DOUBT UNDOGMATIZED:
PYRRHONIAN SCEPTICISM, EPISTEMOLOGICAL EXTERNALISM
AND THE `METAEPISTEMOLOGICAr CHALLENGE
DUNCAN PRITCHARD
University of Stirling
Abstract
It has become almost a conventional wisdom to argue that Cartesian scepticism poses a far more radical sceptical threat than its classical Pyrrhonian
counterpart. Such a view fails to recognise, however, that there is a species
of sceptical concern that can only plausibly be regarded as captured by the
Pyrrhonian strategy. For whereas Cartesian scepticism is closely tied to the
contentious doctrine of epistemological internalism, it is far from obvious
that Pyrrhonian scepticism bears any such theoretical commitments. It is
argued here that by viewing the Pyrrhonian style of sceptical argument in
terms of this contemporary epistemological externalist/internalist distinction one can gain a new insight into some of the more problematic elements
of this variety of classical thought and also get a handle on certain contemporary worries that have been raised regarding the anti-sceptical efficacy
of externalist theories of knowledge.
1. Pyrrhonian versus Cartesian Treatments of Radical
Scepticism
It is widely accepted that the sceptical challenge that Descartes poses
in his Meditations far out-weighs that presented by the classical Pyrrhonian scholars, as represented by Sextus Empiricus in attlines of
Pyrrhonism and Adversus Mathematicos. 1 As Myles Burnyeat has expressed the point:
What he [Descartes . ] achieved was to bring about a permanent
enlargement of our conception of the power and scope of skeptical doubt, with the result that Hume, for example, lists "Cartesian
Principia, 4(2) (2000), pp. 187-214. Published by NEL — Epistemology
and Logic Research Group, Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC),
Brazil.
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doubt" as a species of skepticism alongside, and more fundamental
than, Pyrrhonism [...] This was indeed a transformation of the ancient materials, but in a sense quite opposite to that which Descartes
intended. 2
There is certainly a great deal of truth in this claim, and I shall begin
by rehearsing the main reasons offered in its favour.
On one level, the Cartesian doubt is more compelling because of
its methodological nature. Whereas its classical counterpart was motivated by, broadly speaking, ethical concerns, 3 and therefore was used
to inspire belief (or rather, non-belief) of a certain sort, Descartes
conceived of his doubt as a hurdle that any adequate epistemological
theory must clear. For example, in Outlines of Pyrrhonism, in a section
entitled 'What is the End of Scepticism?', Sextus Empiricus answers
the question in hand by asserting that
[... ] the Sceptic's End is quietude in respect of matters of opinion
and moderate feeling in respect of things unavoidable. (SE I 19) 4
Later on he contrasts the "quietude" gained by living the sceptical
life with the "disquietude" of those who do not suspend judgement:
For the man who opines that anything is by nature good or bad is for
ever being disquieted; when he is without the things which he deems
good he believes himself to be tormented by things naturally bad and
he pursues after the things which are, he thinks, good; which when
he has obtained he keeps falling into still more perturbations because of his irrational and immoderate elation, and in his dread of a
change of fortune he uses every endeavour to avoid losing the things
which he deems good. On the other hand, the man who determines
nothing as to what is naturally good or bad neither shuns nor pursues anything eagerly; and, in consequence, he is unperturbed. (SE
119)
Scepticism is thus a means via which one might learn to lead the
'good' life.
Contrast this conception of the sceptical project with that offered
by Descartes, where the goal of his scepticism — his "general demolition of his opinions" — is to secure a "foundation" upon which he
could establish belief in "the sciences that was stable and likely to
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last" (AT VII 18-9, CSM II 12).5 Here there is no suggestion that
scepticism could be an end in itself 6 This move is important since
it detaches the plausibility of the doubt from the plausibility of a particular stance adopted by a doubter, in that the sceptical challenge
is no longer regarded as an argument that is advanced by an embodied sceptical opponent. This has important dialectical consequences.
Whereas it would constitute an appropriate response to anyone who
argued for his scepticism (and thus to Pyrrhonian scepticism, so conceived), to simply argue, as it were, ad hominern, against the coherence of the sceptic's position in proposing it (a common form of critique against classical scepticism 7), the same line of attack would not
(at least not in itself), seriously trouble Cartesian scepticism. After
all, if one really is presented with an otherwise unobjectionable argument that leads to sceptical conclusions, is it really much of a retort
to claim that no one could seriously advance an argument that led to
such conclusions? 8 Indeed, in understanding the sceptical challenge
in this instrumental fashion, Descartes pays it the compliment of be
broadly speaking, a paradox — a series of claims which, when
taken independently, are all entirely plausible but which, when set
side-by-side, lead to a chain of reasoning that has absurd conclusions. And it would, of course, be no response to the proponent of a
paradox to charge him with absurdity for proposing it since these are,
putatively at least, intuitions which we all accept. 9
A second reason that is often cited in support of the claim that
Cartesian doubt is more radical than Pyrrhonian scepticism is the
fact that it is directed at all of our beliefs all at once, rather than at
each of our beliefs in a piecemeal fashion. As Descartes famously
wrote:
Suppose we had a basket full of apples and were worried that some of
them were rotten. How would we proceed? Would we not begin by
tipping the whole lot out and then pick up and put back only those
we saw to be sound? (AT VII 481, CSM 11 324)
This element of Cartesian scepticism follows naturally on from the
first, in that if one regards one's scepticism as part of one's philosophical position, then it clearly would be incoherent to try to argue for
one's complete ignorance on a principled basis. In contrast, if one re-
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gards scepticism as a paradox, then there need be no bar to elucidating that paradox in a manner that illustrates its utterly devastating
consequences. As Michael Williams has expressed this conception
of the relationship between Pyrrhonian and Cartesian radical scepticism:
It is a commonplace that ancient scepticism had a moral point, that
scepticism was a way of life, life without the comfort of dogma or
theoretical conviction; and it is not likely that philosophers intent
on putting forward a way of living in the world would push their arguments to the point where the very existence of the world became
a problem. Thus, it is sometimes said, the intentions of the ancient
sceptics contrast sharply with those of Descartes who, for the first
time, embeds his sceptical reflection in a project of starkly theoretical purity and, as a result, is able to follow them to a far more radical
conclusion. LO
Indeed, in contrast to Descartes' doubt in this respect, the standard form that Pyrrhonian scepticism takes does not have the appearance of a sceptical argument at all. Instead, the Pyrrhonian sceptic
tends to offer dialectical techniques that enable one to create problems with any particular claim to know that one's opponent may
make. The 'dogmatic' stance of claiming knowledge with complete
conviction should, the Pyrrhonians argued, be opposed by offering a
countervailing argument (isosthenia) which would engender a neutral
attitude (epoche) and eventually lead to a tranquil and untroubled
state of mind (ataraxia).
Consider, for instance, Agrippa's trilemma'. 11 The idea behind
this trilemma is that any challenge to a claim to knowledge can only
be responded to in one of three ways:
I.
II.
III.
Refuse to respond, (i.e., make an undefended assumption).
Repeat a claim made earlier in the argument, (i.e., reason in a
circle).
