Claims Of Consensus Research Articles

Consensus Claims, Problems in Theory and Implimenting, and Obstacles to Ijtihad and Renewing

It is clear to islamic scholars that consensus (eijmaa) has an important place within the sources of islamic legislations, as our scholars counted it as one of the evidences which they agreed upon, and made it the third evidence after Quraan and the Sunna. So they talked about it in detail, especially in theoretical aspects of its definition and proves, its conditions, its types, the validity of each type, the judge on who violates the consensus, and so on.
 On the practical side, we find that the jurisprudential books are full of claims of its unanimity in hundreds of issues. While a professional reader and investigator of these issues finds it difficult to apply the theoretical conditions of consensus to the collected consensus issues. It is a must in its definition that the some of all scholars in one era have the same opinion, also scientifically known that the defined and its definition must be equal and neither of them must not be more specific or more general than the other, that is to say, it must be a collective interdiction, inclusive of all members of the defined. if we apply the fundamental definition of consensus to the codified collections of Islamic jurisprudence, we will see that there is inequality between the definition and the issues included in the true definition of consensus. The investigation reveals to us that hundreds of issues on which consensus is claimed are the opinion of most of the scholars and not everyone of them.
 Hence the idea of this research has developed to solve some issues including:
 - The distinction between fundamental consensus and jurisprudential consensus. With explaining of the proportion of righteousness in the consensuses that have been proven in the jurisprudential heritage.
 - Statement of the effects of excessive claims of consensus on the Islamic community. also clarifying the disadvantages of excess and neglection in these claims on Ijtihad and innovation, and thus on the flexibility of islamic legeslations (Shariaa) and its harmony with every time and place.
 - Statement of the problems related to practicing consensus according to the theory of islamic legeslations principles and to clarify that its impossible to practice these principles on consensus. also to propose alternatives to consensus, finally the most important results presented in the conclusion. only God is always the conciliator of righteousness.

The claims of consensus on "what Allah swore by" where he said ﴾Verily, by your life…﴿: A critical study

أهداف البحث: يهدف البحث إلى بيان مدى صحة القول بالإجماع على أن المقسَم به في آية: لَعَمْرُكَ إِنَّهُمْ لَفِي سَكْرَتِهِمْ يَعْمَهُونَ [الحجر: 72]، هو حياة النبي محمد . منهج البحث: اتبعت الدراسة المنهج الوصفي ببيان مفهوم الإجماع في التفسير، والتعريف بالقسم في القرآن، والمنهج الاستقرائي المشفوع بالمنهج التحليلي، بتتبع كلام أكثر المفسرين ثم تصنيفه وتحليله. النتائج: توصل البحث إلى أن القول بالإجماع على المقسم به في الآية غير دقيق، وأن الرواية المنسوبة إلى ابن عباس رضي الله عنهما غير صحيحة، ولا يمكن البناء عليها في القول بالإجماع، أو في ترجيح قولٍ على قولٍ في التفسير، كما أن سياق الآية يحتمل الخلاف الوارد، وليس فيه ما يدعو إلى الإجماع المذكور. أصالة البحث: تظهر القيمة العلمية للبحث في تدقيقه دعوى الإجماع في التفسير من خلال دراسة مثالٍ، نقل الإجماعَ فيه بعضُ المفسرين المتقدمين، وصحح هذا الإجماعَ أحد الباحثين المتأخرين.

Lack of consensus among scholars on the issue of video game “addiction”.

