The introduction of Greek philosophy into the Muslim world left an indelible mark on Islamic intellectual history. Philosophical discourse became a constant element in even traditionalist Islamic sciences. However, Aristotelian metaphysics gave rise to doctrines about God and the universe that were found highly objectionable by a number of Muslim theologians, among whom the fourteenth-century scholar Ibn Taymiyya stood foremost. Ibn Taymiyya, one of the greatest and most prolific thinkers in medieval Islam, held Greek logic responsible for the `heretical' metaphysical (...) conclusions reached by Islamic philosophers, theologians, mystics, and others. He therefore set out to refute philosophical logic, a task which culminated in one of the most devastating attacks ever levelled against the logical system upheld by the early Greeks, the later commentators, and their Muslim followers. His argument is grounded in an empirical approach that in many respects prefigures the philosophies of the British empiricists. Professor Hallaq's translation, with a substantial introduction and extensive notes, makes this important work available to a wider audience for the first time. (shrink)

Wael Hallaq explores the history, development, and contemporary trends in Muslim political thought using the work of Morocco-based philosopher Taha Abdurrahman. A sweeping intellectual history and philosophical examination, this book examines the trajectory of how we understand the central questions plaguing modernity in both the West and Muslim lands.

Background: The Bene-Anthony Family Relations Test is one of the most widely used measures of family dynamics seen from a child’s perspective. However, the most common issue surrounding this test is the lack of accurate normative scores for use with non-white ethnic groups. The purpose of this study was to examine the BAFRT’s reliability and validity for use with Arab children, as well as to provide normative data for this group. Methods: The BAFRT was translated into Arabic and back-translated to (...) ensure accuracy. The test was administered to a cohort of 394 Arab children, consisting of both cognitively normal children and children diagnosed with a psychological disorder, all aged 5–8 years old. Test-retest reliability was assessed using a sub-set of children and validity was tested against clinical status as well as CBCL and SDQ measures. Normative measures were calculated after examining the impact of influencing variables such as age and gender. Results: Statistical analyses showed that in our cohort of Arab children the BAFRT has good test-retest reliability, correlates well with measures of emotional and behavioral adjustment, and discriminates accurately between clinical and non-clinical children. Age, gender, and clinical status all significantly impacted upon BAFRT scores and therefore normative values are presented from our cohort when considering these variables. Conclusion: The normative scores we present will provide researchers and clinicians an appropriate reference point for the comparison of scores from Arab children and a starting point for future research into this area. (shrink)

Godenschemering van Daniël de Waele is een theologische cultuurgeschiedenis die de evolutie van het geloof in God uitdiept in de loop der tijd. Israël ontdekte in een polytheïstische wereld de Ene God, die door de tijd heen steeds humaner werd en dichterbij kwam. Hoe is het geloof na die grote stap geëvolueerd? Hoe past het verdampen van het geloof, dat uiteindelijk eindigde in de dood van God, in deze evolutie? En welke rol heeft het bestormen van de godenbeelden gespeeld? De (...) Waele ontwaart naast deze geloofsevolutie een andere geschiedenis: een blijvende zoektocht naar de ene God. (shrink)

The comprehension of living organisms in all their complexity poses a major challenge to the biological sciences. Recently, systems biology has been proposed as a new candidate in the development of such a comprehension. The main objective of this paper is to address what systems biology is and how it is practised. To this end, the basic tools of a systems biological approach are explored and illustrated. In addition, it is questioned whether systems biology ‘revolutionizes’ molecular biology and ‘transcends’ its (...) assumed reductionism. The strength of this claim appears to depend on how molecular and systems biology are characterised and on how reductionism is interpreted. Doing credit to molecular biology and to methodological reductionism, it is argued that the distinction between molecular and systems biology is gradual rather than sharp. As such, the classical challenge in biology to manage, interpret and integrate biological data into functional wholes is further intensified by systems biology’s use of modelling and bioinformatics, and by its scale enlargement. (shrink)

Public health is concerned with how to improve the population’s health. At times, though, actions to improve the community’s health may collide with individual civil rights. For example, a public health response to a bioterrorism attack, such as smallpox, may require relaxing an individual’s due process protections to prevent the smallpox from spreading. This tension lies at the heart of public health policy. It also must be considered in discussing the concept of human rights in health.Proponents of incorporating the concept (...) of human rights in health emphasize the importance of both individual rights and collective rights. They argue that observing human rights is not only consistent with broad public health goals, but necessary to their attainment. To many human rights advocates, the concept is not limited to protecting against governmental intrusion. Accordingly, they emphasize the government’s obligation to promote attainment of human rights by, for instance, providing adequate health care. (shrink)