Keep trying to think of something new to say, (i.e., embark on
an infinite regress).
And given that there is no fourth option available, it follows that
any attempt to justify one's claim to know will either be interminable
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(as with option III) or terminate in an unsatisfactory way (as with
options I and II).
Another possible reason why Pyrrhonian scepticism is limited to
this piecemeal doubt could be its focus on the relativity of experience.
Although such relativity may be able to support doubt about particular beliefs (or at least provide reasons against those beliefs that
out-weigh the reasons for), it seems insufficient to support the view
that, in general, experiential knowledge is impossible. After all, it
is consistent with the supposed sceptical import of such 'relativity'
that one does derive knowledge from experience in a range of everyday 'normal' cases, it is just that each particular experience could be
construed as being one of the 'abnormal' ones.
Descartes' doubt, in contrast, goes straight to the heart of what
would constitute epistemic support for our experiential beliefs. Consider, for example, how Descartes' dreaming argument differs from
that utilised by Sextus Empiricus. As Sextus Empiricus notes:
Sleeping and waking, too, give rise to different impressions, since we
do not imagine when awake what we imagine in sleep, nor in sleep
what we imagine when awake; so that the existence of our impressions is not absolute but relative, being in relation to our sleeping or
waking condition. (SE I 63)
Sextus' use of the dreaming argument, unlike that propounded by
Descartes, merely adduces considerations concerning dreaming as a
means of reinforcing the idea that experience is relative and therefore not necessarily a reliable guide to the nature of reality. 12 In
Descartes' writings, in contrast, the argument has less to do with the
relativity of experience than with the fact that we are unable to adduce a definitive criterion — a "sure sign" — that would indicate
that we are awake and not dreaming. As Descartes puts the matter:
[... J I see plainly that there are never any sure signs by means of
which being awake can be distinguished from being asleep. The result is that I begin to fell dazed, and this very feeling only reinforces
the notion that I may be asleep. (AT VII 19, CSM 11 13)
argues, there are no features of our experience
which allow us to definitively distinguish our waking experience from
Since, Descartes
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dreaming, it follows that we should suspend all of our sensory judgements, even when they are undertaken in "ideal" circumstances. The
classical doubt concerning how experience can be 'relative' is thus replaced by a more subversive doubt suggesting that we lack grounds
for believing that experience is any guide to the nature of reality at
all, no matter what the quality of that experience is. It is important
to recognise how radical a suggestion this is. If there are no such
distinguishing features — and if such a distinguishing mark is a prerequisite for any belief based on sensory experience being accorded
a sufficient epistemic sanction — then it would seem to follow that
no matter how 'reliable' our experience in other respects is, it is still going
to be of no use to us in forming epistemically sanctioned beliefs. Accordingly, whereas one could, conceivably at least, meet the classical
arguments for the 'relativity' of experience by fixati,ng upon paradigm
(if only hypothetical) cases of experience where there is knowledge
and then working outwards to the more problematic cases, this would
be no response to the Cartesian dreaming sceptic since on this view
there are no such paradigm cases to which one could appeal. Again,
then, we find Descartes apparently intensifying the disquieting force
of epistemological scepticism.
Note that I have identified the break with the classical sceptical argument in this respect with reference to Descartes' use of the
dreaming argument rather than, as is more usual, the 'malicious demon' argument. 13 It is certainly natural to think that it is only with
the latter argument that one gets the superlative sceptical threat that
is held to be so distinctive of the Cartesian method. After all, as
Descartes himself recognises, the dreaming hypothesis, as opposed to
the malicious demon hypothesis, is perfectly consistent with the existence of many things, such as "eyes, head, hands and the body as
a whole" (AT VII 19, CSM II 13). 14 The latter argument is thus
essential if one is to make the characteristic Cartesian move of being
sceptical about even the existence of an external world. Nevertheless, although it is correct to say that it is only the malicious demon
argument that attacks the truth of most of what is believed, both of
these arguments attack the epistemic status of most of our beliefs (and
not in a piecemeal fashion either, but en masse). For although dreaming does not preclude the truth of many of the propositions which
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we commonly believe (such as those propositions which concern objects in an external world), it does preclude our knowledge of those
propositions. Accordingly, although the malicious demon argument
is indeed a more radical sceptical hypothesis than the dreaming hypothesis, 15 the dreaming hypothesis still marks a definitive break with
the classical form of scepticism under consideration here. 16 ' 17
We have canvassed two main differences between Cartesian and
Pyrrhonian scepticism. First, that the former, but not the latter, is
methodologically (rather than ethically) conceived and thus, relatedly, is not regarded as advanced by any particular adversary. And,
second, that the former is directed at all of one's beliefs all at once,
as opposed to the latter which proceeds on a piecemeal basis and
which, in a related fashion, consists of a series of techniques- to induce doubt rather than arguments as such. As we shall see, these
two axes of distinction are intertwined, but I think it best to keep
them apart for now until we have examined them more closely since,
as I shall explain below, the manner in which one regards them as
inter-connected can vary depending upon one's wider epistemological prejudices.
There are, of course, other differences between Pyrrhonian and
Cartesian scepticism. For example, Cartesian scepticism notoriously
issues in the demand for complete certainty in our beliefs, 18 as opposed to the Pyrrhonian request that we merely adduce grounds for
our belief that out-weigh the grounds offered by the sceptic against
our beliefs. Nevertheless, these differences should suffice for our
purposes since it is on the basis of these distinctions that the conventional wisdom — found, to greater or lesser extents, in the recent work of such writers as, for example, Bernard Williams, Myles
Burnyeat, and Christopher Hookway 19 — has formed that Cartesian scepticism poses the more devastating critique than its classical
counterpart.
2. Epistemological Internalism and Cartesian Scepticism
Despite these obvious ways in which the Cartesian variety of scepticism can seem to pose the greater threat, there is an important sense
in which, as I shall now argue, it is Cartesian scepticism that poses
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the weaker challenge. The reason for this is that, unlike Pyrrhonian
scepticism, Cartesian scepticism depends for its plausibility upon a
prior commitment to the doctrine of epistemological internalism. It
thus follows that, at least on one level, it is Pyrrhonian scepticism
that makes the most pressing demands on our epistemology since
these demands will apply even if we abandon the doctrine of epistemological internalism.
Of course, I am not the first to argue that the plausibility of Cartesian scepticism depends upon epistemological internalism. 20 The
distinctive thesis here is not this claim, but rather the two-fold contention that, (i) the plausibility of Pyrrhonian scepticism does not
depend upon epistemological intemalism, and (ii) that the modern
sceptical debate can therefore learn from an engagement with this
age-old adversary.
For the purposes of this paper, I shall characterise epistemological
internalism as consisting, at least minimally, in the following thesis:
1K:
A necessary condition of an agent, a's, knowledge of a proposition, 9, is that a has sufficient reflective access to the factors
that make it such that a knows 9.
