Thèse--Lettres--Paris, 1968. / Réunit : "Šifā' al-Ġal̄il f̄i l-Tabd̄il" ; "Luma ́fi Quaw̄aíd ahl al-Sunna" Études en français et les deux oeuvres en arabe avec la trad. française en regard.

My overall claim in this paper is twofold: Firstly, the activity of developing arguments in favour of the existence of the Christian God is tenable and worthwhile and, secondly, the “infinite God objection” fails to undermine the kalam cosmological argument. Concerning the former, it is often claimed that the very activity of developing arguments in favour of God’s existence is futile. I argue, however, that such theistic arguments play an important role in the philosophy of religion, natural theology, and apologetics. Concerning the latter claim, I will attempt to show how the infinite God objection fails to undermine a notable theistic argument, namely, the kalam cosmological argument. As regards this objection, the proponents of the kalam cosmological argument face a dilemma – either an actual infinity cannot exist or God’s knowledge cannot be infinite. More specifically, this objection claims that God’s omniscience entails the existence of an actual infinity with God knowing an actual infinite number of future events and mathematical truths. My solution to this problem is that (1) God’s omniscience should be understood as maximal knowledge; (2) the existence of abstract objects (such as numbers and propositions) should be denied; and (3) God’s knowledge is non-propositional in nature. / MPhil, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

The purpose of this study is to sample a number of disparate texts from the early Islamic cultural field to explore the shared grounds or themes that bind them together. The focus of the sampled texts and their analysis is the different relations between God and the real things of this world. The method that is applied in the selection of the texts of this research relies on Pierre Bourdieu’s approach to the study of cultural production. It assumes a relational and dynamic intellectual field which creates interlinked differences and similarities. This is the reason for sampling texts which are assumed to be reasonably marginal to the main cultural establishment. The kalām of the early stage, exemplified by the texts of the Zaydī al-Qāsim al-Rassī and the eastern Ibādīs, is found to emphasise the radical separation between the creator and the created. The development of this relation, which is explored through an intertextual reading of Qurʾānic exegesis, bridges the fissure, between creator and created, through the process of re-interpreting the terms of creation. The act of creation itself becomes an act of transformation, and the objects of creation become eternal ‘non-existent things’ that acquire the quality of existence. In the philosophical works of Jābir Ibn Ḥayyān, the things of this world are also reduced to transformations within the one substance that encompasses the intelligible and the material world. The results of this research show that there is a great degree of diffusion of ideas in this early stage of Islamic culture, from an assumed centre to the margins, and vice versa. The general tendencies in the texts considered reflect, on the one hand, a critique of multiplicity of principles, particularly dualism, and an emphasis on God’s unity, through different interpretations of tawḥīd. On the other hand, the sought unity itself established God’s radical transcendence from the real world, thus leading to another form of dualism dividing the world and the absolute other. The process of opposition to dualism seems to have eventually produced two forms of affirming and defining unity. Both forms define the existent things in terms of substance (jawhar), however, the kalām model expresses it in atomistic terms whilst the alchemical model of Jābir expresses it in terms of a hylomorphic model. One of these redefines the meanings of the existent and the non-existent things in term of subsistence, and the other, develops the idea of a single substance with different gradation in being.

My overall claim in this paper is twofold: Firstly, the activity of developing arguments in favour of the existence of the Christian God is tenable and worthwhile and, secondly, the “infinite God objection” fails to undermine the kalam cosmological argument. Concerning the former, it is often claimed that the very activity of developing arguments in favour of God’s existence is futile. I argue, however, that such theistic arguments play an important role in the philosophy of religion, natural theology, and apologetics. Concerning the latter claim, I will attempt to show how the infinite God objection fails to undermine a notable theistic argument, namely, the kalam cosmological argument. As regards this objection, the proponents of the kalam cosmological argument face a dilemma – either an actual infinity cannot exist or God’s knowledge cannot be infinite. More specifically, this objection claims that God’s omniscience entails the existence of an actual infinity with God knowing an actual infinite number of future events and mathematical truths. My solution to this problem is that (1) God’s omniscience should be understood as maximal knowledge; (2) the existence of abstract objects (such as numbers and propositions) should be denied; and (3) God’s knowledge is non-propositional in nature. / MPhil, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

