The Immateriality of the Soul and Mental Agency in Allameh Tabataba’i’s Epistemology and the Challenge of Perception in Artificial Intelligence

Saghiry, Ali; Afchengi, Mehdi; Baghshani, Ebrahim

doi:10.22054/wph.2026.85967.2306

The Immateriality of the Soul and Mental Agency in Allameh Tabataba’i’s Epistemology and the Challenge of Perception in Artificial Intelligence

Articles in Press

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Ali Saghiry ¹

Mehdi afchengi ²

ebrahim baghshani ³

¹ PhD Candidate, Department of Islamic Philosophy and Theology, Faculty of Theology and Islamic Studies, Islamic Azad University, Gorgan Branch, Iran.

² PhD in Islamic Philosophy and Theology, Islamic Azad University, Gorgan Branch, Gorgan, Iran.

³ Assistant Professor, Department of Islamic Studies, Shahroud University of Medical Sciences, Shahroud, Iran.

https://doi.org/10.22054/wph.2026.85967.2306

Abstract

This paper critically examines the possibility of cognition in artificial intelligence (AI) from the perspective of Islamic philosophy, focusing on the epistemological foundations laid by ʿAllāmeh Ṭabāṭabāʾī. Central to this analysis are the concepts of the soul’s immateriality, mental agency, intuitive (ḥuḍūrī) knowledge, and the theory of the unity of the knower and the known. According to this framework, true knowledge is a kind of existential presence in which the knower and the known are ontologically united, and the object of knowledge is present within the immaterial soul. In contrast, AI systems rely on symbolic representation, computational models, and statistical learning — mechanisms that inherently lack self-awareness, presence, and ontological union with the known. This study argues that due to the absence of immateriality, mental subjectivity, and existential unity, what is referred to as “cognition” in AI does not qualify as true knowledge in the philosophical sense but rather constitutes an external simulation of cognitive behavior. Hence, from the standpoint of Ṭabāṭabāʾī’s philosophy, knowledge in its genuine form is exclusive to immaterial beings endowed with a self-conscious soul. This analysis offers a novel critique of the epistemic foundations of AI and helps to clarify the essential boundaries between human and machine cognition.

Keywords

Allāmeh Ṭabāṭabāʾī'

'immateriality of the soul'

' mental agency'

' artificial intelligence

Subjects