Islamic Theology And The Philosophy Of Science
Islamic Theology and the Philosophy of ScienceThe Metaphysics of Islamic Monotheism-A.D.First DraftYou are reading only a draft.Please find the latest version at: islamtheologyscience.wordpress.comContact: islamtheologyscience@gmail.com
The Evolution of Civilization by E.H. Blashfield (made in 1896). This mural decorates the dome ofthe main reading room of the Thomas Jefferson Building at the United States Library of Congress inWashington, D.C. It recognizes key societies and their contributions to the development of civilization.
The purpose of this is to relate Islamic theology's relationship with philosophy,specifically the philosophy of science and specifically the orthodox theology, throughoutits history and the relationship as it stands today.While some of this takes on an academic tone, most of it is informal and conversational.It is intended primarily for a Muslim audience and assumes a rudimentary understandingof basic philosophical ideas, some of which will be covered hastily in the introductorysections. It is written, however, for a non-Muslim audience to be able to follow along. It’salso targeted for the layman with regards to knowledge of science (especially physics).Much of it was assembled from discussions across various online forums and media.I threw it together, polished it up, and added in citations (often not in proper form)wherever I could.Some parts I obviously gloss over and the explanations suffer for that. I recommendreading the various articles and links I cite for more information.For those who are unfamiliar with Islamic history in general and its relation to science,then I recommend watching this BBC documentary series before reading this:Science and Islam - Episode 1 of 3 - The Language of ScienceScience and Islam - Episode 2 of 3 - The Empire of ReasonScience and Islam - Episode 3 of 3 - The Power of DoubtAn Important Note: On the definition of panentheism: This word has many varyingdefinitions and uses. When used in this work it is used in the sense of:In panentheism, God is viewed as the eternal animating force behind theuniverse. While pantheism asserts that 'All is God', panentheism goesfurther to claim that God is greater than the universe. [Wikipedia]And any theology which espouses as much. In this sense occasionalism (tobe explained later) can be seen as a version of panentheism. It is specificallycontrasted with pantheism. This, occasionalism and theologies which functionsimilarly, is only what is meant by panentheism when the word is used here. It isnot meant that God is “in” the universe or vice-versa, or any other such definition ofpanentheism.
Table of ContentsTheology in Philosophical TermsWhat is What is required for science?The Political / Social / Economic conditions and factors required for scienceEmpiricismSkepticismPeer ReviewHistory of Islamic philosophyWhat Muslims gained from the Qur’anEmpiricismSkepticismScientific SkepticismVerificationFalsificationObservational Deductive FalsificationThe Unity and Hierarchy of the SciencesWhat Muslims Picked Up From the GreeksHellenistic Philosophy and NeoplatonismAl-Farabi (872-950)Beyond the Greeks: Contributions of MuslimsThe Scientific MethodIbn al-Haytham (965-1040)Abu Rayhan al-Biruni (973-1048)Peer ReviewSecularismIbn Rushd (Averroes) (1126-1198)PerennialismAverroismTabula RasaIbn Sina (Avicenna) (980-1037)Ibn Tufayl (Abubacer) (1105-1185)Philosophus AutodidactusIbn al-Nafis (1213-1288)Theologus AutodidactusOccasionalismAl-Ghazali (1058-1111)Problem of InductionProblem of Causation
Occasionalism in Western ThoughtDescartes (1596-1650)Nicolas Malebranche (1638-1715)George Berkeley (1685-1753)David Hume (1711-1776)The Case for OccasionalismHow Islamic Civilization Fell in the SciencesWar: The Collapse of Old Islamic CivilizationSecond Coming of Islam: A Shift in FocusParadigm ShiftThe Case for Islamic OccasionalismThe Arguments for GodThe Ontological ArgumentThe Cosmological ArgumentThe Occasionalist ArgumentPreponderance without a PreferrerThe Infinite RegressObjections on Causal GroundsCausality vs. DeterminismPart 2 starts around pages 165-170Orthodox Theology and the Implications of Islamic MonotheismThe Creed of IslamOntologyEssence and ExistenceThe People of RealityThe SophistsEpistemologyThe Sound Senses (al-hawass al-salima)True Narratives (al-khabar al-sadiq)A Visualization MethodLandscape of KnowledgeTaqlid (Blind Imitation)The Theological NarrativeThe Evidentiary Miracles of the Prophet (saw)Reason (‘aql)MetaphysicsAtomismCausalityTimeMiraclesThe Miracle of the Holy Qur’an
