Philosophical Skepticism
An introduction
Philosophical Skepticism
Defined
♦ From the Greek word “skeptikoi” =
seekers, inquirers
♦ A critical attitude which systematically
questions the notion that absolute
knowledge and certainty are possible.
Philosophical Skepticism
Defined
♦ Philosophical Skepticism is NOT ordinary
skepticism (doubting a belief because the
evidence is weak or lacking).
♦ It is a philosophy that NOTHING can be
absolutely known or certainly proved.
Philosophical Skepticism
Defined
♦ Is the opposite of
PHILOSOPHICAL DOGMATISM
♦ A philosophy that believes a certain set of
positive statements are authoritative, absolutely
certain, and true.
Philosophical Skepticism
The BIG ideas
1.
2.
3.
Knowledge is never absolute
Morality is never certain
(”Moral Relativism”)
Seeking absolute TRUTH creates a
logical paradox
(”Criterion of truth”)
Philosophical Skepticism
The BIG ideas: NO ABSOLUTE KNOWLEDGE
♦ Knowledge is always personal.
♦ Knowledge is always immediate.
♦ Knowledge is always mutable.
♦ Because knowledge comes from sensory
experience, it changes from moment to
moment, person to person.
Judith Beheading Holofernes
by Artemisia Gentilesche
• Artemisia Gentilesche is one of Europe’s most famous female
artists.
• She was taught to paint by her father, Orazio Gentilesche
• She became a vigorous follower of Caravaggio, deploying highcontrast lighting and sometimes extreme violence
• The story comes from the deuterocanonical book of Judith of the
Bible, and depicts a famous Biblical assassination.
• The sword woman is Judith, a Jewish lady, and the other woman is
her maid, Abra.
• The victim is Holofernes, an Assyrian General who was about to
destroy Judith’s home, the city of Bethulia. Holofernes desired
Judith, so she slipped into his tent one night, got him drunk, and
then beheaded him.
Philosophical Skepticism
The BIG ideas: MORAL RELAVITISM
♦ “Man is the measure of all things.”--Protagoras
♦ Each person is the standard of truth.
♦ We perceive things only as they appear to us.
♦ Our perceptions-- yes, even our MORALS-shift according to our environment and
situation.
Philosophical Skepticism
The BIG ideas: Criterion of Truth
♦ Zeno’s arrow is never half-way to its
target, never in motion.
Zeno’s Arrow
by René Magritte
Logical paradox: Can God do everything? Can
he make a stone so heavy he cannot lift it?
Philosophical Skepticism
The BIG ideas: Criterion of Truth
♦ Any criterion used to judge the truth of a
claim can be challenged because a further
criterion is needed by which to judge the
present criterion and so AD INFINITUM!
Philosophical Skepticism
So What’s the Point?
♦ Philosophical skepticism was NEVER put
forth as a literal guide for practical living.
♦ The goal of life is ATARAXIA (peace of mind)
♦ ATARAXIA is reached by
♦ Holding no strong opinions (no “closed cases”)
♦ Supporting the PROBABILITY of a belief if the
evidence supporting it is greatest.
♦ Suspending judgment if the evidence on both
sides is equal.
Philosophical Skepticism
♦ The foundations:
NIHILISM
♦ All values are baseless
♦ Nothing is knowable; nothing
can be communicated
♦ Life itself is meaningless
♦ Not a desperate, sad
existence though, despite its
conflict with most of our
philosophies-- how?
♦ Nihilists struggle with the
conflict between WORD and
DEED
“We are God's
unwanted children?
So be it!”
“You wake up at Seatac, SFO, LAX. You wake up at O'Hare, DallasFort Worth, BWI. Pacific, mountain, central. Lose an hour, gain an
hour. This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. You wake
up at Air Harbor International. If you wake up at a different time, in a
different place, could you wake up as a different person? “
Nihilism
“It is only after we have lost everything that we are free to do everything.”
Narrator:
What do you
do for a
living?
Tyler Durden:
Why? So you
can pretend
like you're
interested?
FIGHT CLUB
Novel by Chuck Palahniuk
Screenplay by Jim Uhls
“On a long enough timeline, the
survival rate for everyone drops
to zero. “
“We're the middle children of
history, man. No purpose or place.
We have no Great War. No Great
Depression. Our Great War's a
spiritual war... our Great
Depression is our lives. We've all
been raised on television to
believe that one day we'd all be
millionaires, and movie gods, and
rock stars. But we won't. And
we're slowly learning that fact.”
Nihilism examples . . .
♦ Broken Flowers
♦ The Big
Lebowski
♦ Pink Floyd’s
The Wall
♦ Most punk rock
♦ Most gothic
rock
♦ Grendel by
John Gardner
“Fountain” Marcel Duchamp (1917)
“Nude Descending a Staircase,
No. 2" Marcel Duchamp
(1912)
Philosophical Skepticism
SOLIPSISM
♦ The foundations
♦ The individual understands all psychological
concepts (thinking, willing, perceiving, etc.) by
comparison with his or her own mental states,
i.e. making generalizations from inner
experiences
♦ Nothing exists but oneself-- the individual
creates everything else.
♦ Solipsism is an unresolvable question! (You cannot
refute it!)
SOLIPSISM EXAMPLES . . .
♦The Great Gatsby by
F. Scott Fitzgerald
♦Stranger than Fiction
(screenplay by Zach Helm)
♦The Truman Show
(screenplay by Andrew
Niccol)
♦Grendel by
John Gardner
Man Striding, Alberto Giacometti
Philosophical Skepticism
EXISTENTIALISM
♦ The foundations:
♦ Rejects Descartes: “I think, therefore I am” for “I am,
therefore I am.” Consciousness is not life.
♦ Individual human beings have full responsibility for
creating the meanings of their own lives
♦ Human beings are subjects in an indifferent,
objective, often ambiguous, and "absurd"
universe
♦ Kirkegaard, Neitzsche, Heiddegger
Galaxy
Jackson Pollock
Dans Mon Pays, Marc Chagall
Existentialism examples . . .
♦ The Stranger by Albert
Camus
♦ Notes from the
Underground by Fyodor
Doestoevsky
♦ The Metamorphosis by
Franz Kafka
♦ The book of Job (Old
Testament)
♦ Grendel by John Gardner
“Duck Amuck”
By Chuck Jones
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2403074570147260475&q=duck+amuck&hl=en