The comprehension of living organisms in all their complexity poses a major challenge to the biological sciences. Recently, systems biology has been proposed as a new candidate in the development of such a comprehension. The main objective of this paper is to address what systems biology is and how it is practised. To this end, the basic tools of a systems biological approach are explored and illustrated. In addition, it is questioned whether systems biology ‘revolutionizes’ molecular biology and ‘transcends’ its (...) assumed reductionism. The strength of this claim appears to depend on how molecular and systems biology are characterised and on how reductionism is interpreted. Doing credit to molecular biology and to methodological reductionism, it is argued that the distinction between molecular and systems biology is gradual rather than sharp. As such, the classical challenge in biology to manage, interpret and integrate biological data into functional wholes is further intensified by systems biology’s use of modelling and bioinformatics, and by its scale enlargement. (shrink)

El estudio de dos formularios notariales del siglo vii/xiii, uno sirio y el otro andalusí, muestra que el discurso sobre las modalidades de comunicación escrita preceptuadas para los jueces refleja una estrecha relación entre la doctrina y la realidad de la práctica legal. Uno de los aspectos de esta relación es el cambio que tuvo que experimentar la doctrina discursiva bajo la presión de las prácticas judiciales cotidianas.

An ongoing debate among legal scholars and public health advocates is the role of litigation in shaping public policy. For the most part, the debate has been waged at a conceptual level, with opponents and proponents arguing within fairly well-defined boundaries. The debate has been based either on speculation of what litigation could achieve or on ideological grounds as to why litigation should or should not be used this way. With the exception of Rosenberg's study of how litigation shaped policy (...) in civil rights, abortion, and environmental matters, there is almost no empirical support for either position.In recent years, the most ardent proponents of litigation as public policy have been public health advocates. Perhaps out of frustration with the inability to achieve desired public health goals through the legislative branch of government, public health advocates have pursued litigation as an alternative strategy. Beginning with tobacco class action litigation in the early 1990s and continuing with litigation against gun manufacturers at the end of that decade, public health advocates have waged a veritable litigation assault aimed at changing how public health policy is formed. (shrink)

Abstract: Potatoes are edible tubers, available worldwide and all year long. They are relatively cheap to grow, rich in nutrients, and they can make a delicious treat. The humble potato has fallen in popularity in recent years, due to the interest in low-carb foods. However, the fiber, vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals it provides can help ward off disease and benefit human health. They are an important staple food in many countries around the world. There are an estimated 200 varieties of (...) potatoes, which can be classified into a number of categories based on the cooked texture and ingredient functionality. Using a public dataset of 2400 images of potatoes, we trained a deep convolutional neural network to identify 4 types (Red, Red Washed, Sweet, and White).The trained model achieved an accuracy of 99.5% of test set, demonstrating the feasibility of this approach. (shrink)

This paper analyses the actual meaning of a transcendental philosophy of biology, and does so by exploring and actualising the epistemological and metaphysical value of Kant's viewpoint on living systems. It finds inspiration in the Kantian idea of living systems intrinsically resisting objectification, but critically departs from Kant's philosophical solution in as far as it is based in a subjectivist dogmatism. It attempts to overcome this dogmatism, on the one hand by explicitly taking into account the conditions of possibility at (...) the side of the subject, and on the other hand by embedding both the living and the knowing system into an ontology of complexly organized dynamical systems. This paper fits into the transcendental perspective in acknowledging the need to analyse the conditions of knowability, prior to the contents of what is known. But it also contributes to an expansion and an actualisation of the issue of transcendentality itself by considering the conditions of possibility at the side of the object as intrinsically linked to the conditions of possibility at the side of the subject. (shrink)

A preoccupation with the subject of freedom became a core issue in the construction of all modern political ideologies. Here, Wael Abu-'Uksa examines the development of the concept of freedom in nineteenth-century Arab political thought, its ideological offshoots, their modes, and their substance as they developed the dynamics of the Arabic language. Abu-'Uksa traces the transition of the idea of freedom from a term used in a predominantly non-political way, through to its popularity and near ubiquity at the dawn (...) of the twentieth century. Through this, he also analyzes the importance of associated concepts such as liberalism, socialism, progress, rationalism, secularism, and citizenship. He employs a close analysis of the development of the language, whilst at the same time examining the wider historical context within which these semantic shifts occurred: the rise of nationalism, the power of the Ottoman court, and the state of relations with Europe. (shrink)

