Ibn Sina One of the Greatest Philosophers - Essay Example

IBN SINA BY EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Ibn Sina is commonly recognized as one of the greatest philosophers and physicians, one whose efforts in science and philosophy have fascinated several studies and researches. He is known as the Prince of Physicians and Philosophers and the doctors of doctors by his colleagues and was the gigantic mastermind of Islamic civilization. His scholarly accomplishments not only include medicine and philosophy, but law, science, music, poetry, mathematics, and astrology. He is considered to be the father and a giant in the field of pharmacology. His philosophical works are based on soul and the existence of God. Ibn Sina’s supreme work includes the monumental Al Qanun, the Canon and Kitab-al-Shifa (The Book of Healing). The Canon discusses medical completely in order to classify all the present medical knowledge. While, Kitab-al-Shifa being a philosophical encyclopedia, covers huge areas of knowledge from philosophy to science. INTRODUCTION The Sheikh al-Ra’is Sharaf al-Mulk Abu Ali al-Husayn Abd Allah al-Hasan Ali Ibn Sina, generally known as Avicenna, is among the most celebrated and original Muslim philosophers in the history of philosophy (Al Naqib, 1993). He is the actual creator of a scholastic system in the Islamic world and is described as the leader of Islamic philosophy. The most famous works of Avicenna are on philosophy and medicine. His philosophical visions have intrigued the interest of Western thinkers over a number of centuries, and his writings have been among the most significant sources in philosophy. His other major contributions were in the fields of metaphysics, poetry, animal physiology, minerals, rhetoric, and mechanics of solids, Arabic syntax and meteorology (Ahmed, 1990). BIBLIOGRAPHY Ibn Sina birth took place in the village of Afshana in the surrounding areas of Bukhara, now known as in Uzbekistan, in 980 AD (370 AH) in an Islamic family interested in intellectual sciences and philosophy which proved to be extremely influential later in his life (Al Naqib, 1993). His early schooling was done in Bukhara and became knowledgeable in the study of the Quran and various sciences by the age of ten. His teacher, Abu Abdallah Natili, a renowned philosopher, taught him logic and many other subjects (Ahmed, 1990). Furthermore, he began reading philosophy by studying numerous Greek, Muslim and other books related to this subject. He accomplished a degree of expertise in medicine at a very young age due to which he gained immense popularity. After curing the King of Bukhara, Nooh Ibn Mansoor, at the age of 17, he was granted to use the sultan’s library and its extraordinary scripts, which further enhanced his knowledge and permitted him to carry on his research into modes of knowledge (Ahmed, 1990). After the death of the sultan, the heir to the throne, asked Ibn Sina to carry on his duties as the al vizier, but the philosopher united with another son of the late king, Ala al-Dawla, and thus went into hiding. All through this time he wrote his most significant philosophical papers, Kitab al-shifa’ (Book of Healing), a complete description of learning that spread from metaphysics to logic and mathematics and the life after death. As he was composing the piece on logic, Ibn Sina was detained and jailed, but he soon ran away and joined Ala al-Dawla once again. He further created at least two key works on logic: al-Mantiq, translated as The Propositional Logic of Ibn Sina, was a commentary on Aristotle’s Prior Analytics and forms part of al-Shifa’; the al-Isharat wa-‘I-tanbihat (Remarks and Admonitions). He also created a piece on meanings and a outline of the theoretical sciences, together with numerous psychological, religious and other works; the latter comprise of works on astronomy, medicine, philology and zoology, as well as poems and an allegorical work, Hayy ibn Yaqzan (The Living Son of the Vigilant). Ibn Sina’s philosophical and scientific efforts and his political participation persisted till his demise (Kemal, 1998). AVICENNAN SCIENCE Ibn Sina was far more than a well-known medical practitioner; all through his years, he performed clinical testing. Even though he was not only a composer of information, but he also contributed appreciably in various aspects of life (Ahmed, 1990). Ibn Sina unique explanations are spread all through his works. He revealed and explained the insertions of the basic muscles of the eye. He also indicated that some particular diseases were water-born. The reason behind these diseases was the species that resided in the water, too minute to be seen by the naked human eye. Ibn Sina was quite close to the theory of microbes in which he suggested that the air being breathed might be contaminated which could result in various diseases. He was among the earliest who tried to distinguish between obstructive and hemolytic jaundice. A number of his medical explanations are outstanding, especially the parts on nervous, cutaneous, and genitourinary