Pyrrho and Ancient Skepticism

in this episode though I want to discuss not so much an alternate version of reality as an alternate version of skepticism the skepticism of the ancient world influenced modern skepticism and continues to fascinate philosophers who work in this area but it is not the same thing as modern skepticism the father of modern skepticism was Descartes who proposed radical doubt as a stepping stone towards reaching conclusions that could not be doubted in his meditations Descartes subjects all of his beliefs to sceptical attack in fact he raises the question of how he knows he isn't dreaming and also proposes a scenario not unlike the matrix in which a malicious demon is filling him with false beliefs the reason Descartes does this is that he wants to see which beliefs if any are immune to doubt he decides that there are some as we'll see when we get to Descartes in oh five years or something after decocked skepticism has usually taken roughly this form we consider beliefs of various kinds and ask whether they can be doubted and if so what that means about the status of those beliefs for instance you may be listening to this while cooking dinner or jogging and you may think you know you're cooking dinner or jogging but in fact you cannot know such things since just maybe you are in the matrix waiting to be freed from your confusion by Laurence Fishburne the ancient skeptics had a very different approach we can see this already by considering the name sceptics as you won't be surprised to learn this word comes from ancient Greek skeptic O's means someone who is inquiring or searching the ancient skeptic then is not testing his beliefs against some kind of radical doubt inducing scenario like the matrix or des cartes evil demon he is rather someone who is sharing in a process of philosophical inquiry he's not raising radical or systematic doubt as a general issue but rather inquiring into the success of other believers especially other philosophers like the stoic the skeptic is struck by the objections that face each attempt to determine the truth of things he finds that incompatible theories seem to have more or less equally good arguments on their side he also finds that the theories of other philosophers fall short of the standards of proof suggested by those very same philosophers and short he always finds room for doubt nonetheless he remains in theory at least committed to the positive enterprise of seeking truth upon finding that various proposals about the nature of things are doubtful he does not give up the search but given that the search has so far failed to turn up a victorious candidate for truth he does suspend judgment this idea of suspending judgment is at the core of ancient skepticism whereas it plays no role in Cartesian skepticism the greek word for the suspension of judgment época became something of a standard around which the sceptical tradition could rally which is not to say that only the skeptics were interested in suspension of judgment as we saw when looking at the stoic theory of knowledge back in episode 60 early Stoics like Zeno and chrysippus thought that the perfect wise man or sage would suspend judgment rather than accenting two impressions which were in any way doubtful but the skeptics pointed out that the Stoics own standards for knowledge were set so high that they made knowledge unattainable all impressions leave room for doubt thus the wise man would always suspend judgment here we have another striking difference between ancient and modern skepticism since we now usually think of skepticism as a challenge to be overcome if at all possible we do not think about skepticism as a stable philosophical posture a way of living one's life but in common with the other Hellenistic schools the skeptics put forth a picture of the ideal sage and of a life that would be free of disturbance this is perhaps the most surprising feature of ancient skepticism it was presented as a rest P for happiness to some extent this is symptomatic of the competition between the skeptics and other philosophical groups since rival schools like these Stoics and the Epicureans had an account of the sage and of the happy life the skeptics needed to say something on these same topics too but it was not merely a dialectical afterthought as we can see by turning to the man who is usually recognized as the first sceptic pyro of Ellis pyro was born in the 360's BC and died in the 270's making him roughly a generation younger than Aristotle and a generation older than Epicurus he was an admired figure in his home of Ellis the northwest corner of the southern part of mainland Greece like Socrates and Diogenes the cynic he wrote nothing our understanding of him as a personality relies on the reports of his followers and other ancient recorders of the history of philosophy diogenes laërtius --is lives of the philosophers an important source for so many Hellenistic thinkers preserves a report on pyro apart from that the most important information derives ultimately from Pyro's student time on who was a great supporter of pyro and his skeptical approach to philosophy that skepticism found in irreverent embodiment and a work of time ons called the silly or parodies it was other philosophers who were the butt of the jokes it's not entirely clear how much of the philosophical stance we associate with pyro was in fact Pyro's and how much was invented by time on but it was pyro not time on who in due course was honored as the founder of a skeptical tradition as will be seen beginning in the 1st century BC and carrying on into the period of the Roman Empire there were skeptics who proudly styled themselves as pyro nests although pyro is thus credited with beginning something new his skeptical attitude did not come from nowhere one hypothesis about his inspiration already excited ancient authors who wrote about pyro in