinburne, Richard. The Existence of God. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Tabatabai, Sayyed Muhammad Husayn. Bidayat Al-Hikmah. Qom: Muassasah al-Nashr al-Islamiyah, 1995.
Swartz, Norman. Nihayat Al-Hikmah. Qom: Muassasah al-Nashr al-Islamiyah, 1984.
Tooley, Michael. “The Nature of Laws.” Canadian Journal of Philosophyy 7, no. 4 (1977): 667–98. https://doi.org/10.1080/00455091.1977.10716190.
Since 2019, TEORIE VĚDY / THEORY OF SCIENCE journal provides open access to its content under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Authors who publish in this journal agree that:
- Authors retain copyright and publication rights without restrictions and guarantee the journal the right of first publishing. All published articles are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution license, which allows others to share this work under condition that its author and first publishing in this journal was acknowledged.
- Authors may enter into other agreements for non-exclusive dissemination of work in the version in which it was published in the journal (for example, publishing it in a book), but they have to acknowledge its first publication in this journal.
- Authors are allowed and encouraged to make their work available online (for example, on their personal websites, social media accounts, and institutional repositories) as such a practice may lead to productive exchanges of views as well as earlier and higher citations of published work.
There are no author fees, no article processing charges, or submission charges.
The journal allows readers to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of its articles and allows readers to use them for any other lawful purpose.
A summary of the open access policy is also available in the Sherpa Romeo database.