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In the Name of God بسم الله
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About this blog

Ideas about modern issues from an Islamic perspective.

Entries in this blog

Freewill, viruses & opportunities

Whether Covid-19 is a naturally occurring virus or whether as some claim (unconvincingly, so far) it is a bioweapon, in my opinion its spread is the result of free will [15]. If it is naturally occurring, then it was human actions that led to its migration from animals to humans. We know that some viruses can do this and we have had previous experience with ones (e.g. SARS) that have created far less havoc [1]. By the same measure this one could be seen to be a dry run for worse epidemics to com
Haji 2003

Haji 2003

3
Politics

A counterpoint to the Great Replacement Theory

[This post was initially published as 'A little conspiracy theory of mine' on Oct 25 2016. I've now retitled it and linked some of the text with the notion of the Great Replacement Theory.] Summary Britain, after the Second World War ostensibly recruited workers from various developing countries in order to fill skill shortages. However, around the same time, there was a concerted effort by Australia to recruit working-class Britons. A possible explanation to this anomalous situation i
Economics

Whichever option you choose - you lose

[updated in May 2023 to include the Nvidia example and refine the argument overall].   Summary When you are in a weak position, all the choices you have are bad ones. Your opponent who dominates you due to more and/or better resources will ultimately prevail. It has historically been easy to 'blame' the Palestinians and other indigenous groups for their loss of territory. But we are fortunate enough to live through a period where erstwhile powerful nations are being made to s
Economics

Misplaced Trust

Summary Following someone else's lead (whether their advice or actions) because they are credible is not sufficient. You need to understand the motives for their actions. The problem https://www.forbes.com/profile/sam-bankman-fried/?sh=2e43415d4449 The firm grew to this size because of investments by large, well-known and reputable organisations, which in turn drew in investments from many other smaller investors. One of those reputable investors was Temasek (the Singapore
God Hypothesis

God Hypothesis

[This was originally posted in 2016 - but seems to have disappeared from my list of blog entries, although subsequent posts in the series are still there. This post is based on the original, but I have used the passage of time to refine it and add some more detail. Detail also added about transition fuels]. Synchronicity between resource availability and human development I think it is interesting how the content of planet Earth appears to be ‘synchronous’ with human growth and develop
Interfaith

Flowering of religions

Summary Since the inception of Islam, there had been various sects competing for prominence; many had died out, and the two major ones were Twelver Shia and the Sunni fiqh. Then suddenly, from the start of the 19th century to the end of that century, we have the emergence of Ahmadiyya, the renewal of Ismailism and the creation of a new faith entirely, Baha ism. Go back a hundred years, and we can add Wahhabism to this list. I identify a common thread amongst all these new religions in
Government

Prophet Nuh (عليه السلام) an early social entrepreneur

Putting 2 and 2 together I have some knowledge of what social entrepreneurship is and like most of you I have read the story of Prophet Nuh ((عليه السلام).) in the Qur'an and Bible. At this point, I would start googling like crazy to build up the argument, but I decided to take a short-cut and asked chatgpt the following question: Can Noah and his construction of the ark be considered a form of social entrepreneurship?   Now there are aspects of social entrepreneurship that
God Hypothesis

God & the concept of multiple discovery

Summary Multiple discovery also referred to as simultaneous invention - is where the same innovation is discovered by people working independently from each other. The notion suggests that individuals do not necessarily possess unique insights, but rather the presence of various environmental and cultural factors will engender innovation. A specific individual therefore has no specific genius that sets them apart from others. An alternative hypothesis is that specific inventions have been t
Economics

Riba and economic inequality

Summary For Muslims, the questions around Riba are focused at the level of the individual because we want to know what we can and cannot do. This post looks at the broader societal issue. The conclusion is that riba and the business of lending can increase economic inequality between different segments in society. Assuming an Islamic state has an overriding need to address economic inequality - it cannot accede to the provision of credit in a manner that we are used to in the West.
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Economics

1
Economics

Money, markets and minorities

Summary Buying and selling in the market place may provide advantages to minority groups at the expense of the majority. A State that represents the majority may need to act in order to address the imbalance in a manner that may seem on the face of it to be discriminatory. The impact of buying and selling in the market place The problem with money and markets is that they strip exchanges between people of all social and cultural content. In market-based exchanges, you can buy/sell
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Economics

0
Rationality

Scientific theory vs. unscientific utility

Summary Just because something is not created via the scientific method, does not mean it can't be useful - implications about how we think about religious precepts. Serendipity (pot luck) I have previously remarked upon how, in some fields of human endeavour where the scientific approach is held to be the ideal, in reality human scientific and technological discoveries has often been the results of luck and even mistakes. Social science 'theories' There is a corollary i
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Rationality

0
Economics

The role information in exchanges - Introduction

Summary I have a few blog posts dealing with knowledge and information (see links at the end of this post). Some of that material tries to frame Qur'anic injunctions in terms of contemporary ideas about exchange to help understand them and their direction better. This post provides some basic background to the contemporary concepts I am familiar with and which underpin some of that discussion. The ideas here are taken from the economics discipline. I have taken care to only reference c
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Economics