the 320s BC pyro party pated in the military campaign of Alexander the Great which meant traveling as far away as India there we are told pyro encountered Indian wise men who may have been a source for skeptical ideas this idea is not without merit given that skepticism did play a role in classical Indian philosophy on the other hand there were antecedents for Pyro's views in Greek philosophy pyro himself seems to have acknowledged Democritus as an important predecessor as we've seen after setting forth his atomic theory Democritus drew skeptical conclusions from it declaring that perceptible qualities like sweetness and color are merely conventions since in reality there is nothing but atoms and void in general pyro or at least his faithful follower time on treated other philosophers was scorned but Democritus was respected for his anticipation of skepticism another pre-socratic who received a degree of admiration was Cinna phonies perhaps because of his irreverence concerning traditional Greek ideas about the gods it must also be said that possible influence from India notwithstanding Pyro's image and way of life fits comfortably into the age of Diogenes the cynic Epicurus and Zeno the founder of stoicism like them and like Socrates pyro cultivated the persona of an imperturbable sage he did not shrink from fearful situations like storms at sea and was happy to stoop to performing menial tasks like washing pigs nor did physical pain bother him a typical legend has him undergoing the horrors of ancient surgery without so much as flinching supposedly in describing his own way of life he used that most central technical term of Hellenistic ethics ataxia or lack of disturbance thus pyro claimed to have achieved the Holy Grail pursued by almost all the philosophers of his day like Dodge needs the cynic he managed this without taking the trouble to devise a complex philosophical theory such as Epicurus and Zeno offered far from it Pyro's indifference to danger and pain was the supposed consequence of his lack of beliefs and commitments now I know what you're thinking why would a life without belief be a life of calm a life free of trouble one might just as easily suppose it would be a life consumed with War II if I don't have firm beliefs about the world around me won't I've faced each new situation in a state of ignorance and confusion aren't the Stoics right to think that it is knowledge and understanding that yield confidence and serenity well I tend to agree with you but it isn't obvious that pyro is wrong about this let's consider again those tales of Pyro's indifference to circumstances for instance his ability to undergo excruciating pain without registering any dismay would perhaps be explained by the fact that he does not believe pain is a bad thing his cheerfulness about performing menial tasks would derive from the absence of beliefs about which activities are unworthy Pyro's life is in fact very like that of the stoic sage the happiness of the stoic sage too is immune to pain and conventional feelings of shame because is positive commitments lie elsewhere he believes that only virtue is worth having and has a solid theory about the nature of virtue pyro doesn't have those positive beliefs of course but he doesn't need them all he needs to do is avoid having beliefs that would give rise to disturbance and of course he has no such beliefs since he has no beliefs at all of course if pyro is to be anything other than one more example of an indomitable Hellenistic wise man he needs to give us some kind of philosophical rationale for the skeptical attitude that yields ataraxia for this we have to rely principally on a single piece of evidence which reaches us through a fill illogical version of the children's game of telephone or Chinese whispers the report is found in the fourth century AD Christian theologian Eusebius hardly a promising place to find details about the ideas of a fourth century BC skeptic but beggars can't be choosers Eusebius is relating an account about pyro preserved by an earlier Aristotelian philosopher who in turn was taking his information from Pyro's follower time on and don't forget that what we can read would be manuscripts that are only copies or copies of copies of the text Eusebius himself wrote do you suppose that scholars just might have proposed amending the Greek text in such a way as fundamentally to change the logic of the whole passage why of course they have such are the delights of trying to reconstruct early Hellenistic philosophy still we have some reason to think that the passage tells us something fairly reliable about pyro or at least about time ins understanding of pyro which is about as much as we can hope for plus it's really interesting so let's see what it says the report tells us that things in themselves are neither one way nor another they are indifferent impossible to measure or to judge our perceptions and beliefs render neither truth nor falsehood thus we should remain without belief inclining neither this way nor that as a result of which we will avoid making any assertions and finally achieve ataraxia freedom from disturbance since pyro himself attained this freedom he is presumably a reliable guide to the method and this at least claims to be his own description of the method the passage is in short exactly what we were looking for unfortunately is not easy to understand we can start with the basic observation that pyro is telling us to avoid opinion or belief the word he uses doxa is the same word that Plato and Aristotle used to describe the state of mind in which one takes something to be true while lacking knowledge in the proper sense in Plato's classic formulation belief lies between ignorance and knowledge of course Plato and Aristotle urge us to shun ignorance and not to be satisfied with true belief rather we should push on until we achieve knowledge and understanding