diseases. He was extremely advanced for his time in his criticism of astrology in influencing health and in his effort to separate science from medicine. Moreover, a theory of vision, which is today considered right, was also taught by him. Even though, a number of his contemporaries and successors criticized both the theory and Ibn Sina. In his ultimate work on medicine, the Canon, he explained 15 different kinds of pain: boring, compressing, corrosive, dull, fatigue, heavy, incisive, irritant, itching, pricking, relaxing, stabbing, tearing, tension, and throbbing. In the section of sphygmology, he explained 10 characteristics of the pulses and 22 forms of abnormal pulses. In the part concerning urology, he emphasized on the examination of urine, that is, its quantity, smell, color, foam, consistency, clarity, and sediment. Diseases were categorized and taken care of based on the diagnosis (Ahmed, 1990). Ibn Sina’s views on pharmacology seem to be quite contemporary as he indicated that polypharmacotherapy and drug mixtures should be thought about only when the diseases seem to be compounded and that a solitary drug should be utilized for uncomplicated situations (Darmani, 1995). He laid further emphasis on the significance of dose, and path of management and explained a schedule for drug administration. Sadly, a few contemporary physicians still tend to overlook these fundamental pharmacological doctrines. While talking about cannabis, Ibn Sina is more precise than the Greeks. He explained quite a few varieties and termed to them as carminative and desiccative. On the subject of analgesics, he was amazingly modern and talked about opium and other narcotics. He completely explained the properties and their medical applications of about 760 drugs in the Canon (Darmani, 1995). In addition, he presented seven rules for a consistent experimental examination of the implications of drugs. AVICENNAN PHIOLOSOPHY Ibn Sina preserves that God, the foundation of all existence, is pure intellect, from whom other existing beings such as minds, bodies and other objects originate, and consequently, to whom they are all essentially linked (Ibnu Sina, No date). Once the inevitability is entirely comprehended, it is logical and permits those who exist to be inferred from each other and, eventually, from God. In reality, the entirety of logic is organized syllogistically and the individual’s knowledge comprises of the minds response and hold of intelligible being. As knowledge includes getting hold of the syllogistically organized intelligibles, it needs to utilize logic to pursue the connections between intelligibles (Ibnu Sina, No date). These intelligibles comprise of the first principles that contain phenomenon like the existent, the thing and the necessary, that compose the classifications, and the realities of rationality, as well as the first-figure syllogistics, all of which are fundamental, primitive and clear. They cannot be described more as all explanation and thought proceeds only on their foundation. The principles of rationality are also critical in the human development (Kemal, 1998). Ibn Sina asserts that it is imperative to acquire knowledge. Taking hold of the intelligibles establishes the fortune of the logical soul in the life after death, and as a result is fundamental to human activity. When the individual’s intelligence gets hold of these intelligibles, it gets in touch with the Active Intellect which is a stage of being that originates eventually from God, and obtains a divine effluence. Individuals might be arranged based on their ability of acquiring knowledge, and therefore by their control and establishment of the ability for coming on the middle term (Iqbal, 2009). At the maximum position is the prophet, who knows the intelligibles all at once, or nearly so. He possesses a clean logical soul and has the power to identify the intelligibles in the appropriate syllogistic arrangement, as well as their middle terms. At the other extreme lies the impure person deficient in the ability for establishing arguments. Most individuals are in between these ends, but they might enhance their ability for getting hold of the middle term by establishing a reasonable temperament and cleanliness of soul (Ibnu Sina, No date). In context to the previous argument about the particular scopes of grammar and logic, Ibn Sina asserts that as logic deals with phenomenon that can be abstracted from rational objects, it also breaks away from the contingencies of the latter. Language and grammar direct rational objects and thus possess a dissimilar field; in fact, languages are different and their systems of operation, their hold of logical objects, are likewise expressed differently (Iqbal, 2009). Nonetheless, languages offer the abstracted phenomenon whose function is ruled by rationality; however if language deals with contingencies, it is not understandable how it can get hold or present the materials of logic. On few occasions, like in al-Isharat, Ibn Sina indicates that languages usually share an arrangement (Kemal, 