Although lacking in detail, this should certainly be an uncontentious
way of describing the core elements of the position.' After all, it
captures the distinctive internalist demand that reflective access to
the relevant epistemic factors is essential to knowledge whilst evading the sort of Gettier-type concerns over the sufficiency of such an
intemalist component of knowledge. Moreover, if we follow convention in defining externalism as the denial of intemalism (and thus,
again at least minimally, as the rejection of this thesis), then we can
allow for the possibility that an externalist account of knowledge
could still incorporate core internalist insights. One could, for instance, disavow the claim that the kind of reflective access described
in IK is necessary for knowledge whilst still allowing such reflective
access to play a pivotal role in one's epistemology. 22
In order to appreciate the relevance of this doctrine of epistemological internalism to the distinction between Cartesian and Pyrrhonian conceptions of scepticism, we must first look again at how Descartes' motivates his scepticism. Take the dreaming argument, for
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example, the beginnings of which we saw above. The definitive criterion that Descartes is seeking is clearly characterised such that it is
reflectively accessible to the agent — that the agent can himself reflectively determine that he is not the victim of the sceptical dreaming hypothesis. But since this "sure sign" can never be reflectively
given in experience — because, ex hypothesi, the coherent dreams
that Descartes is interested in are phenomenologically indistinguishable from waking experience — it follows that one could never know
any of the everyday propositions which one believes the knowledge
of which would be inconsistent with one's being the victim of such a
coherent dream.
One could reconstruct Descartes' argument in this respect in the
following fashion, where `dreaming*' refers to those coherent dreams
that are phenomenologically indistinguishable from waking experience:
(Dl) If I do know that I am, for instance, sitting here now, then it
must be false that I am dreaming*.
Hence:
(D2) In order to know that I am sitting here now, I must be able to
know that I am not dreaming*.
But:
(D3) I cannot reflectively determine that I am not dreaming*.
Hence:
(D4) I cannot know that I am not dreaming*.
Hence:
(DC) I cannot know that I am sitting here now.
Even if one accepts the epistemic principle that drives the crucial
move from (Dl) to (D2) — the highly intuitive principle that (roughly) if one knows a proposition, then one must be able to know what
is presupposed in that knowledge23 — this is still only a plausible set
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of inferences on the assumption of epistemological internalism. The
problematic move is from (D3) to (D4). Although, on an internalist
account, it naturally follows from the fact that one is unable to reflectively determine that one is not dreaming* that one thereby cannot
know that one is not dreaming*, this move is contentious on an externalist account. At the very least, the issue of knowledge possession
will be a further question for the externalist, dependent upon the relevant cognitive mechanisms at work or the subjunctive relationships
that the subject's beliefs bear to the truth-value of the target proposition in near-by possible worlds. The Cartesian sceptical argument
thus presupposes epistemological intemalism. 24' 25
3. A Reconfiguration of Pyrrhonian Scepticism
With this Cartesian dependence on epistemological internalism in
mind, it is worthwhile reconsidering the nature of the Pyrrhonian
doubt. Why is it, for example, that the Pyrrhonians did not go for
the same sort of "sure sign" arguments that Descartes did, especially
since they had already considered the sceptical hypotheses themselves? And, (as we shall see) relatedly, why did they tend to focus
on claims to know rather than on the possession of knowledge itself?
I think that one possible answer lies in a lack of commitment to the
intemalist paradigm.
Consider the Pyrrhonian focus upon claims to know. Right at the
beginning of Outlines of Pyrrhonisrn, Sextus Empiricus emphasises a
crucial difference between, on the one hand, the Dogmatists — who
"have claimed to have discovered the truth" (SE 3, my italics) — and
the Academics — who "have asserted that it cannot be apprehended"
(SE 3, my italics) — and, on the other, the Sceptics who simply "go
on inquiring" (SE 3). A contrast is thus established between those
who claim knowledge or the lack of it, and the Pyrrhonian strategy
of censuring each and every claim to know.
A natural thought to have is that any attack on an agent's ability to claim to know a certain proposition is itself, albeit derivatively,
an attack on the agent's possession of knowledge. This thought depends, however, on the plausibility of the idea that, if one knows
a proposition, then, ceteris paribus, one can properly claim to know
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that proposition. Such a principle is itself only convincing, however,
given an internalist theory of knowledge. Clearly, on whatever epistemological view one endorses (whether intemalist or externalist),
what makes a claim to know legitimate is, (again, ceteris paribus), the
subject's possession of reflectively accessible grounds to support that
assertion. As Wittgenstein expressed the matter:
One says "I know" when one is ready to give compelling grounds. "I
know" relates to a possibility of demonstrating the tnith.26
Similar remarks are also to be found in the work of Austin:
When I say, 'I know', I give others my word: I give others my authority
for saying that 'S is P'. [... ]
If you say you know something, the most immediate challenge takes
the form of asking, 'Are you in a position to know?': that is, you must
undertake to show not merely that you are sure of it, but that it is
within your cognisance. 27
point by saying that a claim to know carries with it
a certain conversational implicature to the effect that one is willing,
and able, to offer adequate grounds (i.e., 'internal' grounds) to support that claim. If this implicature is false, however, (if one is unable
to offer such grounds), then that claim to know, whilst it may be true,
is improper. 28
Given that the internalist stresses the importance of reflectively
accessible grounds to knowledge possession, it follows that on the intemalist account there will be a very tight connection between the
ability to properly claim to know a certain proposition, and the possession of knowledge of that proposition. In general, if one knows,
then one can properly claim that knowledge, and if one can properly
claim knowledge then (provided what is claimed is true), one knows.
In contrast, on the externalist picture this tight connection breaks
down. Although the externalist will agree that a claim to know is
only in order when one has sufficient reflectively accessible grounds
to support that claim, he will demur from the converse direction of
fit. For an extemalist there will be cases in which one knows but
one is unable to properly claim that knowledge because one lacks
sufficient reflectively accessible grounds to support that claim.
One could put the
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Indeed, such is the point of the cases over which the internalist and the externalist disagree. Whereas extemalists are content
to allow, say, small children the capacity to know whilst lacking the
reflective skills demanded by the internalist, they would agree that
small children cannot properly claim such knowledge. For the externalist, then (and unlike the intemalist), just as a lack of reflectively
accessible grounds need not indicate that one does not know, so an
inability to properly claim knowledge because one lacks reflectively
accessible grounds need not indicate that one does not know either.
One might posses a 'brute' externalist form of knowledge whilst being
completely unable to properly claim that one has it.
This point is important because it highlights that it is only when
viewed through the lens of an internalist epistemology that one would
straightforwardly construe the Pyrrhonian attack on claims to know
as thereby being attacks on knowledge possession. Viewed through
the alternative lens of an externalist epistemology the challenge to a
subject's claims to know can coexist with an acceptance that the subject may indeed know a great deal. This point has significant dialectical consequences. Since Cartesian scepticism presupposes internalism, it will only defeat one's putative possession of knowledge (and
thus one's putative ability to properly claim that knowledge), provided one accepts the internalist paradigm. In contrast, the Pyrrhonian censure of claims to know can be construed either as an indirect attack on knowledge possession (if one endorses the internalist
paradigm), or as merely an attack on one's ability to properly claim
knowledge (on the extemalist account). In an important sense, then,
Pyrrhonian scepticism can be understood as stronger than its Cartesian counterpart on the grounds that it can be interpreted as posing
a sceptical challenge whatever type of epistemology, internalist or externalist, one endorses.
