What is Islamic philosophy? With Professor Peter Adamson

In the History of Philosophy podcasts Peter Adamson, Professor of Philosophy at the LMU in Munich and at King's College London, takes listeners through the history of philosophy, "without any gaps." The series looks at the ideas, lives and historical context of the major philosophers as well as the lesser-known figures of the tradition:

[putreyysyahmira]

Love the calm atmosphere, no edits, such ease to absorb most of the talkings, never bored.
Amazing, adding knowledge everyday.
May He blessed you with contentment in what you do as it sure does for me listening.

[adan]

This channel provides a profound balance between serious academic issues and everyday questions that people may have, keep up the amazing work! Hope to be a guest on the channel someday InshaAllah

[IslamicPhilosophers]

It is high time Muslims realize how wonderful and intellectual Islamic Philosophical tradition as put up by Avivenna and those after him is. How it helped in development of sciences, philosophy and mysticism. And how this same framework can be used by Muslims once again to bring back the Islamic Golden Age of Reason and Rationality. The hope is high. All that is required is that Muslims return back to the works of these sages.

[ysooyaalka]

My days of driving a truck in north America, " philosophy without any gaps" podcast was my daily partner. Sometimes I would argue with two or three philosophers and later have Burger with them in my truck. It was so satisfying to listen these men argue sometimes something really trivial.

[Zarghaam]

I think Prof. Sayyid Husain Nasr, (Iranian born) but living and working in the US since the 80s, would be an interesting person to invite, as would Prof. Dr. Sajjad Rizvi (Exeter, UK), esp, since the latter is a specialist on Saaddruddin Shirazi, the Islamic Philosopher the West is only now starting to grapple with. The French scholars Henri Corbin first introduced him to the West.
Yet another name is Prof. Saiyad Nizamuddin Ahmad who has published a critical Arabic edition of Ibn Arabi's 'Fusus al-Hikam' (Bezels of Wisdom), an absolutely fascinating book! Would love to know more about that.

[MsYassineB]

Great discussion as always brother Paul. Prof. Adamson was certainly refreshing from your last guest. It's unfortunate the Prof. did not speak more broadly about Islamic Philosophy & about Ibn Sina's works. Though it is not true that Greek Philosophy pre-Ibn Sina was thought of as "Christian" practice. Certainly, the Nestorian christians did translate Aristotle & others into Arabic, but they had very limited presence in the practice of Falsafa beyond that. The influential Christians among them were often coverts to Islam, such as Ibn Qurra, Ibn Barakat, Ibn Arafa & others. It is also not true that Arabs were marginally present in Islamic Philosophy. For one, the founder of Falsafa itself is Arab, al-Kindi, who wrote some 250 works on the subject. & the western school of Falsafa (mainly in Andalusia) is virtually comprised of Arabs, such as Ibn Rushd, Ibn Tufayl, Tufi & others... albeit less influential (at least in the Muslim world) than the easter school, led by philosophers like al-Farabi & Ibn Sina.

As to Ibn Sina's contributions, they are so much greater than what Prof. Adamson mentioned. For instance, conditional propositions in Logic, & Quantification of predicates, which opened the door to set theory & one-to-one correspondence. Both ideas would only be adopted in Western Logic until 19th century by philosophers such as William Hamilton & Bertrand Russel. In Medicine, his Canon of Medicine was one of three most influential medical encyclopedias for over half a millennium (along with the Hawi of Razi & Tasrif of Zahrawi). Fakhr Razi's commentary on the Canon was standard medical textbook across the Muslim world. The guy talks about a million things, it's impossible to show his greatness in a few lines.

As to Islamic Philosophy. There are three main branches, each with different schools. The Kalam branch (which constitute the bulk of Islamic philosophical output), the Falsafa branch (legacy to Greek philosophy), & the Haqiqa branch (mystical philosophy). The Kalam branch is mainly driven by two schools, the Asha'ira (the Sunni school) & the Mutazila (the many other schools are marginal compared to these two). The Falsafa branch can be categorized into 3 phases, the initial phase, led by al-Kindi, which looks like a reconciliation & consolidation of Greek philosophy with Islamic theology. The second phase, led by al-Farabi, then Ibn Sina, which constitutes an independent paradigm of natively Islamic & Arabic philosophical thought, which a much broader & elaborate body of knowledge than Greek philosophy. The third is the post-Ghazali Falsafa, which is essentially a reconciliation of the former with the Asha'ari thought. On the other end, Hikmah replaces Falsafa & is consolidated into the broader Ash'ari Kalam tradition, finalized by Fakhr Din Razi in the 12th century. The mystical branch pioneered by great mystics like Muhasibi & Talibi, is eventually also consolidated into the Ash'ari Sunni tradition first by al-Ghazali, but also Razi, Shahrastani, Ibn Sabeen & others. By the time of Fakhr Razi, Islamic Philosophy in general became virtually equivalent with Ash'aria.