By the dawn of the fifth/eleventh century, al-Bukhārī (d. 256/870) was recognized as the most highly regarded hadith scholar and his Ṣaḥīḥ as the most authoritative book, after the Qur'an. This canonical status promoted a romanticized version of al-Bukhārī that does not reflect the reality that his pre-canonical historical record presents. This study recovers the reality of al-Bukhārī and provides a critical biography of him, tracing the progress of his career and detailing the objectives of his work. It provides a re-assessment of al-Bukhārī's own juridical, theological, and hadith-criticism principles based on an analysis of his own works, arguing that al-Bukhārī was shaped by the split between hadith and ra'y. It distinguishes three stages in his career: early education under ra'y authorities, conversion to hadith-based school, and his critique of the ra'y-based scholars in Transoxania. Al-Bukhārī was a significant contender of theology and law in his own day and certainly promoted a moderate position in theology and law that proved crucial to his future renown. He appears to have been Medinese in law and Iraqi in hadith criticism. His legal theory adopts some of Mālik ibn Anas' (d. 179/795) views and al-Shāfi'ī's (d. 204/820) hermeneutical concepts. His legal method and positive law appear to be systematically anti-ra'y and exhibit a virulent disparage of Abū Ḥanīfa (d. 150/767) and al-Shaybānī (d. 192/804-5). It appears that al-Bukhārī composed the Ṣaḥīḥ over a long period, at least a decade, as the Ṣaḥīḥ itself tends to confirm a chronological progress. This progress, the author contends, was the outcome of al-Bukhārī's long project in Transoxania, combating ra'y and promoting hadith. Al-Bukhārī achieved prominence within hadith-based circles for his unique transmitter-criticism (rijāl) works, particularly al-Tārīkh, but when he conceded that one's utterance (lafẓ) of the Qur'an is created, he was immediately denounced by the hadith-based school. This controversy caused the collapse of al-Bukhārī's career, leading to his demise in Khartank near Samarqand in 256/870.

Positioning is recognized as an important feature of fifth generation (\abbrFiveG) cellular networks due to the massive number of commercial use cases that would benefit from access to position information. Radio based positioning has always been a challenging task in urban canyons where buildings block and reflect the radio signal, causing multipath propagation and non-line-of-sight (NLOS) signal conditions. One approach to handle NLOS is to use data-driven methods such as machine learning algorithms on beam-based data, where a training data set with positioned measurements are used to train a model that transforms measurements to position estimates.  The work is based on position and radio measurement data from a 5G testbed. The transmission point (TP) in the testbed has an antenna that have beams in both horizontal and vertical layers. The measurements are the beam reference signal received power (BRSRP) from the beams and the direction of departure (DOD) from the set of beams with the highest received signal strength (RSS). For modelling of the relation between measurements and positions, two non-linear models has been considered, these are neural network and random forest models. These non-linear models will be referred to as machine learning algorithms.  The machine learning algorithms are able to position the user equipment (UE) in NLOS regions with a horizontal positioning error of less than 10 meters in 80 percent of the test cases. The results also show that it is essential to combine information from beams from the different vertical antenna layers to be able to perform positioning with high accuracy during NLOS conditions. Further, the tests show that the data must be separated into line-of-sight (LOS) and NLOS data before the training of the machine learning algorithms to achieve good positioning performance under both LOS and NLOS conditions. Therefore, a generalized likelihood ratio test (GLRT) to classify data originating from LOS or NLOS conditions, has been developed. The probability of detection of the algorithms is about 90\% when the probability of false alarm is only 5%.  To boost the position accuracy of from the machine learning algorithms, a Kalman filter have been developed with the output from the machine learning algorithms as input. Results show that this can improve the position accuracy in NLOS scenarios significantly. / Radiobasserad positionering av användarenheter är en viktig applikation i femte generationens (5G) radionätverk, som mycket tid och pengar läggs på för att utveckla och förbättra. Ett exempel på tillämpningsområde är positionering av nödsamtal, där ska användarenheten kunna positioneras med en noggrannhet på ett tiotal meter. Radio basserad positionering har alltid varit utmanande i stadsmiljöer där höga hus skymmer och reflekterar signalen mellan användarenheten och basstationen. En ide att positionera i dessa utmanande stadsmiljöer är att använda datadrivna modeller tränade av algoritmer baserat på positionerat testdata – så kallade maskininlärningsalgoritmer. I detta arbete har två icke-linjära modeller - neurala nätverk och random forest – bli implementerade och utvärderade för positionering av användarenheter där signalen från basstationen är skymd.% Dessa modeller refereras som maskininlärningsalgoritmer. Utvärderingen har gjorts på data insamlad av Ericsson från ett 5G-prototypnätverk lokaliserat i Kista, Stockholm. Antennen i den basstation som används har 48 lober vilka ligger i fem olika vertikala lager. Insignal och målvärdena till maskininlärningsalgoritmerna är signals styrkan för varje stråle (BRSRP), respektive givna GPS-positioner för användarenheten. Resultatet visar att med dessa maskininlärningsalgoritmer positioneras användarenheten med en osäkerhet mindre än tio meter i 80 procent av försöksfallen. För att kunna uppnå dessa resultat är viktigt att kunna detektera om signalen mellan användarenheten och basstationen är skymd eller ej. För att göra det har ett statistiskt test blivit implementerat. Detektionssannolikhet för testet är över 90 procent, samtidigt som sannolikhet att få falskt alarm endast är ett fåtal procent.\newline \newline%För att minska osäkerheten i positioneringen har undersökningar gjorts där utsignalen från maskininlärningsalgoritmerna filtreras med ett Kalman-filter. Resultat från dessa undersökningar visar att Kalman-filtret kan förbättra presitionen för positioneringen märkvärt.