Furthermore, on the assumption that the Pyrrhonian sceptical position is not tied to an internalist epistemology, we now have a compelling explanation of several other interesting features of the Pyrrhonian stance. For one thing, we can further account for why it is that
this variety of scepticism proceeds in a piecemeal fashion. The standard explanation of this facet of the classical doubt was that such a
strategy enabled the Pyrrhonian sceptic to evade the charge that he
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is putting forward the very sort of general epistemological claims that
his scepticism is supposed to undermine. One might add more flesh
to this explanation by noting how a general form of doubt along the
same lines as that proposed by Descartes would, in any case, commit
the Pyrrhonian sceptic to internalist epistemological principles. Why
seek a "sure sign" which would reflectively validate one's putative experiential knowledge if one does not endorse internalism?
By considering the Pyrrhonian challenge in the light of the internalist/externalist contrast we can also explain certain apparent
anomalies in the Pyrrhonian position. It was often thought odd, if
not straightforwardly self-refuting, that the Pyrrhonians claimed to
endorse such an extravagant doubt whilst going about their lives in a
normal (albeit "non-dogmatic") fashion. Isn't it impossible to "live"
one's radical scepticism? 29 Relatedly, how can one understand radical scepticism as an ethical stance when it seems to preclude one from
coherently engaging in any enterprise at all, ethical or otherwise?
There have been a number of proposals put forward to try to explain this apparent anomaly in the Pyrrhonian position. One popular thesis in this regard is to make some sort of distinction between
the 'theoretical' or 'philosophical' beliefs that the Pyrrhonian sceptic
must be sceptical about, and the `practical' beliefs that can be left as
they are. This proposal gains support from the fact that Pyrrhonian
scepticism seems to primarily consist in, as Michael Williams has put
it, "a distrust of theoretical commitments". 30 Burnyeat has pursued
a similar point, noting that
[... I ancient scepticism even at its most extreme did not seriously
question that one can walk around in the world. It did not seriously
question this, I have argued, because it was in fact entirely serious
about carrying skepticism into the practical affairs of life.31
The ethical nature of the Pyrrhonian doubt is thus only possible because 'practical' concerns are exempted from the battery of sceptical
argument.
By making a distinction of this sort between those theoretical beliefs that are open to censure and their quotidian counterparts which
aren't, one can thus explain why scepticism is `liveable' in the way
that the sceptic supposes. 32 The problem with this line of thought
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is that it dramatically weakens the sceptical argument by restricting
the range of propositions to which it is applicable. Moreover, surely
the Pyrrhonian sceptical strategy of doubt could be applied to any
genuine claim to know, even a non-theoretical one made in a `practical' conversational context? Indeed, the application of Agrippa's
trilemma, outlined above, does not seem to be restricted in this way
at all. Prima facie, it can be put to work against any serious claim to
know.
Michael Williams tries to evade this concern by distinguishing
two different epistemological contexts — the context of "reflection"
in which any claim can be legitimately called into question, and the
context of "action" in which everyday beliefs are exempted from sceptical attack. He writes:
I think that the only way to resolve this apparent inconsistency [of
advancing scepticism and assenting to propositions in everyday life] is to
see the scope of sceptical assent as determined not just by style but
also by context. What Sextus must mean is that, though anything
can be questioned, some things ordinarily are not. In the context
of reflection, where we want to determine what is true, or what can
justifiably be believed, any opinion can be subjected to the method
of opposition. But in the context of action, everyday life, all sorts of
things are simply taken for granted, without argument. 33
It is difficult to see how this evades the difficulty, however, since the
problem remains that one can be no less dogmatic in everyday life
than one is in the context of theoretical speculation. Accordingly, if
it is the ethical goal of attaining quietude that is at issue, with dogma
its enemy, then the Pyrrhonian strategy of doubt must be applicable
in whichever context a dogmatic claim is made, whether theoretical
or practical.
Aware of this tension, other commentators have tried to rescue
the radical nature of the classical doubt within an ethical framework by arguing that one should distinguish between two sorts of
assent. Michael Frede, for example, has argued that the Pyrrhonians
merely offered a 'sceptical' rather than a `dogmatic' assent to the beliefs (about, primarily, appearances) that they lived their lives by.34
Relatedly, the point has been made — by David Sedley, Jonathan
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Barnes, and (a later) Burnyeat et al.
that one needs to distinguish
a more demanding sense of 'dogma' from that of 'belief' . 35
Certainly, some distinction is needed if we are to rescue the internal coherence of the Pyrrhonian view. Sextus Empiricus gestures
towards such a distinction himself, of course, at a number of junctures. For example, he writes
[W] hen we say that the sceptic refrains from dogmatizing we do not
use the term "dogma" as some do, in the broader sense of "approval
of a thing" (for the Sceptic gives assent to the feelings which are
the necessary results of sense-impressions, and he would not, for example, say when feeling hot or cold "I believe that I am not hot or
cold"); but we say that "he does not dogmatize" using "dogma" in
the sense, which some give it, of "assent to one of the non-evident
objects of scientific inquiry" F... ]. (SE I 13-4, cf. SE I 16)
The use of the term "dogma" here is remarkably close to a more contemporary reading in terms of "acceptance", where the latter indicates a voluntary willingness to assent to the proposition in question. 36 What is interesting about this notion is that it is completely
unlike belief in the sense that an agent's acceptance of a proposition,
P, neither entails, nor is entailed by, that agent's belief that P.
On the one hand, an agent might involuntarily believe a prowl
sition even though he would not be voluntarily willing to assent to
it (and thereby accept it). This would, plausibly, be the case in scenarios in which an agent is convinced of a radical sceptical argument
but continues to form (what we might call 'Humean') beliefs about
his environment regardless. For example, in such a scenario (as the
Pyrrhonians acknowledge), one would find oneself assenting (if only
implicitly) to statements about one's sense-impressions even though
one did not accept those statements.
On the other, an agent may accept, and thereby be voluntarily
willing to assent to, various propositions that he does not in fact believe.37 Though the extent to which one can exercise control over
one's set of beliefs is moot, it is surely agreed by all that one cannot always changes one's beliefs merely as a matter of fiat. One might thus
be convinced by an argument, and therefore accept the conclusion
of that argument, whilst still retaining one's belief in the negation of
that conclusion.
—
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The essential distinction between the two notions is thus one of
choice. Although one can at least partially capture this distinction in
terms of a 'practical'/theoretical' contrast — since theoretical beliefs
tend to be the paradigmatic sort of beliefs that one chooses to assent
to — the 'voluntary' axis makes a more fine-grained cut. After all,
as noted above, even practical beliefs, if asserted with conviction,
can be prone to the sort of techniques of doubt that one finds with
Agrippa's trilemma. 38
What is significant about those cases in which one spontaneously
'assents' to a proposition in this way is that such assertions do not
carry the same sort of weight of conversational implicature than is
involved in a typical claim to know. For one thing, such spontaneous
acts of assent are rarely, if ever, prefixed by an epistemic operator,
and so do not carry the implicatures associated with such 'epistemic'
claims that we saw above. Indeed, in an important sense, these nondogmatic assertions tend to carry no conversational implicatures at
all since the very fact that they are recognised as being spontaneous
serves to 'cancel' such implicatures from the outset. For example,
applying Agrippa's trilemma to such assertions would clearly be improper because the speaker is obviously not intending them to carry
any sort of conversational burden. They are, if you like, more like
reports than assertions. 39
What is also important about this distinction is that it leaves room
for a notion of belief (however minimal) to play a role within the
Pyrrhonian framework even once the sceptical argumentation has
done its job. And where there is even such minimal belief there
is the potential, at least on the externalist account, for knowledge.
