Sceptical Overkill: On Two Recent Arguments Against Scepticism
Sceptical Overkill: On Two Recent Arguments Against Scepticism
This paper is a discussion of a recent attempt by Crispin Wright to force at least some varieties of external world scepticism to succumb to a "head-on, rational response", contrary to well-known expressions of pessimism by, for example, Sir Peter Strawson and Barry Stroud. The varieties of scepticism in question are those that involve positing a "purportedly undetectable but cognitively disabling state", such as the state imposed by Descartes' malicious demon, in which a sufferer is unable to tell whether or not his or her experiences are caused by items in his or her perceptible environment, as opposed to some disassociated cause; the argument is completed by noticing that, if such a state were possible, then no-one could have complete confidence that he or she were not in such a state. This paper argues that this lack of confidence also fatally undermines Wright's argument.
scepticism malicious demon dreaming maundering
315-27
O'Hara, Kieron
0a64a4b1-efb5-45d1-a4c2-77783f18f0c4
1993
O'Hara, Kieron
0a64a4b1-efb5-45d1-a4c2-77783f18f0c4
O'Hara, Kieron
(1993)
Sceptical Overkill: On Two Recent Arguments Against Scepticism.
Mind, 102 (2), .
Abstract
This paper is a discussion of a recent attempt by Crispin Wright to force at least some varieties of external world scepticism to succumb to a "head-on, rational response", contrary to well-known expressions of pessimism by, for example, Sir Peter Strawson and Barry Stroud. The varieties of scepticism in question are those that involve positing a "purportedly undetectable but cognitively disabling state", such as the state imposed by Descartes' malicious demon, in which a sufferer is unable to tell whether or not his or her experiences are caused by items in his or her perceptible environment, as opposed to some disassociated cause; the argument is completed by noticing that, if such a state were possible, then no-one could have complete confidence that he or she were not in such a state. This paper argues that this lack of confidence also fatally undermines Wright's argument.
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Published date: 1993
Additional Information:
Commentary On: Wright, C. 1991: "Scepticism and Dreaming: Imploding the Demon". Mind, 100
Keywords:
scepticism malicious demon dreaming maundering
Organisations:
Web & Internet Science
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Local EPrints ID: 254162
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/254162
ISSN: 0026-4423
PURE UUID: c6dd74ba-f3ad-418a-92d5-d4a3645436c1
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Date deposited: 04 Nov 2000
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 03:09
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