Whether pathological video game overuse constitutes a distinct mental disorder remains an issue of controversy among scholars. Both empirical data and scholarly opinions differ regarding the status of pathological gaming and whether “addiction” is the best frame by which to understand video game use. The current study sought to examine the status of scholarly opinions in a survey of 214 scholars to examine their opinion of possible behavioral effects of games. Results indicated a variance of opinions. About 60.8% of scholars agreed pathological gaming could be a mental health problem, whereas 30.4% were skeptical. However, only 49.7% believed the DSM criteria for “internet gaming disorder” were valid, with slightly higher numbers, 56.5%, supporting the World Health Organization “gaming disorder” diagnosis. More scholars worried about both the DSM and WHO criteria over-pathologizing normal youth than weren’t worried about this. Scholars were likewise split over whether the DSM/WHO had precipitated moral panics over video games. Belief in pathological gaming was positively predicted by hostile attitudes toward children and negatively by participants’ experience with games. Overall results indicated continued significant disagreements among scholars related to pathological gaming. Claims of consensus are, at this juncture, likely premature

Ideology and Rhetoric Replace Science and Reason in Some Parental Alienation Literature and Advocacy: A Critique

This article analyzes rhetorical strategies that are often used to legitimize classifying children's parent rejection as “alienation,” conceived as a mental disorder or diagnosis. Use of evaluative labels or diagnoses instead of descriptions of behavioral functioning is problematic in child custody evaluations. We address Distorted Claims of consensus, Alienation Labeling, Renaming, Proof by Assertion, Misrepresenting Endorsement by Authorities, Reduction Ad Absurdum, and Ad Personam Attacks. Rhetoric distracts from the evidence and observable behaviors required to accurately classify mistreated/alienated children and protective/alienating parents. It creates an ideology that obfuscates the absence of and need for scientific validity studies; reliable prevalence data; non‐conclusory assessment of parent–child relationship quality; empirical evidence testing the coaching hypothesis; and valid, objective evaluations of treatment programs. The article concludes with suggestions to improve dialogue between scholars in order to advance research and custody evaluations.

The “Normalization” of Intersex Bodies and “Othering” of Intersex Identities in Australia

Once described as hermaphrodites and later as intersex people, individuals born with intersex variations are routinely subject to so-called "normalizing" medical interventions, often in childhood. Opposition to such practices has been met by attempts to discredit critics and reasserted clinical authority over the bodies of women and men with "disorders of sex development." However, claims of clinical consensus have been selectively constructed and applied and lack evidence. Limited transparency and lack of access to justice have helped to perpetuate forced interventions. At the same time, associated withthe diffusion of distinct concepts of sex and gender, intersex has been constructed as a third legal sex classification, accompanied by pious hopes and unwarranted expectations of consequences. The existence of intersex has also been instrumentalized for the benefit of other, intersecting, populations. The creation of gender categories associated with intersex bodies has created profound risks: a paradoxically narrowed and normative gender binary, maintenance of medical authority over the bodies of "disordered" females and males, and claims that transgressions of social roles ascribed to a third gender are deceptive. Claims that medicalization saves intersex people from "othering," or that legal othering saves intersex people from medicalization, are contradictory and empty rhetoric. In practice, intersex bodies remain "normalized" or eliminated by medicine, while society and the law "others" intersex identities. That is, medicine constructs intersex bodies as either female or male, while law and society construct intersex identities as neither female nor male. Australian attempts at reforms to recognize the rights of intersex people have either failed to adequately comprehend the population affected or lacked implementation. An emerging human rights consensus demands an end to social prejudice, stigma, and forced medical interventions, focusing on the right to bodily integrity and principles of self-determination.

Forging the Fifth Province

The period after the end of the Second World War was, literally, a defining moment in Namibian history. The future status of the territory was debated during some of the earliest meetings of the United Nations in 1945–1946. On the one hand, the South Africans argued that they had forged Namibia into a de facto fifth province of the South African nation, and that ‘consultations’ held with both black and white residents of the territory showed that the vast majority embraced absorption within the Union of South Africa. Critics argued that the ‘consultations’ had been an elaborate deception and that the claims of consensus were a forgery. Both these readings, however, reflect nationalist perspectives that oversimplify the conceptual contest. A closer look at four different contemporary interventions suggests a range of alternative perspectives, but also suggests that the notion of a liberation struggle was grounded in the failure to export South African identity and the persistence of perceptions of empire and foreign occupation.