Moreover, where there is belief there is also the capacity for beliefguided action, thereby offering an explanation of how it could be that
this form of classical scepticism was advanced as an ethical position
that the proponents claimed to be trying to embody.
Accordingly, this distinction between dogma and belief merely
serves to emphasise the fact that Pyrrhonian scepticism is entirely
consistent with an externalist epistemology. It may well be that one
is so related to the world such that one's beliefs do indeed mesh with
reality in an appropriate fashion. In this nominal sense one would
thus have a very 'brute' knowledge of the world borne of this um-
Doubt Undogmatized
203
ited causal engagement with an external reality. On this reading,
then, the Pyrrhonian sceptics have no interest in attacking this type
of 'knowledge', if, indeed, that is what it is. The focus of their attack
is rather that form of knowledge that can be put to discursive use
— knowledge that can be claimed, defended, used to convince. It is
this form of knowledge — a more sophisticated cousin of its weaker
externalist relative — which is under attack.
Provided one does not regard the Pyrrhonian sceptics as presupposing (even implicitly) epistemological internalism, one can thus
see the exegetical difficulties surrounding the coherence of a sceptical ethical stance dissipate because such sceptics are not now committed to the widespread absence of knowledge, at least in this brute
'exte rn alise sense, only to the incoherence of any cicarn to possess it.40
So although the Pyrrhonian sceptic is committed to undermining the
dogmatic stance of claiming knowledge, he is not thereby committed to regarding himself as lacking knowledge, at least not the sort of
knowledge that the ex ternalist is content to allow to be deserving of
the name.
In a very real sense, then, Pyrrhonian scepticism can, on this view
at least, be regarded (in contrast to the atheism of Cartesian scepticism), as truly agnostic about knowledge possession, and what could
be more non-dogmatic than that? It is important to note that the
contention here is not that the Pyrrhonians were closet externalists,
which would, in any case, be both superfluous to the core contention
of this paper and highly implausible. Rather, the claim is that the
Pyrrhonian sceptical strategy is consistent with both sides of the internalism/externalism distinction (which is what you would expect frám
a non-dogmatic form of scepticism), and therefore cannot be undermined simply by rejecting an essential component of either epistemological camp. Accordingly, advancing epistemological externalism would not directly excuse you from serious consideration of a
Pyrrhonian sceptical argument in the manner that it would a Cartesian sceptical argument. It is in this sense, then, that Pyrrhonian
scepticism poses a more pressing sceptical challenge than its Cartesian counterpart.
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Duncan Pritchard
4. Pyrrhonian Scepticism and the Contemporary
`Metaepistemologicar Challenge
What makes Pyrrhonian scepticism particularly intriguing on this interpretation is that it seems to be able to encapsulate certain contemporary worries that have been expressed about the anti-sceptical
efficacy of externalism. Sure, the objection might run, we may well
(externalistically) know lots of things, but of what use is this sort of
knowledge to us unless we can reflectively determine that we have
it and therefore properly claim to possess it? This type of sceptical
worry has been labelled by Richard Fumerton as `Metaepistemological Scepticism', since it is directed at epistemological views (especially externalist epistemological views) which, at least by their own
lights, are actually inconsistent with radical scepticism. 41 For whilst
it may well be true that externalism is inconsistent with the sceptical
contention (on a priori grounds), that knowledge is, in the main, impossible, the issue remains as to whether one's endorsement of this
externalist reorientation of one's concepts is itself warranied, or at
least an intellectually satisfying mammuyre to make in response to
scepticism.
Part of the problem of expressing this concern, however, is to develop it in such a way that it does not simply beg the question against
the externalist anti-sceptic. That is, we do not simply want to dismiss
externalist anti-sceptical accounts on the grounds that they are not
internalist anti-sceptical theories of knowledge. Consider, for example, the following quotation from Fumerton:
[T]he main problem with extemalist accounts, it seems to me, just
is the fact that such accounts I-..] develop concepts of knowledge
that are philosophically irrelevant. E... ] The philosopher doesn't just
want true beliefs, or even reliably produced beliefs, or beliefs caused
by the facts that makes them true. The philosopher wants to have
the relevant features of the world directly before consciousness. 42
What is problematic about this quotation is the last phrase that the
"philosopher wants to have the relevant features of the world directly
before consciousness". After all, if this is simply the demand that
an appropriate anti-sceptical philosophy should incorporate reflec-
Doubt I.Inclogmatized
205
tive access to the factors which make it such that the agent knows,
then it is simply a demand for intemalism.
Similar concerns beset other attempts to formulate this metaepistemological worry. Consider the following remarks by Barry Stroud:
[...1 suppose there are truths about the world and the human condition which link human perceptual states and cognitive mechanisms
with further states of knowledge and reasonable belief, and which
imply that human beings acquire their beliefs about the physical
world through the operation of belief-forming mechanisms which
are on the whole reliable in the sense of giving them mostly true
beliefs. [... I If there are truths of this kind, although no one has
discovered them yet, that fact alone obviously will do us no good as
theorists who want to understand human knowledge in this philosophical way. At the very least we must believe some such truths;
their merely being true would not be enough to give us any illumination or satisfaction. But our merely happening to believe them
would not be enough either. We seek understanding of certain aspects of the human condition, so we seek more than just a set of
beliefs about it; we want to know or have good reasons for thinking
that what we believe about it is true. 43
Again, one might object to this characterisation of the difficulty on
the grounds that what Stroud is demanding when he speak of 'understanding human knowledge philosophically' is nothing less than
some sort of reflective access to the fact that one does indeed have
the knowledge that one takes oneself to have, and thus an internalist
epistemology. 44
The advantage that the construal of Pyrrhonian scepticism offered here holds is that we can by-pass these concerns and nevertheless capture the metaepistemological worry implicit in these quotations. For what is accepted by both parties to the dispute is that
the propriety of claims to know — and thus of any dogmatic form of
assent — can be dependent upon reflectively accessible grounds. It
thus follows that one could formulate the metaepistemological sceptical concern along Pyrrhonian lines in terms of an inability to ("dogmatically") properly claim knowledge — regardless of whether or not
that knowledge is actually possessed. Moreover, this demand does
not beg the question against the extemalist since this condition on
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Duncan Pritchard
the propriety of claims to know is one that, we might legitimately
assume, the extemalist would himself share. The issue would thus
not be the standard first-order concern about knowledge possession
(although, on the internalist account, it would translate into that),
but rather whether or not one could properly claim one's putative
knowledge; whether one could adopt the "dogmatic" stance of assenting to/accepting propositions which one is under no compulsion
to believe or assent to.