1998). Ibn Sina’s approach to knowledge recognized the intellectual abilities of the soul in relation to their origin, nature and limitations. He illustrated that knowledge starts with abstraction. Sense perception, being already mental, is the type of the object apparent. Sense perception acts in response to the specific with its certain type and object accidents (Iqbal, 2009). As a mental activity, being a perception of a material rather than the object itself, perception takes place in the particular. To examine this reaction, categorizing its recognized characteristics in abstraction from material accidents, both perceptions must be maintained by the given sensation and also influence them by dividing the elements and arranging them based on their formal and other features. Furthermore, Ibn Sina places special emphasis on the importance estimation (wahm). This is the ability to recognize irrational purposes that are present in the person’s sensible objects. Lastly, there has to be the capability that maintains the subject matter of wahm, the explanations of images. He also depends on an ability of logic, including understanding of the effort and outcomes of other abilities, which connects these characteristics (Ibnu Sina, No date). Of these capabilities, imagination has a chief part in intellection. Its evaluation and creation of images with provided meanings gives it admission to universals in that it is capable to imagine of the universal by influencing images (Kemal, 1998). However, Ibn Sina describes this procedure of getting hold of the universal, this surfacing of the universal in the individual’s mind, due to the action on the mind by the Active Intellect. This intelligence is the ultimate of ten celestial intelligences that are positioned under God (Iqbal, 2009). At the peak beyond the Active Intellect, God, the clean intellect, is also the highest entity of individual knowledge. All sense experience, rationality and the abilities of an individual’s soul are thus aimed at getting hold of the basic formation of truth as it originates from that source and, through different stages of being down to the Active Intellect; it is offered to an individual’s thinking through reason or, in the case of prophets, intuition. According to this phenomenon, there is a close connection between rationality, thinking, experience, the getting hold of the critical formation of truth and a comprehension of God (Iqbal, 2009). As the uppermost and purest intellect, God is the basis of all the things existing on the earth. The latter originates from that pure high intellect, and they are classifies due to an obligation that can be taken hold of by utilizing the logical conceptual thought. These interrelations can be understood more easily in Ibn Sina’s metaphysics. Metaphysics investigates existence as such, absolute existence (al-wujud al-matlaq) or existence because it exists. Ibn Sina depends on the difference in Aristotle’s Prior Analytics among the beliefs primary to a scientific or mathematical understanding of the world, also comprising of the four causes, and on the other hand the theme of metaphysics, the chief or ultimate reason of all objects - God. In context of the first matter, Ibn Sina identifies that adherence of regularities in the natural world fails to create their need (Wisnovsky, 2005). At best it verifies the existence of a connection of relation between occurrences. To develop the requirement implicated in causality, one must be familiar, that simply accidental regularities would be improbable to always take place, or even at all, and definitely not with the regularity that occurrences can display. Thus, one must anticipate that such regularities must be the essential consequence of the required characteristics of the entities in question (Kemal, 1998). In establishing this difference among the beliefs and subject of metaphysics, Ibn Sina identifies another difference among essence and existence, one that is applicable to everything except God. Essence and existence are different in the sense that one cannot infer from the essence of an entity that it has to exist (Wisnovsky, 2005). Essence assumes only the nature of objects, and while this might be recognized in specific true situations or as an object in the mind with its attendant conditions, nonetheless essence can be assumed for itself separately from that mental and physical realization (Tahir, No date). Essences are present in the person’s intellect. Moreover, if essence is different from existence in the manner Ibn Sina is suggesting, then both the existence and the nonexistence of the essence might take place, and each might need clarification. From his evidence of Gods existence, Ibn Sina moves further give details on how the world and its arrangement originate from God. While Aristotle did not speak about the Active Intellect, later commentators on his work recognized the two, creating the Active Intellect, the belief that brings about the course of the individual’s intellect from probability to reality, into the first foundation