Background: Nurse-patient communication is a unique clinical skill in the healthcare professions that promotes good quality care and patient outcomes. This communication can be disrupted by many barriers that impact the therapeutic relationship and deliver of care. Purpose: The study aims to identify the barriers affecting nurse-patient communication at primary health centers in Almadina Munawara City, Saudi Arabia. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed among 212 nurses and 214 patients utilizing a self-reporting questionnaire. A version of the same file was (...) then uploaded into NVivo, and data that were coded under all communication barriers including language discordance among patients and healthcare providers (e. g., subtheme: patient prefers a mother tongue speaking doctor), cultural-religious difference and environmental cues between the involved parties to determine their importance in this context as well (see Table 2). Results: The results showed that language, cultural and environmental differences had an extensive influence on how nurses communicated with patients. Key barriers included nurse shortages, limited communication time and low income. Our results suggest that these barriers differ in their effect with language barrier and habitat disturbance being the most important ones. Conclusions: This study concludes that nurse-patient communication is a complex multi-sectional process, constrained by numerous barriers. Strategic intervention aimed at addressing these barriers can strengthen nurse-patient interaction and accelerate patient care. Communication remains a cornerstone in all the best practices of delivering healthcare effectively and keeping patients happy. (shrink)

While relatively unknown to Anglophone circles, there was a thriving Anabaptist community in Italy during the reformation. It is the scope of this article to help retrace the origins of the Anabaptist movement in Italy and to set straight some misconceptions unintentionally perpetuated by some who have attempted this journey in the past. This is done in the hopes of raising appreciation for the movement and of enticing future research interest in this forgotten branch of the Radical Reformation.

En el presente artículo se propone crear un margen conceptual para la construcción de una criminología fenomenológica que aborde el conocimiento de cómo se interpretan las conductas de las personas a través de las percepciones de otros, enfocado a la constitución de la conducta criminal, delincuencial, violenta o antisocial, que, siendo estos provenientes de la naturaleza de variadas ciencias, provoca tener horizontes amplios en el entendimiento que en la misma esencia lo vuelven complejo, la criminología actual, tiene en sí, varios (...) objetos de estudio que ha tomado de aquellas ciencias que tienen en su qué hacer lo relacionado con el crimen, de tal modo, desde el derecho, se estudia el delito y sus elementos, desde la psiquiatría y psicología, la conducta antisocial y su desarrollo, de la sociología, la conducta desviada patológica y su formación, el trabajo social, aporta otras interpretaciones, lo mismo, cuando corresponde a la antropología de la violencia, su historia, percepciones, cambios culturales, entre muchas otras. En ello radica la complejidad en la armonización de objetos de estudio que encuentran reunión en la criminología en una integración interdisciplinaria, pero esta se agota ante la abrumante realidad criminal que afecta a la aldea global, donde poco tiempo permite a la reflexión, necesitando con urgencia la intervención. El caso abordado aquí, es dar esa aproximación a una criminología fenomenológica, que pasará previo a su desarrollo, por el proceso de especialización de la criminología, soltando por momentos el paradigma clásico, para avanzar al futuro en la sistematización de teorías de otras ciencias, para generar un banco de conocimientos, que permitirán a posteriori, desarrollar sus propias concepciones e interpretaciones. No hay algo malo en la especialización, es parte de la evolución y maduración. (shrink)

Neuroscience is advancing at a rapid pace, with new technologies and approaches that are creating ethical challenges not easily addressed by current ethical frameworks and guidelines. One fascinating technology is neuroimaging, especially functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI). Although still in its infancy, fMRI is breaking new ground in neuroscience, potentially offering increased understanding of brain function. Different populations and faith traditions will likely have different reactions to these new technologies and the ethical challenges they bring with them. Muslims are approximately (...) one-fifth of world population and they have a specific and highly regulated ethical and moral code, which helps them deal with scientific advances and decision making processes in an Islamically ethical manner. From this ethical perspective, in light of the relevant tenets of Islam, neuroimaging poses various challenges. The privacy of spirituality and the thought process, the requirement to put community interest before individual interest, and emphasis on conscious confession in legal situations are Islamic concepts that can pose a challenge for the use of something intrusive such as an fMRI. Muslim moral concepts such as There shall be no harm inflicted or reciprocated in Islam and Necessities overrule prohibitions are some of the criteria that might appropriately be used to guide advancing neuroscience. Neuroscientists should be particularly prudent and well prepared in implementing neuroscience advances that are breaking new scientific and ethical ground. Neuroscientists should also be prepared to assist in setting the ethical frameworks in place in advance of what might be perceived as runaway applications of technology. (shrink)