It is not hard to see how such a challenge would function. Consider the 'regress' element of Agrippa's trilemma that demands that a
new assertion must be made ad infinitum to support a claim to know.
The externalist could respond to the epistemological regress principle
that underlies this argument by simply contending that there are no
a priori reasons for thinking that such ultimate grounds do not exist
and thus that the appearance of a regress is illusory. But that would
be beside the point. For any claim to know must itself be supported,
and if, as the trilemma suggests, each legitimate claim to know must
always give way to another legitimate claim to know, then this regress
will, prima facie at least, still stand. After all, whichever 'foundation'
the externalist offered would itself be subject to the trilemma, and so
a regress would loom even here. The externalist would thus have to
meet a more specific sceptical challenge which was not directed at
knowledge possession in the 'brute' sense, but merely at any claim to
have knowledge; any form of dogmatic assent.
Even on an externalist account, then, although it may be that
knowledge is rescued from the Cartesian sceptic and everyday conversational practices are left intact even by Pyrrhonian lights, what
is really at issue in the sceptical debate — the ability to dogmatically claim knowledge; to understand knowledge 'philosophically' as
Fumerton and Stroud might be tempted to put it — is still left moot
whilst the Pyrrhonian sceptical challenge remains to be neutralised.
It would thus appear that Pynhonian scepticism should be given a
re-examination outside of the internalist paradigm in order to see
whether it has anything important to tell us about the inadequacy
of extemalist responses to scepticism. 45 It may be that, on an externalist account, there is no a priori reason to believe that one lacks
knowledge of most of what one believes. This would be of little use,
Doubt Undogmatized
207
however, if it still remained that there was an a priori reason to believe that one is unable to properly claim a substantive portion of
that knowledge, and it could be that it is Pyrrhonian scepticism that
is able to capture this latter type of `metaepistemological' sceptical
worry. 46
Keywords
Cartesian scepticism; epistemological externalism; metaepistemological scepticism; Pyrrhonian scepticism
Duncan Pritchard
Department of Philosophy
University of Stirling
Stirling, FK9
Scotland, UK
d.h.pritchard@stir.ac.uk
Notes
I Henceforth, when I refer to 'classical' scepticism, I shall have only the
Pyrrhonian sceptical thought as represented by Sextus Empiricus in mind.
2 'Introduction' in M. Bumyeat (ed.) The Skeptical Tradition (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), p. 3.
3 For an illuminating discussion of the ethical goals of Pyrrhonian scepticism, see David Sedley's paper 'The Motivation of Greek Skepticism', in M.
Bumyeat (ed.) The Skeptical Tradition, op. cit.
4 See also SE 9 where Sextus Empiricus writes that "[TI he originating cause
of Scepticism is, we say, the hope of attaining quietude." All references to
Sextus Empiricus given in the text are drawn from Sextus Empiricus with an
English Translation (London: Heinemann, 1933-1949: 4 volumes), translated by R. G. Bury and cited as SE.
5 References to Descartes' writings in the text are given in the standard
manner to the Charles Adam and Paul Tannery edition of CEuvres de Descartes (Pans, Cerf. , 1897-1913: 12 volumes), cited as AT, and to the translation by J. Cottingham, R. Stoothoff, D. Murdoch and A. Kenny in the
Philosophical Writings of Descartes (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press,
1985-1991: 3 volumes). Volumes I and II are cited as CSM I and II and
volume III as CSMK.
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Duncan Pritchard
Bernard Williams offers a sophisticated account of how Descartes' methodological conception of scepticism marks a definitive break with Pyrrhonian scepticism in 'Descartes's Use of Skepticism' in M. Bumyeat (ed.) The
Skeptical Tradition, op. cit. See also his Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry
(Harmondsworth: Pelican, 1978), chapter 2.
7 We shall consider the effectiveness of such a strategy below.
8 Crispin Wright offers an interesting contemporary account of Cartesian
scepticism that runs along these lines, arguing for what he calls the "adversary" constraint on anti-sceptical theories to the effect that, insofar as the
sceptic is offering us a paradox, then one must not motivate one's antiscepticism by making any essential reference to the incoherence of the
sceptic's position. See his paper, 'Scepticism and Dreaming: Imploding
the Demon' Mind 397 (1991), pp. 87-115. For a discussion of this proposal, see Duncan Pritchard, 'Meta-Epistemological Constraints on AntiSceptical Theories', Facta Philosophica 3 (2001), pp. 101-26.
9 Although this primarily epistemological characterisation of the Cartesian
project in this respect is still dominant, there are those who maintain that
one should also give due weight to the particular scientific and metaphysical
concerns which engaged Descartes. For a subtle discussion of the exegetical options in this regard, see J. L. Berrmidez, 'Scepticism and Science in
Descartes' Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 57 (1997), pp. 743-72.
1 ° Unnatural Doubts: Epistemological Realism and the Basis of Scepticism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991), p. 2.
11 SE I 95-101. See also Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Philosophers translated by R. D. Hicks (London: Heinemann, 1925), vol. 2, p. 501; and the
translation offered by J. Annas & J. Barnes in The Modes of Scepticism: Ancient Texts and Modern Interpretations (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1985), appendix C. The trilemma is actually presented as part of a
collection of five 'modes' that lead to a suspension of judgement. The role
that the other two modes play — 'discrepancy' and 'relativity' — is, however, peripheral, and so I shall not discuss them here. For an excellent
discussion of Agrippa's trilemrna, from which I borrow the essentials of the
above characterisation, see Michael Williams, Unnatural Doubts: Epistemological Realism and the Basis of Scepticism, op. cit., section 2.4.
17 Indeed, some commentators, most notably Stephen Gaukroger, take this
difference in approach to the use of sceptical hypotheses to indicate that the
Pyrrhonians were not really proposing scepticism at all as such, but rather
propounding a form of relativism. See his 'The Ten Modes of Aenesidemus and the Myth of Ancient Scepticism', British Journal for the History of
Philosophy 3.2 (1995), pp. 371-876
Doubt Unclogmatized
209
13 For instance, in 'Idealism and Greek Philosophy: What Descartes Saw
and Berkeley Missed', Philosophical Review 40 (1982), pp. 3-40, Myles Burnyeat, whilst recognising the radical nature of the dreaming argument (p. 36),
nevertheless maintains that it is the malicious deity argument that supports
"a doubt more radical than the traditional sceptic had dared to suppose"
(p. 37). As I note below, the reason for this is that Bumyeat believes that
the distinctive Cartesian thesis in this regard consists in the doubt of even
the existence of the external world.
14 Descartes makes the point via the analogy of a painter who, whilst creating even the most fictional of images, makes use of images of things which
are real. Or, as he notes, "at least the colours used in the composition must
be real" (AT VII 20, CSM 11 13).
15 For one thing — as both Burnyeat, 'Idealism and Greek Philosophy:
What Descartes Saw and Berkeley Missed', op. cit., and M. Williams, Unnatural Doubts: Epistemological Realism and the Basis of Scepticism, op. cit.,
pp. 11Off., make clear — it is this move that prompts Descartes to take the
unusual step of 'extemalising' his body.