Some Additional Features of the Qur’an’s ArabicSome Common Questions and ObjectionsScientific Miracles of the Holy Qur’anLawsPhysical LawsEvolutionA Final Note on NatureMoral or Behavioral LawsWhere Do Morals Come From?The Common MoralityIslamic MoralityMiracles and their Implications for DeterminismWhere Metaphysics Meets PhysicsQuantum PhysicsWave-Particle DualityAl-Farisi (1267-1318)Quantum Mechanics, the Wavefunction, and MathematicalFormulationQuantization (“atoms”) of Matter, Space, TimeThe Jawhar of MatterIbrahim an-Nazzam (775-845)The Planck ScaleThe Uncertainty PrincipleIntuition and Natural ations of Quantum MechanicsThe Instrumentalist PositionThe Copenhagen InterpretationThe Many-Worlds Interpretation (MWI)The de Broglie-Bohm Interpretation (Pilot Wave Theory)Quantum Field TheoryGravityString TheoryCosmologyBig BangThe Universe: Infinite or Finite?Inflation and the Problem of “Fine Tuning”A Universe From NothingThe No-Boundary Proposal and Quantum CosmologyMultiverse and the Anthropic Principle: The Linchpin of AtheistMetaphysicsCosmology in the Qur’an
EnergyGottfriend Leibniz (1646-1716)EntropyEntropy in Information TheoryMaxwell’s DemonCausality (in Physics)Time (in Physics)Timeless PhysicsPowerDoes Science Describe Reality?The Metaphysics of Imam MaturidiThe Metaphysical View of Creation in Light of Modern PhysicsPart 3 starts around page 470Orthodox Theology Versus the Other Sects TodayIslam’s Impact on IdeasThe Falling Out Beween Islamic Civilization and ScienceThe Further Evolution of PhilosophyDistinguishing Islamic, Christian, and later Western CivilizationIndividualismWestern MetaphysicsThe Trend Towards AtheismWestern IdealismImmanuel Kant (1724-1804)The Evolution of Empiricism and Naturalism[UNFINISHED BEYOND THIS POINT]The Further Evolution of Islamic Theology: Understanding God1. The Essential Attribute: Existence as subject - Being itself2. The Other AttributesIs Modality the answer?Abstract ExtensionalityIslam’s Compatibility With Other Social OrdersContemporary PhilosophyKarl PopperThomas KuhnSaul Kripke
Theology in Philosophical TermsWhat is theology?What's referred to here is not the traditional definition of theology as its used in theJudeo-Christian context. In Islam, the religion is considered divided into three parts: Iman: 'Aqeedah / Creed / Doctrine / Beliefs / Theology (as I use it here)Islam: Fiqh / Law (Shariah)Ihsan: Tasawwuf / Sufism (Spirituality)Theology traditionally refers to specific beliefs or doctrine about the nature of God andGod’s relation to the world. Thus ‘aqeedah encompasses more than just traditionaltheology. For the most part this discussion does remain restricted to theological issues(and not, for example, issues regarding belief in a Day of Judgment, all the otherprophets and revelations, angels, etc).Which brings me to the purpose of this. How can we relate to a religion on a rationalbasis? How do you relate to faith via reason? Simply put, the theological componentof any religion can be translated into philosophical terms and then be used to compareor relate it to other traditions or philosophies. Theology can also double as a type ofphilosophy.PhilosophyThere are at least three branches of classical philosophy which generally constitute aworldview. It is into these terms that theology can be translated.MetaphysicsAs per the definition at Wikipedia:Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining 000168.aspx
fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easilydefined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions inthe broadest possible terms:"What is there?""What is it like?"A person who studies metaphysics would be called either a metaphysicistor a metaphysician. The metaphysician attempts to clarify the fundamentalnotions by which people understand the world, including existence, thedefinition of object, property, space, time, causality, and possibility.A central branch of metaphysics is ontology, the investigation into the basiccategories of being and how they relate to each other.Prior to the modern history of science, scientific questions were addressedas a part of metaphysics known as natural philosophy. The term scienceitself meant "knowledge" of originating from epistemology. The scientificmethod, however, transformed natural philosophy into an empirical activityderiving from experiment unlike the rest of philosophy. By the end of the 18thcentury, it had begun to be called "science" to distinguish it from philosophy.Thereafter, metaphysics denoted philosophical enquiry of a non-empiricalcharacter into the nature of existence.The word's etymology itself needs to be taken into account.The word "metaphysics" derives from the Greek words μετά (metá) ("beyond"or "after") and φυσικά (physiká) ("physics"). It was first used as the title forseveral of Aristotle's works, because they were usually anthologized after theworks on physics in complete editions. The prefix meta- ("beyond") indicatesthat these works come "after" the chapters on physics. However, Aristotlehimself did not call the subject of these books "Metaphysics": he referred to itas "first philosophy." The editor of Aristotle's works, Andronicus of Rhodes, isthought to have placed the books on first philosophy right after another work,Physics, and called them τὰ μετὰ τὰ φυσικὰ βιβλία (ta meta ta physika biblia)or "the books that come after the [books on] physics". This was misread byLatin scholiasts, who thought it meant "the science of what is beyond thephysical".However, once the name was given, the commentators sought to find intrinsicreasons for its appropriateness. For instance, it was understood to mean "thescience of the world beyond nature (phusis in Greek)," that is, the scienceof the immaterial. Again, it was understood to refer to the chronological orpedagogical order among our philosophical studies, so that the "metaphysical
