Editing Islamic philosophy (section)

===Thought experiments===
{{Further|Avicenna#Thought experiments}}
While he was imprisoned in the castle of Fardajan near [[Hamadhan]], [[Avicenna]] wrote his "Floating Man" [[thought experiment]] to demonstrate human [[self-awareness]] and the substantiality of the soul. He referred to the living human [[intelligence]], particularly the [[active intellect]], which he believed to be the [[Hypostatic abstraction|hypostasis]] by which God communicates truth to the human [[mind]] and imparts order and [[intelligibility (philosophy)|intelligibility]] to [[nature]]. His "Floating Man" thought experiment tells its readers to imagine themselves suspended in the air, isolated from all [[Wikt:sensation|sensations]], which includes no [[Sense|sensory]] contact with even their own bodies. He argues that, in this scenario, one would still have [[self-consciousness]]. He thus concludes that the idea of the [[Self (philosophy)|self]] is not logically dependent on any physical [[Object (philosophy)|thing]], and that the soul should not be seen in [[relative term]]s, but as a primary given, a [[Substance theory|substance]].<ref name=Leaman>Seyyed [[Hossein Nasr]] and [[Oliver Leaman]] (1996), ''History of Islamic Philosophy'', p. 315, Routledge, {{ISBN|0-415-13159-6}}.</ref>

This argument was later refined and simplified by [[René Descartes]] in [[epistemic]] terms when he stated: "I can abstract from the supposition of all external things, but not from the supposition of my own consciousness."<ref name=Leaman/>