Fakhr al-Din al-Razi is a significant philosopher who is famous for his critics on Avicenna. He also made effective dialogues between two rival doctrines (namely Kalam and Peripateticism) in the Islamic world in Middle Ages. He defended Kalam Atomism in last decades of his life. This thesis is working on his two treatises as manuscripts and translating it into English. One of the treatises is about proving atom and another one is rejecting Hylomorphism. These two treatises are attached together as a manuscript book titled as Proving Atomism. / Au Moyen Âge, dans le monde islamique, il y avait deux groupes d'érudits qui avaient deux indications différentes sur l'existence. Le premier groupe était des philosophes, ḥukamā, qui ont approuvé falsafah ou ḥikmah. Cette doctrine avait des bases aristotéliciennes. Un autre groupe était des théologiens, mutikalimūn qui était pour la plupart atomistes. Les théologiens constituaient le kalām qui se traduisait parfois par théologie islamique.Fakhr-e-Razi ou Fakhr al-Din al-Razi était un philosophe et théologien important au 12ème siècle qui a fait des dialogues et des débats entre ces deux doctrines. Il a écrit des critiques sur les livres d'Avicenne et a défendu la doctrine de l'atomisme de Kalam. Bien qu'il ait défendu l'atomisme de Kalam dans beaucoup de livres, il a écrit un traité indépendant sur ce sujet. Cette thèse est l'édition et la traduction d'un livre manuscrit qui comprend deux traités indépendants, dont l'un, prouve atomisme et un autre réfute Hylémorphisme.Cette thèse inclut des commentaires sur l'atomisme et l'hylémorphisme (l'introduction du livre). L'atomisme comme vue générale et l'atomisme de Kalam en particulier sont étudiés. L'histoire de l'atomisme est brièvement passée en revue en tant que racines de l'atomisme de Kalam. Puis la vue de Razi sur l'atomisme est étudiée selon ce livre présent et ses autres livres. Le contraste entre la vision de Razi et la doctrine d'Avicenne comme son rival sont également analysés.

<p>This dissertation is concerned with two of the largest questions that we can ask about the nature of physical reality: first, whether physical reality begin to exist and, second, what criteria would physical reality have to fulfill in order to have had a beginning? Philosophers of religion and theologians have previously addressed whether physical reality began to exist in the context of defending the Kal{\'a}m Cosmological Argument (KCA) for theism, that is, (P1) everything that begins to exist has a cause for its beginning to exist, (P2) physical reality began to exist, and, therefore, (C) physical reality has a cause for its beginning to exist. While the KCA has traditionally been used to argue for God's existence, the KCA does not mention God, has been rejected by historically significant Christian theologians such as Thomas Aquinas, and raises perennial philosophical questions -- about the nature and history of physical reality, the nature of time, the nature of causation, and so on -- that should be of interest to all philosophers and, perhaps, all humans. While I am not a religious person, I am interested in the questions raised by the KCA. In this dissertation, I articulate three necessary conditions that physical reality would need to fulfill in order to have had a beginning and argue that, given the current state of philosophical and scientific inquiry, we cannot determine whether physical reality began to exist.</p>