of the universe (Kemal, 1998). Together with this is the evidence of Gods existence that perceives him not just as the chief mover but also as the first existent. Gods self-knowledge persists in an everlasting behavior that consequences in or brings about a first intelligence or knowledge. This first intelligence considers or understands the need of Gods existence, the requirement of its own existence, and its own existence as possible. (Tahir, No date) As of these behaviors of understanding, other individuals who exist occur in the arrangement of intellect, a cosmic spirit and a cosmic body. The last comprises of the first sphere of the universe, and when the second intelligence connects in its own cognitive act, it makes up the level of fixed stars also another stage of intelligence that then generates intelligence and another level of body. The final intellect that originates from the consecutive actions of being aware is the Active Intellect, which creates the world. Such production cannot persist for an indefinite period; even though a being may carry on from intelligence, not every intelligence including the similar characteristics will result in similar effects. Consecutive intelligences have reduced influence, and the active intellect, ranked tenth in the hierarchy, no longer holds the power to emit eternal beings (Wisnovsky, 2005). None of these propositions by Ibn Sina suggest reasons that he was devoted to mysticism. His supposed Eastern philosophy, typically understood to hold his mystical principles, seems to be a completely Western phenomenon that over the last two centuries has been read into Ibn Sinas work (Kemal, 1998). Nonetheless, Ibn Sina puts together his Aristotelianism and a religious interest, looking to clarify prophecy as having its foundation in a direct openness of the prophets mind to the Active Intellect, through which the middle terms of syllogisms, the syllogisms themselves and their ends are presented without the process of working out evidences (Wisnovsky, 2005). At times the prophet gains insight through imagination, and communicates his insight in metaphorical terms. It is also likely for the imagination to get in touch with the souls of the higher areas, permitting the prophet to envision the future in some symbolic form. There might also be other varieties of prophecy (Kemal, 1998). The entire contact with prediction, awareness and metaphysics, Ibn Sina assumes that the body concerned is the individual’s soul. In al-Shifa he suggests that the soul should be a spiritual object because intellectual thoughts themselves are undividable (Tahir, No date). Most probably he explains that a logical thought, including ideas in some determined arrangement, cannot be present in portions by various intellects and still stay a distinct coherent thought. In order to be a coherent single thought, it must be had by a solitary, united intellect rather than, for example, one intellect is having one portion of the thought, another intellect having a distinct part of the thought and yet a third intellect having a third different portion of the similar thought. This means that, a coherent thought is undividable and is there as such just an intellect that is same, united or undividable. However, physical matter is dividable; thus the undividable thought that is essential for coherent thought cannot be bodily. It must consequently be spiritual, as those are the simply two existing possibilities (Wisnovsky, 2005). According to Ibn Sina, the soul being spiritual suggests that it has to be eternal, that is, the decomposition and demolition of the body cannot influence the soul (Kemal, 1998). There are principally three associations to the physical body that may intimidate the soul but, Ibn Sina suggests, none of these associations is accurate for the spiritual soul, which thus must be undying. If the body was the reason for the souls existence, or whether the body and soul relied on each other essentially for their existence, or if the soul rationally relied on the body, then the obliteration or crumbling of the body would establish the existence of the soul (Iqbal, 2009). However, the body is not a reason of the soul; both are entities, physical and spiritual, and therefore as entities they must be autonomous of each other; and the body decomposes and crumbles due to its autonomous reasons and substances, not due to the alterations in the soul, and thus it does not follow that any modifications in the body, including death, must establish the existence of the soul. Even if the surfacing of the person’s soul suggests the function for the body, the function of this physical entity is unintentional (Kemal, 1998). To this illustration that the decaying of the human body does not involve or is that basis of the decomposition of the soul, Ibn Sina further asserts that the decaying of the soul cannot be the reason for anything (Ibnu Sina, No date). Compound existing entities are can be destroyed; on the other hand, the soul as a plain spiritual entity cannot be destroyed. Furthermore, as the soul