sciences would mean, those that we study after having mastered thesciences that deal with the physical world" (St. Thomas Aquinas, "In Lib,Boeth. de Trin.", V, 1).There is a widespread use of the term in current popular literature, whichreplicates this error, i.e. that metaphysical means spiritual non-physical:thus, "metaphysical healing" means healing by means of remedies that arenot physical.I find the best way to relate the idea of metaphysics to actual science, such as physics,is by distinguishing the prefix 'meta-' from 'proto-'. The aforementioned "naturalphilosophy" could have been said to be a "protophysics". Proto is a prefix thatmeans "first". As Aristotle called metaphysics the "first philosophy", the specific branchof it known as natural philosophy can be said to have been the "first science", in otherwords a proto-science. Still, the colloquial understanding of metaphysics as "beyondphysics" is useful as distinguished from the type of philosophy which would be protoscience or proto-physics; "the first physics" or a precursor to physics, directly leading tothe evolution of physics as the science we know it today. Metaphysics itself is not "protophysics". The latter would constitute one branch or part of the former, but there isan obvious etymological, historical, philosophical, and evolutionary relationship orconnection between the ideas of metaphysics and physics.For that matter, science itself comes from the word for "knowledge". It's been divorcedfrom that general idea into something more specific and all its own in recent times(including how I’ve used the term thus far), but this isn't necessarily the case as its beenunderstood in Arabic (where 'ilm means knowledge and science alike). More on thatlater.OntologyWhich brings us to the main branch of metaphysics, ontology.Going to Wikipedia again for the definition:Ontology (from the Greek ὄν, genitive ὄντος: "of that which is", and -λογία, logia: science, study, theory) is the philosophical study of the nature of being,existence or reality as such, as well as the basic categories of being andtheir relations. Traditionally listed as a part of the major branch of philosophyknown as metaphysics, ontology deals with questions concerning whatentities exist or can be said to exist, and how such entities can be grouped,related within a hierarchy, and subdivided according to similarities anddifferences.
Ontology, in analytic philosophy, concerns the determining of whether somecategories of being are fundamental and asks in what sense the items inthose categories can be said to "be". It is the inquiry into being in so muchas it is being, or into beings insofar as they exist—and not insofar as, forinstance, particular facts obtained about them or particular properties relatedto them.Some philosophers, notably of the Platonic school, contend that all nouns(including abstract nouns) refer to existent entities. Other philosopherscontend that nouns do not always name entities, but that some provide akind of shorthand for reference to a collection of either objects or events. Inthis latter view, mind, instead of referring to an entity, refers to a collectionof mental events experienced by a person; society refers to a collection ofpersons with some shared characteristics, and geometry refers to a collectionof a specific kind of intellectual activity. Between these poles of realism andnominalism, there are also a variety of other positions; but any ontology mustgive an account of which words refer to entities, which do not, why, and whatcategories result. When one applies this process to nouns such as electrons,energy, contract, happiness, space, time, truth, causality, and God, ontologybecomes fundamental to many branches of philosophy.Obviously, feel free to read the full articles on these terms before continuing if you wish.EpistemologyThe last major branch of philosophy relevant here and most important in relation to thephilosophy of science is epistemology.Once again, the definition from Wikipedia:Epistemology (from Greek ἐπιστήμη (epistēmē), meaning "knowledge,science", and λόγος (logos), meaning "study of") is the branch of philosophyconcerned with the nature and scope (limitations) of knowledge. It addressesthe questions:What is knowledge?How is knowledge acquired?How do we know what we know?Much of the debate in this field has focused on analyzing the nature ofknowledge and how it relates to connected notions such as truth, belief, andjustification. It also deals with the means of production of knowledge, as wellas skepticism about different knowledge claims.
