Against the Conditional Correctness of Scepticism

2015

ABSTRACT Nowadays, when one doubts or questions extraordinarily, he is branded a skeptic and consequently resisted. The reason for this anachronistic approach towards the skeptic as an individual, and skepticism as a method or an attitude is not far-fetched. For example, people usually think that skeptics are men whose basic mood is that of doubt. Also they argue that skeptics are those who deny absolutely that true knowledge is possible. In this work, our attempt generally is to show how wrong this position is, and specifically, it is to restate that rather than denying the possibility of certain knowledge, skepticism is a philosophical method of inquiry or epistemological attitude towards knowledge whose goal is indeed certainty, but which selects a serious universal doubt concerning all knowledge as the starting point of a theory of knowledge. In this context therefore, the paradox of skepticism in epistemological enterprise would demand that whoever wants certain knowledge should proceed through doubt. Ordinarily, one would have thought that the best way to certainty is by accepting entirely all that one is told especially when it comes from a sage, or a tradition. Unfortunately, the position of this paper suggests otherwise.

Essays on Traditional Epistemic Internalism, 2016

Teorema, 2014

Erkenntnis, 2010

For a putative knower S and a proposition P, two types of skepticism can be distinguished, depending on the conclusions they draw: outer skepticism, which concludes that S does not know that P, and inner skepticism, which concludes that S does not know whether P. This paper begins by showing that outer skepticism has undesirable consequences because that S does not know that P presupposes P, and inner skepticism does not have this undesirable consequence since that S does not know whether P does not presuppose P. We indicate that the two types of skepticism aim to different loci of doubts: while outer skepticism doubts whether we can gain an epistemic warrant for the actuality, inner skepticism doubts whether we can gain epistemic identification of the actuality. It is further indicated that responses to skepticism from externalist theories, as well as from fallibilist internalist theories, can only respond to outer skepticism but not to inner skepticism.

The Journal of Philosophy, 1987

2016

INTRODUCTION Since Antiquity the scope of skeptical doubt was already a controversial issue for ancient Pyrrhonians; however, textual evidence suggests that for them, skeptical doubts were directed exclusively towards disputes between philosophers, particularly in relation to the problem of determining the nature of good and bad things. But regarding everyday beliefs, Pyrrhonians assented to appearances as the rest of us (cf. Sextus Empiricus, PH. 1.7 and 1.23-4).1 Sextus makes it explicit that a doxastic conception of human agency, where knowledge was a necessary condition for action, was commonplace among philosophers.2 Descartes (HR 219-220) also affirmed that skeptical doubt was possible only in philosophical inquiry but not in everyday life, where action results more relevant than truth. In the Treatise (1.4.57) Hume warned against a clash of intuitions regarding the skeptical

Quaderns de Filosofia, 2020

In this paper we don't intend to show, against the sceptic, that most of our everyday beliefs about the external world are cases of knowledge. What we do try to show is that it is more rational to hold that most of such beliefs are actually cases of knowledge than to deny them this status, as the external world sceptic does. In some sense, our point of view is the opposite of Hume's, who held that reason clearly favours scepticism about the independent existence of an external world rather than common sense belief in such an independent existence. In arguing for the superior rationality of this common sense, Moorean view, we also take a fallibilist conception of knowledge to be rationally preferable to an infallibilist view of it.

Philosophical Studies, 2009

The traditional argument for skepticism relies on a comparison between a normal subject and a subject in a skeptical scenario: because there is no relevant difference between them, neither has knowledge. Externalists respond by arguing that there is in fact a relevant difference—the normal subject is properly situated in her environment. I argue, however, that there is another sort of comparison available—one between a normal subject and a subject with a belief that is accidentally true—that makes possible a new argument for skepticism. Unlike the traditional form of skeptical argument, this new argument applies equally well to both internalist and externalist theories of knowledge.

Dialectica, 1987

This essay explores analogies between classical notions of pyrrhonist skepticism and reflexive phenomena of twentieth-century metamathematics. In a (first order) theoretical framework T, for example, one may interpret (1) T's appearances (@ a r u b p u a) as its axioms; (2) evident and inevident assertions (GijXa and biGqXa) in the language L(T) of T as sentences @ which are decidable and undecidable in T; and (3) skeptical self-doubt about T in L(T) as T's Godel-sentence y(T) (which may be construed as the assertion that " I doubt'this sentence"'). (4a) pyrrhonist 'modes' (~e O ? r o r) of indefinite semantic regress (;X?TTWUiS d n b i m r e o u) , and (4b) recurrent appeals to 'new' metatheories T', T",. . ., to consider 'new' q h i u o f i t u a , identify alternate interpretations, and adjudicate claims of (in)consistency. These analogies are also reflexivcin a wider sense. (1)-(3) are statedfor theories T, T', T",. . ., in some unspecified metatheory Tf o which they also apply. This wider reflexivity suggests that 'problems' of skeptical self-doubt are not vicious or otiose, but significant aspects of the phenomena of indefinite semantic regress. These analogies complement another one, between Resume Cet essai explore quelques analogies entre les notions classiques du scepticisme pyrrhonien et les phenomenes reflexifs de la metamathematique du vingtieme siecle. Dans un cadre theorique T du premier ordre, par exemple, on peut interpreter

Synthese 143 (2005), pp.273-290

Some philosophers understand epistemological skepticism as merely presenting a paradox to be solved, a paradox given rise to by some apparently forceful arguments. I argue that such a view needs to be justified, and that the best way to do so is to show that we cannot help seeing skepticism as obviously false. The obviousness (to us) of the falsity of skepticism is, I suggest, explained by the fact that we cannot live without knowledge-beliefs (a knowledge-belief about the world is a belief that a person or a group of people know that p, where p is an empirical proposition about the world). I then go on to argue for the indispensability of knowledge-beliefs. The first line of argument appeals to the practical aspects of our employment of the concept of knowledge, and the second line of argument draws on some Davidsonian ideas concerning understanding and massive agreement.