is not a composite of substance and type, it might be produced but it does not experience the obliteration that troubles all generated objects that is formed of form and substance. In the same way, even if an individual recognizes the soul as a composite, for it to possess the accord that composite must itself be incorporated as a union, and the belief of this union of the soul must be easy; and, so far as the principle includes an ontological obligation to existence, being easy and spiritual it thus has to be everlasting (Iqbal, 2009). From the soul to be everlasting, questions may come up about the nature of the soul, what the soul might anticipate in a world originating from God, and what its place will be in the celestial system. Spirits uphold their distinctiveness into dissolution, individuals may further inquire about their fortune and how this is decided. Lastly, as Ibn Sina also desires to assign punishment and remuneration to such souls, he has to give details how there may be both fate and punishment (Ibnu Sina, No date). The requirement for punishment relies on the likelihood of evil, and Ibn Sinas investigation maintains that moral and other evils troubles humans rather than animals. Evils are typically an unintentional consequence of things that otherwise generate good. God creates more good than immorality when he creates this world, and disposing off an overpoweringly good practices because of a vices that occur infrequently would be a privation of good (Kemal, 1998). Here the example of fire can be taken, where fire is helpful and thus good, even if it sometimes troubles people. God may have produced a world in another existence that was completely liberated of the evil present in this one, but that would prevent all the greater goods present in this world, regardless of the uncommon evil it also holds (Ibnu Sina, No date). Therefore, God creates a world that holds both good and evil and the mediator, the soul, behaves in this world; the rewards and punishments it receives in its existence further than this world are the consequence of its preferences in this world, and there can be both fate and punishment because the world and its arrangement are exactly what offer souls an option between good and evil (Tahir, No date). Recognizing poetic language as creative, Ibn Sina depends on the capability of thoughts to create images to assert that poetic language allows the difference between locations, assertions and finish, and permits for an idea of poetic syllogism (Iqbal, 2009). Aristotles explanation of a syllogism was that if particular statements are acknowledged, then the other particular statements must automatically be acknowledged. Ibn Sina signifies the poetic premises as similarities formed by poets that generate an amazing outcome of suffering or happiness in order to clarify this syllogistic construction of poetic language (Iqbal, 2009). The similarities written by poets and the evaluations they presented in poems, when these are remarkable, unique and so on, generate an amazing outcome or sensation of marvel in the listener or the person who reads (Iqbal, 2009). The evening of life evaluates the periods of a day and a life, putting forward the implications of the day to enlighten some features of a lifetime. To discover this making use of consequential poetic language, the proposition is that an individual has to observe the comparison as the end of a syllogism (Tahir, No date). A principle of this syllogism would be that days have an extent that are similar to or is comparable to the development of a life. This similarity is remarkable, fresh and perceptive, and comprehending its combination of days and lives results the listener or reader be in awe or amazement. After that, pleasure takes place in this reflection of the poetic syllogism as the foundation of an individual’s creative assent, equaling assent in, for example, the demonstrative syllogism: once the individual has acknowledged the premise, the individual is led to accept the connections and creative productions that effect; once the comparison between days and lives is acknowledged, individuals can comprehend and realize the comparison between adulthood and evening (Iqbal, 2009). Ibn Sina also discovers further similarities involving poetic language and consequential assertions, illustrating that enjoyment in creative consent can be anticipated of other objects; assent is thus more than an expression of individual’s preferences. This authority of poetic language allows him to assert that loveliness in poetic language has an honorable worth that preserves and relies on connections of fairness between independent members of a community. In his explanation on Aristotles Poetics, though, he joins this with an argument that various types of poetic language will go with various types of people. Comedy goes with individuals who are base and impolite, whereas heartbreak interests listeners who are of decent (Iqbal, 2009). WORKS Of Ibn Sinas 16 medical works, eight papers on the subject of 25 signs signifying the deadly