No scientific consensus on GMO safety

A broad community of independent scientific researchers and scholars challenges recent claims of a consensus over the safety of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). In the following joint statement, the claimed consensus is shown to be an artificial construct that has been falsely perpetuated through diverse fora. Irrespective of contradictory evidence in the refereed literature, as documented below, the claim that there is now a consensus on the safety of GMOs continues to be widely and often uncritically aired. For decades, the safety of GMOs has been a hotly controversial topic that has been much debated around the world. Published results are contradictory, in part due to the range of different research methods employed, an inadequacy of available procedures, and differences in the analysis and interpretation of data. Such a lack of consensus on safety is also evidenced by the agreement of policymakers from over 160 countries - in the UN’s Cartagena Biosafety Protocol and the Guidelines of the Codex Alimentarius - to authorize careful case-by-case assessment of each GMO by national authorities to determine whether the particular construct satisfies the national criteria for ‘safe’. Rigorous assessment of GMO safety has been hampered by the lack of funding independent of proprietary interests. Research for the public good has been further constrained by property rights issues, and by denial of access to research material for researchers unwilling to sign contractual agreements with the developers, which confer unacceptable control over publication to the proprietary interests. The joint statement developed and signed by over 300 independent researchers, and reproduced and published below, does not assert that GMOs are unsafe or safe. Rather, the statement concludes that the scarcity and contradictory nature of the scientific evidence published to date prevents conclusive claims of safety, or of lack of safety, of GMOs. Claims of consensus on the safety of GMOs are not supported by an objective analysis of the refereed literature.

A review on deep molluscan phylogeny: old markers, integrative approaches, persistent problems

Molluscs are diverse and important enough to receive considerable scientific attention. We herein question recent opinions that the molluscan origin, deep inner relationships, and early evolution have been largely resolved. The traditional Testaria concept implied progressive evolution from worm-like aplacophoran to polyplacophoran and then conchiferan body plans; sole evidence for this came from morphocladistic analyses, which we conclude were confounded by homoplasy. The recently preferred Aculifera-Conchifera concept is supported by some but not all analyses using massive sequence data on rather small and uneven taxon sets. Recent results from mitogenomics indicate that gene-rearrangement events could cause sequence biases overriding potential phylogenetic signal. We discuss recent progress regarding multilocus marker analyses, particularly refining the neglected Serialia hypothesis with Monoplacophora sister to Polyplacophora. This third hypothesis for molluscan relationships is supported by an integrative interpretation and is roughly compatible with available fossil evidence if the first molluscs were small and had a true shell rather than a chiton-like body organization. Despite some claims of consensus, there are substantial discrepancies among recent molecular studies regarding class-level topologies. These may be symptomatic of a plethora of factors and evolutionary processes – obvious or more hypothetical – that might hinder successful reconstruction of early molluscan diversification.

Biobanks, consent and claims of consensus

Many scholars claim there is a consensus on broad consent for biobanking. We analyzed the literature in PubMed and found no evidence for consensus. Public perception studies report mixed findings on consent, but many biobanks adopt broad consent. A belief in consensus may stem from knowledge of biobank consent practices.

An Exploration of the Juristic Consensus (ijm??) on Compulsion in the Marriages of Minors