0
Rationality

Information that is easy to understand vs. what is useful

Summary This post is about the reasons why there is so much imperative in the Qur'an on sellers not taking advantage of their customers. The point being elaborated here is that it can be easy for sellers to take advantage of their buyers. The Qur'an uses a specific context (weights and measures) but this notion can be extended to other areas of the transaction. We can lump together all sorts of decisions that we make every day. Amongst other things, these can be decisions about:
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Rationality

0
Rationality

Give me the evidence and I'll believe

The imperative for proof An often heard comment about Muslim scholars in the past few decades has been that they need to express their thoughts in terms of science and proof. Because the yoofs of today are more 'educated' than their forebears and they have a higher standard of proof against which to measure what they hear from the pulpit. People need proof about the importance of hijab and they want proof about the benefits of circumcision (I thought I should put in the latter for gender eq
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Rationality

0
Economics

Prophet Yusuf's policy options

Surah Yusuf Prophet Yusuf (عليه السلام) advised Pharoah to hoard grains during the years of plenty. I think this episode is a noteworthy one because it shows how a State can intervene in the marketplace in order to improve the welfare of the wider population. But as we shall see below, the government intervention that Prophet Yusuf (عليه السلام) instigated favoured some sections of the population over others - it was not neutral in terms of how it spread gains and losses across the pop
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Economics

2
Lifestyle

Self-control

Summary This post is based on western academic literature on self-control. We will see that self-control by individuals is used to fight desire and can depend on principles, a monitoring process and personal capability (willpower). Willpower can vary between individuals, but it can be developed. Self control vs. desire In this 1991 paper by Stephen Hoch and George Loewenstein: http://www.cmu.edu/dietrich/sds/docs/loewenstein/TimeInconsistConSelf.pdf it’s argued that cons
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Lifestyle

0
Politics

FIFA Sweet Spot

Summary Winning need not be the goal of every country, getting into the last 16 can be good enough. We want to do better next time ... Now that the World Cup is over you get the following headlines: https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Sports/World-Cup-leaves-Asia-with-pride-regret-ahead-of-old-power-final   But is this where Asian countries really want to be? It seems to me as a casual observer that the better performing teams have the following characteristics
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Politics

0
Politics

Monitoring social media

Introduction This originally started as a post on another thread dealing with the protests in Iran in 2022. But I also wanted to focus on it as an idea and develop it here. The material here is updated from the previous post.  This post is about social media postings (specifically on Twitter) and the 'Iran centredness' of the people who were tweeting about that country. I was curious to see whether the interest that people were showing in the "welfare of Iranian women" mirrored their i
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Politics

0
Sexuality

Androids and inheritance

In this thread there was a half jokey but also serious issue that I raised: At some point Muslims will ask whether conjugal relations with androids are allowed and we can predict the answer will be no.   Since I first started that thread a lot has happened and I think it's worth introducing some new variables to the discussion. There was a time when men who dressed as women (and vice versa) did so either for humour or if it was in some way related to their sexuality the atte
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Sexuality

0
Politics

The current chaos in British politics

The 2019 UK election As some of you may know Britain had an election in 2019 and the Conservative party (aka Tories), who are on the right of the political spectrum won the most seats in the House of Commons. Their leader was Boris Johnson so he became Prime Minister. I'm pointing this out because UK politics works differently to other systems. But various scandals plagued his premiership and earlier this year he was forced to stand down. Selecting a new Prime Minister This t
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Politics

4
Politics

A link between the Russia/Ukraine conflict and the protests in Iran?

I think there is. It's about the Stans As the conflict continues there is media coverage being given to: Russia's Asian regions who are physically far from the conflict and who have little vested interest in it, some of the people are Muslims Russia's neighbours who are 'independent', but nevertheless have a close relationship with Moscow e.g. Tajikistan and the latter has specifically voiced concerns I think there is a longer-term attempt to take these regions and co
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Politics

0
Economics

Where Saudi sports and entertainment initiatives are headed

TL:DR Saudi is increasing investments in sports and entertainment. This is supposedly diversifying the economy away from oil and gas. They are also laying open Saudi to 'international consumer culture' because these industries also rely on international tourists. To cater for the latter you have to accommodate their tastes and these include alcohol, music and the exploitation of women.  By investing now in these industries the Saudi government is making itself hostage (deliberately) to
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Economics

0
Government

Values - Institute of Iranian Studies - case study

Introduction The institute is a Saudi attempt to exercise soft power. It presents 'research' designed to undermine the IRI. The people behind this organisation know the value of appearing to be independent and great care has been taken to present the image of a western 'thinktank'. Indeed you almost get the impression that the people behind an American think tank came up with this one. But as with any articificial exercise there are holes and I'll examine one of them. About us
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Government

1
Ethics

Could vs. should

Jurassic Park Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park says "You were so preoccupied with whether or not you could, you never bothered to ask if you should." Are changing attitudes towards transgenderism a function of technology? Would it be a fair assessment of human history to say that whenever we have developed the capability to do something we have, and whether or not we should has not really stopped us? The current debates around transgenderism reflect this, I think. It's more than a c
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in Ethics

0
God Hypothesis

Belief and proof

We need proof One of the challenges presented to people who believe in God by atheists is the lack of what is considered to be acceptable proof for His existence. But what happens when you are given proof? The case of CV19 I think our experience with covid over the past two years provides a really interesting case study in terms of how people respond to a phenomenon where you could argue that the type of evidence atheists are looking for is available in abundance and yet there are
Haji 2003

Haji 2003 in God Hypothesis

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