As to argument from contingency. Without going into the technical details. Ibn Sina argues from sufficient cause principle, that is God (illiyah), hence the Will of God is itself the existence of God. Which the Sunnis (namely Ghazali) find unconvincing, because this undermines the Free Will of God. As beautiful as the argument is, it badly needed improvements, hence the Burhan Imkan, the latest version of Ibn Sina's proof. The main contentions Ghazali find with Ibn Sina's proof are: one, it assumes time is absolute & God is timely, which he deems wrong, for time is relative & is merely an accident created by God, He can not be contingent on it. Things occur in single instances, which appear to us as if time is absolute. The Universe may thus be eternal (in time), but can not be everlasting (without time). Two: that essence precedes existence, which the Asharis find issue with, since these two concepts are not formally linked. As such the Asharis will also find issue with the modern time trend of Existencialism in the West (that existence precedes essence), which Razi argues means essence & existence are identical, which they clearly aren't. Three, efficient causations is not necessary as Ibn Sina contends. The order of events is just apparent...etc...etc. This needs a whole lecture to explain, so... Ibn Sina's argument is indeed a very powerful argument, but needed to be polished from the hidden assumptions it had. The fact is, the Universe may have the appearance to be eternal, but it could've happened in an instance & we'd be none the wiser. Fakhr Razi even argues that we could have an infinite amount of universes & it wouldn't change a thing, for to a timeless & spaceless & immaterial noncontingent God, it's all but a dot, a countless amount of dots is still a dot.

As to the falling man thought experiment. It is originally meant to show the existence of the mental plain. The Asharis (like Ghazali & Razi) use it to discuss the Necessary Reason, that is the essential rational capacity of the human being as they are born without any nurture, i.e. nature. What you know you know such that you can not not know you know. For instance, to know that opposites do not concur. A falling man without senses will still be unable to conceive of a square circle. Al-Ghazali goes further into the thought experiment exploring the spherical human, such that their perception is spherical, they would be a one dimensional being, unaware of distance & directions (since all directions are identical to him), hence some level of idealism. & also exploring the Nature of the predatory animal if we literally remove his body (& not just mask his senses), at what point would the wolf, for instance, stop having the nature of a wolf (to prey on sheep) if we remove his different body parts shy of death. He wonders what body part exactly has the wolfiness, since none has it, then it must not be in the body, it must be beyond the body, i.e. the soul.

[islamadam]

That's an excellent episode 👏 professor Adamson is a well informed and nice speaker, please let's have more episodes with him to talk about other Islamic philosophy figures and ideas.

A little anecdote: Ibn Sina recounted that he was so talented that in his early youth he had no need for teachers and relied entirely on self learning. One day he found Aristotle's book of metaphysics, he read it from cover to cover without understanding anything of it, then with patience he reread it but still understood nothing, then he read it again and again until he involuntarily memorised the whole text of the book without understanding it so he left it thinking that there's no good in trying to understand it.

One day he was sitting with some book sellers and one approached him with a book, when Ibn Sina asked the seller about its subject he replied that it was metaphysics, Ibn Sina shunned but the seller begged him to buy it because its scribe was in need of money, so he bought it eventually.

When he opened it he found that it was Al-Farabi's commentary on Aristotle's metaphysics which he wrote to explain it for the readers, by reading this book Ibn Sina finally understood Aristotle's metaphysics which made him so happy that he gave a lot of charity to the poor to thank Allah for making him understand it.

[hassanmirza]

He is a very famous Prof. in Germany. Well done for inviting him.

[Zarghaam]

I'm a great fan of Peter Adamson. Read many of his books.

[alib]

Paul your channel is an endless source of lofty intellectual discourse. Jazakallah my brother.

[Arsim]

Great THANK YOU to both of you! Best regards from Zurich.

[silkydude]

Your interview style is fantastic. You ask the questions the audience is thinking of. Great job

[sofianeelhaddad]

I respect this researcher a lot, because his studies in the field of the history of philosophy in the Islamic world are very inspiring.

[whootoo]

As a muslim who loves history, philosophy and kalam, I bought and read 2 of his books. Great author and looking forward to some more books from him.

[everfreshlove]

Brilliant discussion! Loved every moment!

[sanamt]

Checked out his website from your link - seems interesting. Thank you brother Paul. Maulana Rumi was also from Afghanistan, and was a Persian speaker and eventually lived in Turkey. This is a common pattern for the Muslim scholars of that age.

[keta]

Amazing discussion as always brother paul!

[yoservs]

another absolute gem of a discussion, Paul. thanks for the upload👏

[eelpzfzj]

Been following his podcast for a looong time, I highly recommend, especially the early episodes, glad he made an appearance here! Thanks Paul!
You should rename this to "Discussing Ibn Sina" :D

[mohebsarwary]

It was one of the exceptional discussion on Ibn Sina that I have ever watched. It really brought me in tears about Afghanistan which gave birth to people like Ibn Sina, Rumi, Jami, Fakhrudin Razi and many more but now it's the battlefield of International forces and terrorism.