In the Hanbal? fiqh manual the Mughn?, Ibn Qud?mah (d. 620/1223) claims consensus (ijm?’) of the scholars of Islamic Law regarding a father’s ability to compel his prepubescent daughter to marry against her will, provided it is to a suitable match. This paper explores Ibn Qud?mah’s claim by investigating the contours of consensus- writing on child marriage. It looks first to the primary transmitter of early consensus (Ibn al-Mundhir, d. 318/930)—who is cited as a source of consensus throughout al-Mughn?—then at three other writers who focused on Ijm?’ (al-Marwaz? (294/906), al-?a??w? (321/933), and Ibn ‘Abd al-Barr (463/1070).
 This discussion explores the relationship between early claims of consensus and the proof texts upon which they relied. The paper highlights the influence on this topic of al-Sh?fi’?, whose arguments in support of compulsion of female minors in the Umm changed the discussion irrevocably. Finally, it illustrates how, unlike the Sh?fi‘?s, early M?lik? and ?anaf? texts did not rely upon the unit tradition regarding ‘?’ishah’s marriage to the Prophet. When jurists began relying upon the report of ‘?’ishah as a proof text for this issue, its veracity itself became a topic of consensus. In the hands of Ibn ?azm (465/1072), and with that report as his basis, child marriage shifted from an issue applying equally to both children to an issue pertaining only to girls. The larger juristic culture seems to have followed his lead, as child marriage for boys became radically under-discussed in the later legal texts, including the famed manual al-Mughn?.
 Above all, this paper exposes the concept of Ijm?’ as a “lowest common denominator” of agreement on this topic. Extracting an ijm?’ic claim from its context of debate and discussion deprives the inquiring scholar of any sense of the ripples of conflict and controversy emanating from it. In these early texts, we find there was no consensus with regard to what grants agency to females (pubescence or sexual experience); no consensus on the meaning of “suitability” in marriage (a condition for the permissibility of a father’s force); no consensus on at what point a female child can tolerate sexual activity; and, of extreme importance from the legal standpoint, there was no consensus with regard to how the prepubescent is to be maintained if she is not yet able to tolerate sexual activity. Because the marriage contract predicates maintenance upon sexual availability, this point causes a crisis in the jurists’ definition of marriage.

Scholarly consensus:Ijma‘: between use and misuse

Some conception of consensus is essential for ascertaining the bedrock teachings of the Islamic faith. There is an operative presumption that the normative tradition was defined by such a notion. This presumption, however, is complicated by the fact that historical discussions of the scholarly concept of legal consensus (ijma') can be traced roughly to the 2nd century subsequent to the advent of Islam, more than a century after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. Shiite rejection of the legal concept further vitiates Sunni claims of the authoritativeness and binding yields of unanimous consensus. Sunni jurists and legal theorists themselves from the earliest of times have also casts aspersions on the validity of claims of unanimous consensus while generally acknowledging its theoretical possibility. Despite these considerations, many significant scholarly personalities throughout Islamic history have claimed unanimous consensus on a number of legal and theological matters. When a ruling is the result of un...

Economic reform in developing countries: Some conceptual issues

This paper is an effort to show that the outcome of stabilization and structural adjustment policies, largely based on the neoclassical economic rationale, was justifiable neither in terms of the analytical nor the historical literature. The very ideological nature and the inherent contradictions of policies inhibited successful implementation and accentuated poverty and inequity in developing countries. By drawing on the views of various contemporary schools of economic thought, the paper also questions the validity of the international financial institutions' claims of consensus on development policy. The paper emphasizes that in social science research and, more so in policy prescriptions, the search for consensus may in fact be futile.

The Webster Brief: History as Advocacy, or Would You Sign It?

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS law professor Sanford Levinson raised a provocative question a few years ago. While touring Independence Hall in Philadelphia, he stumbled into a constitutional bicentennial exhibit that asked citizens to endorse the document. Should he sign? What did signing the Constitution imply? Levinson shared his struggles over the implications of endorsement.' The historians' brief to the Webster case posed a similar dilemma. It raised some fundamental questions about the role of historians and history in contemporary public policy-making, questions involving both the general difficulties of using the past in the present as well as the particular problems of history in the courtroom. In the end, over 400 historians signed the brief. Should the historians have signed? Just what was it they signed? The answers to these questions send us into the brief to see just what sort of history they endorsed. A historians' brief is an unusual use of history in the courts. History generally enters legal discourse through appropriation by lawyers and judges. In the Webster case, though, lawyers became the mediums for expressing the historians' message to the Supreme Court. Unlike the typical use of history in lawyers' arguments or judicial opinions, or even in expert testimony, the Webster brief represents a direct attempt by historians to inject their findings into judicial determinations and to legitimate their message with claims of professional expertise and consensus. Consequently, the brief sidesteps many of the charges leveled at historians who