The term was introduced into English by the Scottish philosopher JamesFrederick Ferrier (1808–1864). Many dictionary definitions may give theimpression that epistemology is closely related to critical thinking: "the studyor a theory of the nature and grounds of knowledge especially with referenceto its limits and validity" (Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary, 11th Edition).But in part because epistemology defines knowledge as being of the truth,unlike critical thinking, epistemology nearly ignores mechanisms, topics,and methods emphasized in critical thinking such as the testing of specificpropositions, logical fallacies, bias, and deception found in everyday, real-lifeconditions and problem solving.In physics, the concept of epistemology is vital in the modern interpretationof quantum mechanics, and is used by many authors to analyse the worksof dominant physicists such as Werner Heisenberg, Max Born and WolfgangPauli.I would highly recommend doing some further reading on this, both at Wikipedia and theStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (plato.stanford.edu), before continuing.What is required for science?In other words, what necessary philosophical ingredients are required for the practice ora tradition of science? I don’t mean the scientific method but rather what precipitates thescientific method.The Political / Social / Economic conditions andfactors required for scienceLet's get the obvious out of the way. For a society to engage in scientific pursuits(whether at all or simply more effectively than another), certain prerequisites existbefore we can talk about philosophy. The sort of environment in which science canfoster needs to promote critical thinking, have an abundance of need to solve variousproblems (such as the sort run into by a fast expanding society), not to mention (andmost importantly according to some) have economic or financial conditions in its favor.After all, science can be expensive. Political conditions need to also include security (adecent law and order situation) and a lack of political interference at minimum. On theflip side, political patronage of the sciences can be a good thing though the possibility
of disproportionately promoting the evolution of its various fields becomes an issue (soscientific pursuits get concentrated in certain areas and suffer in others).On the social side, with regards to what I mentioned of critical thinking, perhaps no oneput it better than Richard Feynman, the famous 20th century American physicist.During a commencement address delivered in 1974, Feynman introduced the ideaof "cargo cult science" to describe one of the most necessary ingredients for asuccessful scientific tradition.The full text of the address can be found online.A synopsis of the idea from Wikipedia:The term cargo cult science refers to an analogy between certain fields ofresearch in the sciences, and cargo cults—i.e. the religious practice that hasappeared in many traditional tribal societies in the wake of interaction withtechnologically advanced cultures. The cults focus on obtaining the materialwealth (the "cargo") of the advanced culture through magic and religiousrituals and practices.The term cargo cult science was first used by the physicist Richard Feynmanduring his commencement address at the California Institute of Technology,United States, in 1974, to negatively characterize research in the softsciences (psychology and psychiatry in particular) - arguing that theyhave the semblance of being scientific, but are missing "a kind of scientificintegrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utterhonesty".[.]He based the phrase on a concept in anthropology, the cargo cult, whichdescribes how some pre-scientific cultures interpreted technologicallyadvanced visitors as religious or supernatural figures who brought boonsof cargo. Later, in an effort to call for a second visit the natives woulddevelop and engage in complex religious rituals, mirroring the previouslyobserved behavior of the visitors manipulating their machines but withoutunderstanding the true nature of those tasks. Just as cargo cultists createmock airports that fail to produce airplanes, cargo cult scientists conductflawed research that superficially resembles the scientific method, but whichfails to produce scientifically useful results.Feynman cautioned that to avoid becoming cargo cult scientists, researchersmust first of all avoid fooling themselves, be willing to question and doubt
their own theories and their own results, and investigate possible flaws ina theory or an experiment. He recommended that researchers adopt anunusually high level of honesty which is rarely en
The Further Evolution of Philosophy Distinguishing Islamic, Christian, and later Western Civilization Individualism Western Metaphysics The Trend Towards Atheism Western Idealism Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) The Evolution of Empiricism and Naturalism [UNFINISHED BEYOND THIS POINT] The Further Evolution o
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Islamic Philosophy(Kegan Paul International, 2001) and M. Fakhry’s A History of Islamic Philosophy(Columbia University Press, 1970/2004). O. Leaman’s An Introduction to Classical Islamic Philosophy(Cambridge University Press, 2001) offers a somewhat more selective accou
