Özdemir, Şengül2026-04-252026-04-2520252630-6069https://doi.org/10.26650/di.2025.36.3.1762022https://hdl.handle.net/11486/8054This article analyzes the fact that artificial intelligence fulfills the functions at the level of species competence of many beings classified and analyzed within the framework of the concept of soul (nafs) in terms of ontological status, and that the ontological description of Classical Islamic philosophy has changed radically. This radical transformation of the ontological description is generally discussed around the fundamental question of whether artificial intelligence will gain consciousness. To make sense of this problem in the context of Islamic thought, we conduct a conceptual analysis and comparison within the framework of the conception of the soul and artificial intelligence. This is mediated by the approach of functionality and multiple realisability in the philosophy of mind. The aim of this article is to shed light on the radical transformation that has occurred in both classical Islamic thought and contemporary understandings of existence and to discuss the impact of artificial intelligence in the reshaping process of contemporary Islamic thought. To make sense of this profound transformation and its impact on contemporary Islamic thought, the inseparable nature of understanding, interpreting and application the hermeneutic method is emphasised. Without grasping the ontological, epistemological and axiological dimensions of the artificial intelligence phenomenon, which transforms human existence and experience in all its dimensions, and without constructing a new language for it, reducing the existing religious, philosophical and scientific knowledge and heritage to an application element consisting of mere repetition and imitation is criticized within the framework of the concept of cognitive self-censorship. © 2025 Istanbul Universitesi. All rights reserved.trinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessArtificial IntelligenceFunctionalismIslamic PhilosophyPeripateticismSoul (Nafs)TranshumanismArticle36382084410.26650/di.2025.36.3.17620222-s2.0-105030682315Q4