16 And this is not just because it attacks the certainty we attach to those
beliefs either, but rather due to the more general feature of knowledge that
its possession seems to preclude the kind of deviant causal chains involved
in dreaming. That said, it is certainly true that Descartes felt the need for
the malicious demon argument. For a recent example of a paper which
takes the opposing view in this respect — that it is the malicious demon
argument that makes the definitive break with classical scepticism — see
J. L. BermUdez, The Originality of Cartesian Scepticism: Did it have Ancient or Medieval Antecedents?', History of Philosophy Quarterly 17 (2000),
pp. 333-60.
17 This is precisely the reason why radical sceptical arguments that revolve
around dreaming hypotheses do not succumb to the standard treatment
that deals in terms of the 'Closure' principle for knowledge. This principle
states that if a subject knows a proposition, (p, and knows that this proposition entails a second proposition, g, then that subject knows I. . The sceptic
contraposes on this principle by arguing that since the agent does not know
the denial of the favoured sceptical hypothesis (such as, for example, the
malicious demon hypothesis, or the brain-in-a-vat hypothesis), and since
the agent does know that the paradigm everyday proposition in question
entails this denial, it follows that the subject does not know the paradigm
everyday proposition. But since the paradigm everyday proposition will,
most likely, be entirely consistent with the dreaming hypothesis, it follows
that the dreaming sceptic will be unable to use Closure to lever support for
Duncan Pritchard
210
his doubt in this way. As I briefly discuss below, one has CO view sceptical arguments based upon dreaming hypotheses as motivated via a different
epistemic principle entirely.
18 As Descartes puts it:
Reason now leads me to think that I should hold back my assent from opinions which are not completely certain and indubitable just as carefully as I
do from those that are patendy false. So, for the purposes of rejecting all my
opinions, it will be enough if I find in each of them at least some reason for
doubt. (AT VII 18, CSM 11 12).
For a seminal discussion of this aspect of the Cartesian project, see B. Williams, Descartes; The Project of Pure Enquiry op. cit., chapter 2.
19 See B. Williams, 'Descartes's Use of Skepticism', op. cit.; Bumyeat, 'Idea lism and Greek Philosophy: What Descartes Saw and Berkeley Missed',
op. cit.; and Christopher Hookway, Scepticism (Oxford: Routledge, 1990).
20 For an eloquent critique of Cartesian scepticism along extemalist lines,
see M. Williams, Unnatural Doubts: Epistemological Realism and the Basis of
Scepticism, op. cit. In this and other works — such as 'Descartes and the
Metaphysics of Doubt' in A. Rorty (ed.) Essays on Descartes' Meditations
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986), and 'Scepticism Without
Theory' Review of Metaphysics 41 (1988), pp. 547-88 —Williams has been
one writer who has explicitly emphasised the differences between classical
and Cartesian forms of scepticism, arguing that the latter depends upon
a greater commitment to what he regards as being the contentious theoretical (and 'acontextualise) doctrine of "epistemological realism". For
a discussion of Williams' position in this respect, see Pritchard, 'Wittgenstein, "Hinge" Propositions and On Certainty' in Bent Brogaard & Barry
Smith (eds.) Rationality and Irrationality: Proceedings of the 23rd International Wittgenstein Symposium (Kirchberg, Austria: Austrian L. Wittgenstein
Society, 2000), pp. 84-90, and 'Radical Scepticism, Epistemological Externalism, and "Hinge" Propositions', forthcoming in Wittgenstein-Studien
(2001).
One finds equivalent characterisations in the main works by the chief
exponents of the view in the literature, such as, for example, Roderick
Chisholm's Theory of Knowledge (3 1-cl edition) (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1989), chapter 1; and also by its chief detractors, such as Alvin
Plantinga, Warrant: The Current Debate (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1993), chapter 1. Indeed, in a recent survey article on contemporary epistemology, James Pryor has argued that this conception of internalism constitutes the "core intemalist position". See Pryor, 'Epistemology
21
Doubt Undogmatized
211
c. 1988-2000', The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 52 (2001),
pp. 95-124.
22 For example, Robert Brandom has offered an account of knowledge which
is clearly extemalist but which also emphasises the importance of internal 'virtues'. See Brandom, 'Knowledge and the Social Articulation of
the Space of Reasons' Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 55 (1995),
pp. 895-908, and 'Insights and Blindspots of Reliabilism' The Monist 81
(1988), pp. 371-92. He is not the only one. Even Alvin Goldman allows an
internalist notion of justification to play a pivotal role in his epistemology.
See, for example, Goldman, 'Strong and Weak Justification' Philosophical
Perspectives 2 (1988), pp. 51-69.
23 A very similar principle is referred to as "Descartes' Principle" by Wright,
'Scepticism and Dreaming: Imploding the Demon', op. cit., p. 91. For further discussion of this principle, especially in terms of how it differs from
the 'Closure' principle (see footnote 17) that currently receives a great deal
of discussion in the contemporary epistemological debate, see Barry Stroud,
The Significance of Philosophical Scepticism (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1984), chapter 1, and M. Williams, Unnatural Doubts: Epistemological Realism and the Basis of Scepticism, op cit., section 2.8.
24 The same is true of the malicious demon argument. As with the dreaming
argument, the problem here is that one is unable to reflectively determine
that this hypothesis is false, and it is this that undermines the epistemic
status of the agent's everyday beliefs about the world. This argument only
poses a direct challenge, however, provided one demands, with the internalist, that such reflective access to the conditions under which one putatively
knows everyday propositions is necessary.
25 For further (and more specific) discussion of how extemalist treatments
of knowledge can be used to block the Cartesian argument, see Ernest Sosa,
'Philosophical Scepticism and Epistemic Circularity' Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, (supplementary vol.) 68 (1994), pp. 263-90, and 'How to
Defeat Opposition to Moore', Philosophical Perspectives 13 (1999), pp. 141—
54; Christopher Hill, 'Process Reliabilism and Cartesian Scepticism' Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 56 (1996), pp. 567-81; and Pritchard,
'Resurrecting the Moorean Response to Scepticism', forthcoming in International Journal of Philosophical Studies 10 (2002).
26 On Certainty, (eds.) G. E. M. Anscombe & G. H. von Wright, (tr.) Denis
Paul &G. E. M. Anscombe, (Oxford: Blackwell, 1969), §243.
27 'Other Minds', reprinted in his Philosophical Papers, (eds.) J. O. Urmson
6/.. G. J. Warnock, pp. 44-84, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961), pp. 99-100.
28 I take a conversational implicature to be any inference that one is entitled
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Duncan Pritchard
to draw upon hearing an assertion (but which need not be entailed by the
assertion itself), provided one may legitimately make certain assumptions
about the agent making the assertion — that he is, for example, honest,
co-operative and (at least otherwise) rational. For the locus classicus for
this account of conversational implicature, see H. P Grice, 'Logic and Conversation', reprinted in his Studies in the Way of Words (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1989). Of course, as Grice himself pointed out, a
conversational implicature can always be cancelled by the subject making an
explicit disclaimer of some sort. In what follows I shall only be considering
knowledge claims that are not cancelled in this way.
