Camera or behind Camera: Ibn al-Haitham vis-à-vis Shaykh Ishraq on Vision | ||
| مجله پژوهش های فلسفی | ||
| Volume 18, Issue 48, 2024, Pages 309-318 PDF (972.58 K) | ||
| Document Type: Research Paper | ||
| DOI: 10.22034/jpiut.2024.59157.3630 | ||
| Author | ||
| Nadia Maftouni* | ||
| Professor, Department of Philosophy and Islamic Kalam, University of Tehran, Iran. | ||
| Abstract | ||
| Developing the empirical method based on observation and experiment, Alhazen is considered the greatest Muslim physicist and the most significant figure in the history of optics between antiquity and the seventeenth century. Inventing a camera obscura, Alhazen rebuilt our conception of eyesight. His theory of vision was enormously prominent and much of our understanding of optics and light is based upon his groundbreaking discoveries. He began his criticism of emission by describing what happens when people are exposed to bright lights. No matter what the light source, the effect of bright lights was always the same. What this indicates to Alhazen is that light entering into the eye from an external source had some serious function in eyesight. Respecting observation, experiment and empirical method, Suhrawardi, the father of Illumination School, argues all theories of vision and rejects them just by mere reasoning. Suhrawardi validates his own Illuminationist method by scientists’ empirical method. So, I will argue, he is not to deny empirical aspect of Alhazen’s theory of vision. In an allegory, I will use the camera, representing the whole process of a human vision, while I use “beyond camera” for the embodiment that allows for the unfolding of a human soul’s position in the process of vision. What Alhazen is speaking of, we might call the process within the camera; while what Suhrawardi is speaking of, we could name the process behind the camera. | ||
| Keywords | ||
| Alhazen; Suhrawardi; vision; emission; intromission | ||
| References | ||
|
Alhacen. (1983). Kitab Almanazir. al-Turath al-Arabi. (in Arabic) Aristotle. (1995). The Complete Works of Aristotle. Edited by Jonathan Barnes, 2 vols. University of Princeton. Avicenna, A. (1997). Isharat va Tanbihat. [In:] Tusi, Sharh Isharat va Tanbihat, vol. 2. Nashr al-Balaqah. (in Persian) Avicenna, A. (1985). Mabda va Maad, Edited by A. Nurani. McGill University Institute of Islamic Studies. (in arabic) Avicenna, A. (1986). al-Nejat. University of Tehran. (in Arabic) Avicenna, A. (1953). Resaleh al-Nafs, Edited by Musa Amid. Anjoman Asar Meli. (in Arabic) Avicenna, A. (1983). al-Shifa (Tabiiat, Nafs), Edited by Ibrahim Madkur. Marashi Library. (in Arabic) Avicenna, A. (1984). Taliqat, Edited by A. Badavi. Maktab Ilam Islami. (in Arabic) Avicenna, A. (1995). Uyun al-Hikmah, Edited by Ahmad Hejazi. Assadeq. (in Arabic) Guimaraes, F. (2011). Research Anyone Can Do It. Pedia Press. Hobson, M. (2004). The Eastern Origins of Western Civilization. Cambridge University Press. Kettani, A. (1976). Moslem Contributions to the Natural Sciences. Impact of Science on Society (UNESCO) 26(3) “Science and the Islamic World”, 135–149. URL: https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000020203. Al-Khalili, J. (2010). Pathfinders: The Golden Age of Arabic Science. Penguin Books. Lindberg, C. (1967). Alhazen’s Theory of Vision and Its Reception in the West. Isis 58(3), 321–341. URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/227990. Lindberg, C. (1976). Theories of Vision from al-Kindi to Kepler. University of Chicago Press. Masood, E. (2009). Science and Islam: A History. Icon Books. Photography History Facts 2023: History of Camera Obscura – Who Invented Camera Obscura? URL: http://www.photographyhistoryfacts.com/photography-development-history/camera-obscura-history/. Pickett, P. (2011). Empirical. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language.5th editon, Houghton Mifflin. Plott, C. (2000). Global History of Philosophy, Vol. 4: Study of Period of Scholasticism (Pt. 1) (800–1150 A.D.). Motilal Banarsidass. Rashed, R. (2007). The Celestial Kinematics of Ibn al-Haitham. Arabic Sciences and Philosophy 17, 7–55. (in Arabic) Rashed, R. (2016). Ibn al-Haytham’s Scientific Research Programme. [In:] Optics in Our Time. Edited by M. Al-Amri, M. El-Gomati, & M. Zubairy, Springer, Cham. http://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31903-2_2. (in Arabic) Rosińska, G. (1986). Fifteenth-century optics. Between medieval and modern science (in Polish). “Studia Copernicana” vol. 24, 40–42. URL: https://kpbc.umk.pl/dlibra/doccontent?id=41250. Sambursky, S. (1974). Physical Thought from the Presocratics to the Quantum Physicists. Hutchinson. Sarton, G. (1927). Introduction to the History of Science, vol. 1. Williams and Wilkins Co. Selin, H. (ed.) (2008). Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures, vol.1. Springer. Schramm, M. (1963). Ibn Al-Haythams Weg zur Physik. “Boethius, Texte und Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der exakten” vol.1. Steiner Franz Verlag. Shahrezoori, M. (2002). Sharh Hikmat al-Ishraq. Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies. (in Arabic) Shahrezoori, M. (2006). Rasa’il al-Shajareh al-Elahiye, vol.2. Edited by N. Habibi, Institute for Research in Philosophy. (in Arabic) Suhrawardi, S. (2002a). Hikmat al-Ishraq. [In:] Sharh Hikmat al-Ishraq. Edited by M. Shahrezoori, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies. (in arabic) Suhrawardi, S. (2002b). Majmu’e Musannafat Shaykh Ishraq, Vol. 1, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies. (in persian) Suhrawardi, S. (2002c). Majmu’e Musannafat Shaykh Ishraq, Vol. 2, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies. (in persian) Suhrawardi, S. (2002d). Majmu’e Musannafat Shaykh Ishraq, Vol. 3, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies. (in persian) Suhrawardi, S. (2002e). Majmu’e Musannafat Shaykh Ishraq, Vol. 4, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies. (in persian) Suhrawardi, S. (n.d.). al-Mashare va al-Motarehat (al-Tabiiat). “Library of Islamic Parliament of Iran”, manuscript no. 144. (in Arabic) Tbakhi, S. (2007). Ibn Al-Haytham: father of modern optics. Annals of Saudi Medicine 27(6), 464–467. http://doi.org/10.5144/0256-4947.2007.464 | ||
|
Statistics Article View: 1,554 PDF Download: 1,473 |
||