Diabetes is a major public health issue that affects the nations of our time to a large extent and is described as a non-communicable epidemic. Diabetes mellitus is a common disease where there is too much sugar (glucose) floating around in your blood. This occurs because either the pancreas can’t produce enough insulin or the cells in body have become resistant to insulin. The concentration in this paper is on diagnosis diabetes by designing a proposed expert system. The main goal (...) of this expert system is to get the appropriate diagnosing of the illness, dealing with it quickly, and tips for permanent treatment whenever possible is given out. SL5 object expert system language was used for designing and implementing the proposed expert system. (shrink)

The study sets out to develop an online course for medical professionals who are not native Arabic speakers. The present study relied on a questionnaire developed by reviewing relevant theoretical literature and prior research in order to apply descriptive and analytical methods to accomplish the study's aims. The researcher sent an online questionnaire to a large number of healthcare workers, including doctors, nurses, lab techs, and radiology technicians. The objective of this survey is to learn about the linguistic communication needs (...) of healthcare workers and to find out when Arabic is useful for communicating with patients and meeting quality standards in healthcare. The study compiled a list of 36 linguistic needs pertaining to various medical settings (e.g., emergency rooms, outpatient clinics, hypnosis rooms, labs, and radiology departments), developed an electronic program to teach Arabic to non-native speakers, and made several suggestions and recommendations. (shrink)

Low heart rate causes a risk of death, heart disease, and cardiovascular diseases. Therefore, monitoring the heart rate is critical because of the heart’s function to discover its irregularity to detect the health problems early. Rapid technological advancement allows healthcare sectors to consolidate and analyze massive health-based data to discover risks by making more accurate predictions. Therefore, this work proposes a real-time prediction system for heart rate, which helps the medical care providers and patients avoid heart rate risk in real (...) time. The proposed system consists of two phases, namely, an offline phase and an online phase. The offline phase targets developing the model using different forecasting techniques to find the lowest root mean square error. The heart rate time-series dataset is extracted from Medical Information Mart for Intensive Care. Recurrent neural network, long short-term memory, gated recurrent units, and bidirectional long short-term memory are applied to heart rate time series. For the online phase, Apache Kafka and Apache Spark have been used to predict the heart rate in advance based on the best developed model. According to the experimental results, the GRU with three layers has recorded the best performance. Consequently, GRU with three layers has been used to predict heart rate 5 minutes in advance. (shrink)

Viewing the brain as an organ of approximate Bayesian inference can help us understand how it represents the self. We suggest that inferred representations of the self have a normative function: to predict and optimise the likely outcomes of social interactions. Technically, we cast this predict-and-optimise as maximising the chance of favourable outcomes through active inference. Here the utility of outcomes can be conceptualised as prior beliefs about final states. Actions based on interpersonal representations can therefore be understood as minimising (...) surprise – under the prior belief that one will end up in states with high utility. Interpersonal representations thus serve to render interactions more predictable, while the affective valence of interpersonal inference renders self-perception evaluative. Distortions of self-representation contribute to major psychiatric disorders such as depression, personality disorder and paranoia. The approach we review may therefore operationalise the study of interpersonal representations in pathological states. (shrink)

For many decades the term “Enlightenment” was seen as antonymous to Christianity and religious dogmatism.1 This polarity has informed our understanding of the history of secularism as an idea that...

Via a historical reconstruction, this paper primarily demonstrates how the societal debate on genetically modified organisms (GMOs) gradually extended in terms of actors involved and concerns reflected. It is argued that the implementation of recombinant DNA technology out of the laboratory and into civil society entailed a “complex of concerns.” In this complex, distinctions between environmental, agricultural, socio-economic, and ethical issues proved to be blurred. This fueled the confusion between the wider debate on genetic modification and the risk assessment of (...) transgenic crops in the European Union. In this paper, the lasting skeptical and/or ambivalent attitude of Europeans towards agro-food biotechnology is interpreted as signaling an ongoing social request – and even a quest – for an evaluation of biotechnology with Sense and Sensibility. In this (re)quest, a broader-than-scientific dimension is sought for that allows addressing the GMO debate in a more “sensible” way, whilst making “sense” of the different stances taken in it. Here, the restyling of the European regulatory frame on transgenic agro-food products and of science communication models are discussed and taken to be indicative of the (re)quest to move from a merely scientific evaluation and risk-based policy towards a socially more robust evaluation that takes the “non-scientific” concerns at stake in the GMO debate seriously. (shrink)

