The Dialectical Forge identifies dialectical disputation as a primary formative dynamic in the evolution of pre-modern Islamic legal systems, promoting dialectic from relative obscurity to a more appropriate position at the forefront of Islamic legal studies. The author introduces and develops a dialectics-based analytical method for the study of pre-modern Islamic legal argumentation, examines parallels and divergences between Aristotelian dialectic and early juridical jadal-theory, and proposes a multi-component paradigm—the Dialectical Forge Model—to account for the power of jadal in shaping Islamic (...) law and legal theory.In addition to overviews of current evolutionary narratives for Islamic legal theory and dialectic, and expositions on key texts, this work shines an analytical light upon the considerably sophisticated “proto-system” of juridical dialectical teaching and practice evident in Islam’s second century, several generations before the first “full-system” treatises of legal and dialectical theory were composed. This proto-system is revealed from analyses of dialectical sequences in the 2nd/8th century Kitāb Ikhtilāf al-ʿIrāqiyyīn / ʿIrāqiyyayn through a lens molded from 5th/11th century jadal-theory treatises. Specific features thus uncovered inform the elaboration of a Dialectical Forge Model, whose more general components and functions are explored in closing chapters. (shrink)

Is the Nazi euthanasia program a useful analogy for contemporary discussions of euthanasia? This paper explores the logic of slippery slope arguments with the Nazi analogy as a test case.

The author nationally recognized for the quality and depth of his teaching in religious studies has written the first full-scale introduction to the history and methods of the study of religion.

Whether or not we have any natural right to landownership, like life and liberty, the institution of private property is agood. The utility produced by private property in land is overshadowed by the evils produced by the speculative withholding of supramarginal land unless compensatory payments are required of landowners. Such payments should be made to those living in the same “rental area” and should be of an amount that will eliminate all incentive to land speculation. It is not always either (...) desirable or possible to require that all of one's land value be paid in compensation. and even if such payments could be accomplished, they would not always be enough to redistribute the product stemming from the “monopolization” of real property The proper compensatory payment should reflect real increases in the value of real estate since its purchase, minus the value of improvements to the site made by the owner. (shrink)

Introduction.-God in the Copernician world.-God in the Newtonian world.-God in the Kanthian world.-God in the Darwinian world.-Science and theism today.-Epologue: The future of theism.