of the way things are but this pyro claims is impossible things in themselves are neither one-way nor another unfortunately the passage contains no defense of this alarming statement but we've seen the sentiment before think for instance of Protagoras in Plato's theaetetus saying that if the wind feels cold for you and warm for me then there is no truth of the matter about whether the wind is warm or cold in itself all truth is relative to an observer or think of Democritus again saying that the perceptible features of things are only a matter of custom because in reality they are atoms and void pyros reference to perception in addition to belief suggests that he also had in mind examples like this the moral of the sceptical story is that Plato and Aristotle were wrong belief is not inadequate because it falls short of knowledge rather it goes too far to have a belief presupposes that we are able to determine the nature of things but this is impossible thus we should to put the point in plato's terms content ourselves with ignorance rather than striving for true belief never mind full scale knowledge it's obvious that the sceptic must be ignorant in a sense given that ignorant just means lacking knowledge and the skeptic is someone who accepts that knowledge has not been attained either by himself or by anyone else as far as he can tell yet it's equally obvious that the sceptics ignorance is special it will not involve having false beliefs of course since he will have no beliefs at all rather it is a mature self conscious and blissful form of ignorance in which he suspends all belief and in this way achieves peace of mind there are several difficulties that remain though I'll mention two of them the first is that pyro seems in our passage to be laying down a bold philosophical thesis namely that the natures of things cannot be determined now pyro isn't doubting the existence of the things around us he apparently didn't raise Descartes style worries about whether there is a wind he only suggested that there is no fact of the matter about whether the wind is warm or cold but that's not the problem in fact it's just another difference between ancient and modern skepticism ancient skeptics in general did not raise worries about whether external things are really out there they only raised problems for attempts to determine the natures of those things the problem is rather that at least on the interpretation I've just given pyro asserted confidently that the natures of things are unknowable that sounds very like a belief or even a proposed bit of knowledge he seems to be completely convinced that things cannot be determined which is why we should refrain from belief but this conviction is itself a belief later skeptics as we'll see are more careful here and say only that they suspend judgment about whether the natures of things might be knowable some modern scholars by the way interpret the Eusebius passage in such a way that pyro too avoids committing himself to the intrinsic unknowability of things for our purposes perhaps we should just suspend judgment about his real view the second problem I want to mention is also one that confronted the later skeptics we've understood pyro to be saying that he can do without any beliefs at all in fact to be saying that his freedom from disturbance is achieved by giving up on the whole enterprise of forming beliefs this he has discovered is the happy life but not only does this life sound less than happy it doesn't even sound possible to give just one example how am I supposed to avoid starving to death if I suspend judgment about which items in my environment are edible this sort of worry infected the biographical reports about pyro so that we are told fanciful legends about his students following him around stopping him at the last minute from walking out in front of oncoming wagons or stepping off cliffs the idea that pyro actually behaved like the cartoon character mr. Magoo blinded by his lack of beliefs rather than by real blindness is clearly silly but a serious point underlies the stories namely that life without Billy seems downright impossible at least for humans perhaps pyro agreed in one anecdote he is frightened by a dog and reacts betraying his belief that the dog is dangerous after regaining his composure he remarks that it is difficult to divest oneself of one's humanity but the evidence at our disposal concerning pyro does not really allow us to say with confidence how he would have solved these problems or indeed whether he tried to solve them fortunately the sceptical tradition is only just starting soon enough there will come a new group of thinkers who avoid commitments belief and assertion and who respond to the two problems I've just raised first that skepticism is itself a kind of commitments and second that one cannot live without belief these new sceptics arise within Plato's Academy of all places one can easily imagine Plato to say nothing of his immediate successors boo CIPA sans inequities spinning in their graves at the thought of their academy being run by skeptics but the skeptics could claim platonic legitimacy they looked not to Democritus nor to pyro rather like so many other Hellenistic thinkers their idol was Socrates after all Socrates did claim to know only that he knew nothing the sceptics of the new Academy are going to wonder if they know even that much I'm in no doubt that you'll want to join me to hear all about them next time on the history of philosophy without any gaps

Channel: Prometheus Unchained

Views: 16,650

Rating: 4.8434162 out of 5

Keywords: Pyrrho (Philosopher), Skepticism (Quotation Subject), Hellenistic Period (Historical Period), Alexander The Great (Pharaoh), Ancient History (Field Of Study), Philosophy (Professional Field)

Id: iSE9EjqsBjY

Length: 19min 43sec (1183 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 19 2014