In light of the development of “CRISPR” technology, new promising advances in therapeutic and preventive approaches have become a reality. However, with it came many ethical challenges. The most recent worldwide condemnation of the first use of CRISPR to genetically modify a human embryo is the latest example of ethically questionable use of this new and emerging field. Monotheistic religions are very conservative about such changes to the human genome and can be considered an interference with God’s creation. Moreover, these (...) changes could cause perpetual changes to future generations. The Muslim scholars establish their decisions by addressing five foundations of Islamic law i.e. “maqāṣid al sharı̄`a”; the purposes of the law. These are dın̄, nafs, nasl, `aql and māl. To achieve this, the five principles should all be met before approval of an experiment like the Chinese embryo modifications; Qaṣd which is achieved in this case as it aims to protect the embryo from HIV. Yaqın̄ and Ḍarar were not satisfied as they require strong scientific certainty of the procedures, and evidence of safety. Ḍarūra by which the alternatives being compared; in this case more established and proven safe alternatives to protect the HIV transmission from the father are available, so this principle is not met. The final principle is `Urf, by which the social context of using any contemporary technology should be taken in consideration, and clearly this was not achieved. Collectively, germline changes are rejected from an Islamic perspective until the five principles are fulfilled. In the Chinese Twins gene editing case, there was clearly no justification or support for it according to the Muslim Jurisprudence laws. These laws and approaches can serve as an ethical checklist for such controversial research, especially in early stages of the research. (shrink)

This paper analyses the actual meaning of a transcendental philosophy of biology, and does so by exploring and actualising the epistemological and metaphysical value of Kant's viewpoint on living systems. It finds inspiration in the Kantian idea of living systems intrinsically resisting objectification, but critically departs from Kant's philosophical solution in as far as it is based in a subjectivist dogmatism. It attempts to overcome this dogmatism, on the one hand by explicitly taking into account the conditions of possibility at (...) the side of the subject, and on the other hand by embedding both the living and the knowing system into an ontology of complexly organized dynamical systems. This paper fits into the transcendental perspective in acknowledging the need to analyse the conditions of knowability, prior to the contents of what is known. But it also contributes to an expansion and an actualisation of the issue of transcendentality itself by considering the conditions of possibility at the side of the object as intrinsically linked to the conditions of possibility at the side of the subject. (shrink)

Background: Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming healthcare systems by improving operational efficiency, simplifying patient care procedures, and improving diagnostic accuracy. Artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, like machine learning and natural language processing, present previously unheard-of chances to quickly and accurately evaluate enormous volumes of healthcare data, assisting with clinical decision-making and enhancing patient outcomes. Aim thorough examination and analysis of artificial intelligence's impact on healthcare leadership, with a particular emphasis on present nursing trends and their implications for the future. The study (...) tries to uncover the advantages, difficulties, and consequences of AI integration by looking at how AI technologies including clinical decision support systems, predictive analytics, robots, natural language processing, and telehealth are being used in nursing practice. Method: A comprehensive analysis including research articles published between 2015 and 2024 was carried out. To give a thorough overview of AI's present and future uses in healthcare, major themes and trends were found and summarized. Results: By stressing AI's role in improving diagnostic accuracy and patient outcomes, the study highlights the technology's major contributions to drug discovery, virtual patient care, and medical imaging. Human-centered design concerns, the necessity of educational changes, and ethical challenges surrounding the application of AI surfaced as crucial topics needing attention. Conclusion: AI has enormous potential to transform healthcare by enhancing operational effectiveness, optimizing the delivery of care, and increasing diagnostic precision. Still, ethical issues must be resolved, interdisciplinary cooperation must be promoted, and educational frameworks must be improved in order to provide healthcare workers with the necessary AI skills. (shrink)

To design and develop AI-based cybersecurity systems ), users can justifiably trust, one needs to evaluate the impact of trust using machine learning and deep learning technologies. To guide the design and implementation of trusted AI-based systems in IDS, this paper provides a comparison among machine learning and deep learning models to investigate the trust impact based on the accuracy of the trusted AI-based systems regarding the malicious data in IDs. The four machine learning techniques are decision tree, K nearest (...) neighbour, random forest, and naïve Bayes. The four deep learning techniques are LSTM and GRU. Two datasets are used to classify the IDS attack type, including wireless sensor network detection system and KDD Cup network intrusion dataset. A detailed comparison of the eight techniques’ performance using all features and selected features is made by measuring the accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score. Considering the findings related to the data, methodology, and expert accountability, interpretability for AI-based solutions also becomes demanded to enhance trust in the IDS. (shrink)