Skeptical Philosophy

Guide Rating -

It is commonly believed that skepticism is a relatively minor issue in the context of Western philosophy. A recent book from Richard H. Popkin and Avrum Stroll argues, however, that skepticism is actually an important key to understanding the course and development of philosophy in the West; and in the course of this argument, they provide a readable and understandable introduction to Western philosophy itself.

According to Popkin and Stroll, most of Western philosophy can be best understood as an attempt to demonstrate that knowledge is possible and that adequate grounds for justifying beliefs exist. In other words, much of philosophy involves attempts to refute or at least forestall the critiques of radical skepticism.

Together Popkin and Stroll cover a wide range of philosophical thinking, starting with Plato and moving through to Derrida. They also don't limit themselves simply to historical reviews of abstract philosophical issues - instead, they include significant sections devoted to the Philosophy of Religion, Ethics and Political Philosophy. There is even a debate at the end between Popkin and Stroll on the relative success Western philosophy has had in dealing with skepticism.

The skepticism this book covers is not simply that which results from critical thinking - it is, rather, philosophical skepticism, which involves:

...profound doubts about the very existence of other persons, of a world external to the mind of the doubter, and so forth.

Not all philosophical skepticism is as radical as that, however:

What all forms of skepticism have in common are reservations about the attainment of knowledge. [T]he radical skeptic doubts that any piece of information is any better than any other. ...The mitigated skeptic disagrees. While concurring that certitude is unachievable, his outlook is that some information is more reliable than other information. Generally speaking, the mitigated skeptic is committed to the thesis that information is to be described in probabilistic terms. The more probable, the more reliable. But in saying this, he is also saying that no degree of probability, no matter how high, is equivalent to knowledge.

According to Popkin and Stroll, Descartes formulated the two most powerful ways of expressing skeptical doubts. The first is called the Dream Hypothesis, according to which "we cannot know at any particular moment that we are not dreaming."

The second is known as the Demon Hypothesis, according to which a malevolent demon might cause us to believe with absolute certainty things which are absolutely false. A popular reformulation of this is the "brains in vats" thought experiment in which we are all really just brains in vats with no genuine contact with a genuine outside world while mad scientists cause us to believe the most nonsensical things, all contradicting "real" reality.

How can either of those hypotheses actually be refuted? How can anyone prove that they aren't really dreaming? How can anyone prove that the outside world exists and that one or all us isn't experiencing a manufactured "reality"? This is the context in which modern philosophy works to try and demonstrate the reliable knowledge is possible.

Perhaps one of the most pointed rebuttals to skepticism which Popkin and Stroll describe was the one offered by Wittgenstein, who argued that such skepticism in essence proceeds from a position of bad faith. According to Wittgenstein, philosophical skepticism is a type of obsession because the skeptic has never, even from the beginning, allowed for the possibility of anything counting as evidence which might satisfy his doubts. Thus, doubt is perpetual, and the activity of constantly questioning is ultimately pointless.

This book is an excellent introduction to the topic of Western philosophy and to the process of skeptical questioning. Even though the topic of philosophy and philosophical skepticism is quite difficult, Popkin and Stroll make it very understandable, even to the average reader without much background in philosophy.