annihilation of illnesses, hygienic notions, proved cures, anatomical memoranda etc. The Qanun, known as the Canon, is the biggest, well-known and extremely significant work of Ibn Sina. It comprises of approximately one million words and is highly divided and subdivided (Ahmed, 1990). The main partition is into five books, of which the first talks about general beliefs; the second with straightforward drugs arranged alphabetically; the third with diseases of specific organs and parts of the body from the head to the toe; the fourth with illnesses which though local in the beginning, extend to other parts of the body, such as fevers and the fifth with compound medicines (Ahmed, 1990). The Canon differentiates mediastinitis from pleurisy and acknowledges the infectious character of phthisis (tuberculosis of the lung) and the extension of disease through water and soil (Darmani, 1995). It offers a scientific analysis of ankylostomiasis and assigns the condition to an intestinal worm. The Canon emphasizes the significance of dietetics, the control of weather and surroundings on health and the surgical use of oral anesthetics (Ahmed, 1990). Ibn Sina recommended surgeons to take care of cancer in its initial phases, making sure that all the diseased tissue is removed. The book mentions about 760 drugs, with explanation on their appliance and usefulness. He advised the testing of a novel drug on animals and humans before it is put to general use (Darmani, 1995). The Book of Healing (Kitab-e-Shafa) is almost certainly the largest work of its kind written by an individual. It is a philosophical encyclopedia, covering huge areas of knowledge from philosophy to science. This book talks about logic, the natural sciences, the quadrivium and also metaphysics. Ibn Sina’s principles in The Book of Healing were influenced by Aristotle, other Greek authorities and Neoplatonism (Iqbal, 2009). His structure was founded on the notion of God as an essential existent, that is in God alone, what he is and existence that he is, correspond. There is a slow increase of individuals through an everlasting release from God due to his self-knowledge. He categorized all the aspects of knowledge into: theoretical knowledge and practical knowledge. The theoretical knowledge includes physics, mathematics, and metaphysics. While practical knowledge includes ethics, economics and politics (Iqbal, 2009).  The book also contains thorough explanations of natural happenings such as rainbows and geological constructions as well as explanation of igneous and sedimentary rocks and stalagmites, with indication to Ibn Sina’s own childhood experiences. There is one particular piece on the “science of god’ in Book of Healing. This part was translated into Latin and distributed under the name The Metaphysic of Avicenna, as a result assuring that it would be presented to the western scholars and put forth an extraordinary influence on them. DEATH Exhausted by working hard and living a life full of suffering, Ibn Sina passed away in 1037 at a moderate age of 58 years. He was buried in Hamadan where his grave is still present. CONCLUSION Due to such magnificent honor to his work, Ibn Sina is remembered all through the world and his primary contributions to medicine and philosophy are largely recognized. Furthermore, there are exhibits illustrating a number of his manuscripts, surgical tools from that time and paintings of patients going through treatment in the museum at Bukhara, A remarkable tribute to the life and works of Ibn Sina who came to be known as the doctor of doctors still stands outside Bukhara museum and his portrait hangs in the Hall of the Faculty of Medicine in the University of Paris. REFERENCES Ahmed, M. (1990) ‘Ibn Sina (Avicenna) - doctor of doctors’, Available at: http://www.ummah. com/history/scholars/ibn_sina/ (Accessed 6 December 2009) Al Naqib, A. (1993) ‘Avicenna’, Prospects: the quarterly review of comparative education, 23 (1/2), pp. 53-69, Available at: http://www.ibe.unesco.org/publications/ThinkersPdf/avicenne.pdf (Accessed 6 December 2009) Darmani, N. A. (1995) ‘Avicenna: The prince of physicians and a giant in pharmacology’, The Journal of Islamic Medical association Of North America, 26, pp. 78-81, Available at: http://www.afghan-network.net/Culture/avicenna.html (Accessed 6 December 2009) Ibnu Sina. (No date), Available at: http://e-malabari.net/tokoh/ibnu_sina.htm (Accessed 6 December 2009) Iqbal, M. (2009) ‘Avicenna’, Available at: http://www.enotes.com/science-religion-encyclopedia /avicenna (Accessed 6 December 2009) Kemal, S. (1998) ‘Ibn Sina, Abu Ali al-Husayn (980-1037)’, Available at: http://www.muslim philosophy.com/ip/rep/H026.htm (Accessed 6 December 2009) Tahir, M. (No date) ‘Ibn-e-Sina-e-Balkhi (Avicenna of Balkh)’, Available at: http://www. khorasanzameen.net/pers/ibnsina.html (Accessed 6 December 2009) Wisnovsky, R. (2005) ‘Avicenna’s metaphysics in context’, Ars Disputandi, 5, pp. 1566-5399, Available at: http://www.arsdisputandi.org/publish/articles/000211/article.pdf (Accessed 6 December 2009) Read More