I do not agree with Mulls Sadra (though elsewhere he has...

I do not agree with Mulls Sadra (though elsewhere he has expressed an opposite opinion), Mulls Had! Sabzawari and Ibn Sina in considering inclination and will as one thing. Elsewhere they, including even Ibn Sina, have drawn a distinction between the two. Will is the state of self-possession of the soul, a state of resolution, where reason is involved and rational calculations are made and the judgement of reason prevails.

Moral imperatives relate to man as a rational being (in the same way as early Muslim Philosophers consider them as part of practical reason), not to the soul from a practical aspect. Moral approval and disapproval are judgements of practical reason (the contemplative faculty which comprehends universals) from the aspect of the government of the body. Otherwise moral norms are irrelevant to animals or to man from the viewpoint of not being subject to the judgements of reason.

Metaphorical ideas are exclusive to man. His thought has reached the point where he can apply the term for something to another thing. For instance, he sees the moon and then sees a human being possessing beauty to whom he is drawn. He applies the term for the former to the latter and transfers to the latter his feelings evoked by the moon. This act signifies man's developed nature and no animal is capable of such an act. This act is a kind of make up and adornment; i.e.

man observes a kind of beauty in someone and then he adds to it by supplementing accidental graces, while he knows that these graces do no belong to that person but are charms borrowed from extraneous colour, water, and line but which heighten his feelings of attraction towards that person. This is what happens in metaphorical and poetical expressions.

When the poet refers to something with metaphors, that thing assumes a greater charm in his sight, as in the case of Rudaki who wrote those verses for the Samanid prince using those metaphors for Bukhara. Bukhara remained what it was but he projected the city in such charming terms that they moved the prince. These are miracles of the human mind. Q: Is this the Pavlovian conditioned reflex? A: No.

Pavlovian conditioned reflex relates to the materialist approach to perception (not to normative concepts) which tries to give a materialist interpretation to human thought. Pavlov talks of involuntary human reflexes. The issue of conditioned reflex or association of ideas is different from the issue of values and metaphor.