29 For discussion of this point, see Ame Naess, Scepticism (London: Routledge &.Kegan Paul, 1968), chapter 2; Bumyeat, 'Can the Sceptic Live His
Scepticism?', Doubt and Dogmatism: Studies in Hellenistic Epistemology, (eds.)
J. Barnes, M. Bumyeat &. M. Schofield, chapter 3, (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1980); and Charlotte Stough, `Sextus Empiricus on Non-Assertion',
Phronesis 29 (1984), pp. 137-64.
3° 'Scepticism Without Theory', op. cit., p. 560.
31 'Idealism and Greek Philosophy: What Descartes Saw and Berkeley
Missed', op. cit., p. 40. See also Bumyeat, The Sceptic in his Place and
Time', Philosophy in History: Essays on the Historiography of Philosophy, (eds.)
R. Rorty, J. B. Schneewind &. Q. Skinner, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), chapter 10.
32 Of course, Bumyeat himself famously did not, at least at one point in his
career, think that such scepticism is, ultimately, liveable because there are
other sorts of beliefs that the sceptic must retain that are contrary to the
sceptical stance. See 'Can the Skeptic Live His Skepticism?', op. cit.
33 Scepticism Without Theory', op. cit., p. 563.
34 See The Sceptic's Two Kinds of Assent and the Question of the Possibility of Knowledge', in Philosophy in History: Essays on the Historiography of
Philosophy, (eds.) R. Rorty, J. B. Schneewind & Q. Skinner, (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1984), chapter 11.
35 See Sedley, 'The Motivation of Greek Scepticism', op. cit. ; Barnes, 'The
Beliefs of a Pyrrhonist', Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 208
(1982), pp. 1-29; and Burnyeat, The Sceptic in his Place and Time', op. cit.
Bumyeat also offers a subtle discussion of the manner in which belief and
dogma are understood by the Pyrrhonian sceptics — such that, on at least
one conception of belief, the Pyrrhonians can be viewed as retaining a significant class of their beliefs — in 'Can the Skeptic Live his Skepticism?',
op. cit. See also M. Williams, 'Scepticism Without Theory', op. cit.
36 See, for example, Keith Lehrer, Theory of Knowledge (Boulder, CO: West-
Doubt Urulogniatized
213
view Press, 1990).
37 One finds a similar notion in the constructivist work of Bas van Fraassen
where he argues for the acceptance of scientific theories (as empirically adequate) over belief in them (as true). See his The Scientific Image (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1980).
38 Interestingly, despite his ultimate contextualist reading of the Pyrrhonian
stance in this regard, Michael Williams does not recognise the import of the
distinction that is being made here. This is especially surprising given that
many of the observations that he makes directly support this conclusion.
For example, he writes (`Scepticism Without Theory', op. cit., pp. 561-2):
[... ] the Pyrrhonian has a distinctive style of assent: spontaneous, involuntary submission to his unrationalised impulses. Assent is a pathos, something
that comes over one. (It is tempting to see Sextus as ironically inverting the
Stoic rule of overcoming the affections, pathoi, in order to live by reason,
logos: Sextus neutralises reason in order to live by his affections). Ordinary
life, as Sextus sees it, is much more a matter of impulse and habit than of
judgement properly so-called.
Wittgenstein expands upon this point at length in On Certainty, op. cit.
It is important to distinguish this point from a similar contention made
by some commentators to the effect that by distinguishing between the different notions of belief in play in the classical sceptical argument one can
see that Pyrrhonian scepticism was not concerned with the possibilitY of
knowledge at all. As Michael Frede in 'The Sceptic's Two Kinds of Assent
and the Question of the Possibility of Knowledge', op. cit., p. 278, has put
the point:
39
40
[...] because one has failed to understand the classical sceptic's attitude
towards belief, one has also failed to understand the peculiar nature and
status of the arguments of classical scepticism, one has read them and keeps
reading them as if they represented the sceptical view of the problem of the
possibility of knowledge.
Strictly speaking, Frede is right, of course, in the sense that distinguishing between the two different notions of belief does mark out Pyrrhonian
scepticism as explicitly not making the claim that knowledge is impossible.
A much stronger point is being made here, however, which is that if one
regards the Pyrrhonian sceptic as agnostic about the intemalist/extemalist
distinction, then one can regard his view as actually being consistent with
the widespread possession of knowledge, at least of a sort.
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Duncan Pritchard
41 See Fumerton, `Metaepistemology and Skepticism' in M. D. Roth (St
G. Roth, Doubting: Contemporary Perspectives on Skepticism (Kluwer: Dordrecht, 1990), pp. 57-68; cf. Fumerton, Metaepistemology and Skepticism
(Lanham, MA: Rowtnan and Littlefield, 1995).
42 `Metaepistemology and Skepticism', op. cit., p. 64. A related concern is
raised by Edward Craig in Nozick and the Sceptic: The Thumbnail Version' Analysis 49 (1989), pp. 161-2, regarding the coherence of the sort of
'conditional' anti-sceptical account of knowledge offered by Robert Nozicic
in Philosophical Explanations, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981). For
discussion, see Anthony Brueckner, 'Unfair to Nozick' Analysis 51 (1991),
pp. 61-4, and Pritchard, 'Understanding Scepticism', Nordic Journal of Philosophy 1 (2000), pp. 107-23.
43 'Scepticism, 'Externalism', and the Goal of Epistemology', Proceedings of
the Aristotelian Society (supplementary vol.) 68 (1994), pp. 290-307, p. 297;
cf. Ernest Sosa, 'Philosophical Scepticism and Epistemic Circularity', op. cit.
44 No te that the issue is not (at least not directly) one of second-order
knowledge (as Stroud seems to suggest at the end of the quotation cited
above), since the extemalist can perfectly consistently allow that an agent
may have second-order (or indeed, nth-order) knowledge without thereby
requiring that such knowledge must essentially involve reflective access
in the manner that the intemalist demands. For more on this point, see
Pritchard, The Opacity of Knowledge', Essays in Philosophy, Vol. 2: The
InternalismlExternalism Debate in Epistemology, (ed.) H. Benjamin Shaeffer
(Humboldt University Press: Humboldt, California), pp. 1-10.
45 Interestingly, in a recent article by a prominent commentator on Pyrrhonian scepticism --- Robert Fogelin — one does find a cursory discussion of
how one might apply a Pyrrhonian sceptical argument to an anti-sceptical
strategy that ran along explicitly extemalist lines. Notably, however, Fogelin fails to see that the advantage that the Pyrrhonian strategy holds in
this respect is that it is primarily directed at knowledge claims, focussing instead upon the fact that the Pyrrhonian sceptic could allow that many everyday propositions were knowable even though they were not known. See
The Sceptic's Burden', International Journal of Philosophical Studies 7 (1999),
pp. 159-72; cf. Fogelin, Pyrrhonian Reflections on Knowledge and Justification
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994)46 Thanks to Patrick Greenough, Leslie Stevenson, Michael Williams and
Crispin Wright for discussion on this, and related, topics, and to my colleague, Jose Berrmidez, from whose work in this area I have learned a great
deal.