The Pyrrhonean Skeptic
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really is, we cannot know what things are really like. Since our perceptions
cannot determine if things really are what they appear to be, we should not make judgments about
them. We should suspend judgment. Later, the common Pyrrhonist phrase for this suspension of
judgment, which they borrowed from Democritus, became ou mallon, no more this than that.
The Aristocles passage above is currently debated in academia according to two interpretations:
epistemological or metaphysical. According to the epistemological interpretation, and one that is most
in keeping with later skepticism, Pyrrho holds that things equally appear to be and not to be. That is,
we are incapable of determining the true nature of things. According to the metaphysical explanation,
and one that is most in keeping with the mystical philosopher such as Heraclitus, things actually are
and are not. They both are and are not, and neither are nor are not. That is, things in themselves are
indefinite or indeterminate. Those who prefer the metaphysical explanation believe the Aristocles
passage is correctly reported and translated as written; those who prefer the epistemological
explanation believe the passage should be emended.
Regardless of what Pyrrho actually said or Aristocles thought he said, later Pyrrhonism adopted the
epistemological version and distinguished between the relationship of the sensory perception to the
thing being perceived and between the actual properties of the thing being perceived. As Diogenes
Laertius says (ix 103), speaking for the Pyrrhonean: We admit the fact that we do see, we recognize the
fact that we do have this particular thought; but we do not know how we see or how we think. We say
by way of description that ‘this appears white’, without confirming that it really is
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white.
What a Pyrrhonean doesn’t deny is that a thing appears white; what s/he does deny is any
knowledge of the real property of the thing in itself. Right now, my feet are resting on what appears to
me to be a brown and fluffy pillow. That, I do not deny. What I as a Pyrrhonean do deny is that I have
any certain knowledge of this brown and fluffy thing apart from my perception of it. Later, it will be
shown in Aenesidemus’ modes of argument that to another creature, say a housefly, this thing may not
be perceived as brown and fluffy at all. If hundreds or thousands of different creatures all perceive this
thing differently, what is the thing in itself? A Pyrrhonean doesn’t claim to know.
Pyrrho and Timon
As mentioned earlier, what we know of the teachings of Pyrrho come to us in fragments from
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Timon. While Pyrrho was described by all as gentle and serene, his follower and publicist Timon was
witty, restless, and scathing in his attacks on dogmatists. He said that Plato and Aristotle were arrogant
and argumentative pedagogues who fooled people with dogma that could never be proved. He wrote
voluminously and became renowned for his satires and lampoons. When it was suggested that the
senses and reason may not be reliable witnesses but that both working together may find the truth he
said, “Birds of a feather flock together.” He went on to say that all the dogmatists were doing is
accumulating illusions, piling one speculation on top of another. (For example, religious myths do this
routinely. For example, do angels have gender? If so, why? Do they have children, baby angels? This
whole line of questioning follows from silly to absurd without ever proving the existence of angels in
the first place.)
Timon appeared to detest the pretentious, contentious reasoning of the philosophers, but didn’t
appear to have any difficulty with the ordinary experiences of life. In fact his primary and essential
contribution to Pyrrhonism was how one deals with the apparent, the phenomena (to phainomenon) of
life. He believed that living with the appearances of the phenomena of our familiar world was what
really mattered and most deserved our interest, not because they told us anything about the inner
constitution of things, which he considered unknowable, and therefore a matter of indifference. He
said, “The apparent is omnipotent wherever it goes.” He practiced what he said and gave up philosophy
to find happiness among the phenomena of appearances, becoming very wealthy in his later life.
Pyrrhonism and Skepticism
There is no known relationship between Pyrrho and the
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skepticism of the Academy; and until
Aenesidemus, the only acknowledgment of members of the Academy to forerunners or founders of
skeptical thought were to Socrates and Plato. However, it is essential to understand something of the
nature of skepticism as it evolved in the Academy in order to see how it eventually came about that a
member of the Academy itself established the purest form of skepticism both as a completion of and
contrast to all that had gone before all the way back to Pyrrho himself. In addition, the arguments of the
Academics with the Stoics is instructive as a way of contrasting skeptical thought with the leading
dogma of the Hellenistic period.
3. Skepticism in the Academy
The Hellenistic period spans almost 300 years, beginning in Greece with the death of Alexander the
Great (323 BCE) and ending with the death of Mark Antony at the battle of Actium (31 BCE). This
period saw the birth and development of Epicurean and Stoic philosophies, as well as fundamental
change in the Old Academy founded by Plato in 369 BCE, initiated by the scholarch Arcesilaus,
heralding the birth of skepticism in the Academy. Schools of philosophy were now institutions of
higher education, mostly for the sons of the elite, and philosophers were regarded as eminent members
of their community often employed as counselors to the powerful and ambassadors to the world. As
worldly philosophers, the Stoics were pre-eminent and the most influential at this time.
Arcesilaus (?315-240 BCE).
Skepticism was not a term that the Academics used themselves but was given to them by later
writers to describe the new philosophy initiated by Arcesilaus when he became the scholarch, or head
of the school. When Arcesilaus became head, about 25 years prior to his death, the Old Academy of
Plato
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became known as the Middle Academy. Arcesilaus taught that Socrates was right to claim that he
knew nothing, but unlike Socrates he took this claim a step further by saying that he was certain of
nothing, even that he was certain of nothing. This complete denial of the possibility of knowledge
brought him closer to the position of Pyrrhonism than any other, and some accused him of being an
Academic in name only.
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Arcesilaus modeled his philosophical arguments on the dialectic method of Socrates: taking the
belief of the opponent and showing that his argument contradicts itself. According to Diogenes Laertius
he was the first philosopher to argue both sides of any question. Again, like Socrates he wrote nothing,
and because he had no doctrine of his own the chief activity of the Middle Academy under his
leadership consisted in verbally attacking those dogmatists that did, chiefly the Stoics. Before we
indignantly take Arcesilaus to task for challenging the Stoics it’s important to remember that by such
challenges he restored the critical function of philosophy begun by Socrates who sharply prodded
leading Athenians by showing them the inconsistencies in their beliefs.
Arcesilaus and the Stoics.
The Stoic (Zeno’s) theory of knowledge was a new kind of epistemology, an empirically-based
epistemology derived by sense experience and observation. The Stoic position (see Principal Doctrines
of the Stoa, IX -XII) was that information we get about the external world comes through our senses.
There are three epistemological states – belief, apprehension, and knowledge – based upon three kinds
of sensory information:
1. Uncertain information lacking clear evidence which requires BELIEF to maintain (e.g.,
religion, ghosts, UFOs) and is acceptable only to FOOLS. Stoics say the wise should suspend
judgment on sense impressions that are uncertain.
2. Accurate information we APPREHEND (katalepsis) or grasp as a true perception of the real
world (e.g., the sun is shining, therefore it is day). Both FOOLS and the WISE can apprehend
such accurate information, and this was Zeno’s criterion of truth.
3. Certain information which is KNOWLEDGE because it is secure against all argument but is the
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apprehension only of the sage, the WISE.
Arcesilaus Objected. Apprehension cannot be the criterion of truth, because the sensory information
we receive is either certain or uncertain; there is no middle ground. When we apprehend something, we
either have knowledge or we don’t. Arcesilaus disagreed with Zeno’s definition of apprehension, assent
to a cognitive impression, for two reasons:
1. We are assenting to a proposition, not an impression. That is, what we are assenting to is an
offer of information, which may or may not be true and accurate.
2. There is nothing in the sensory information we receive that guarantees that it could not be false.
By accepting the Stoic distinction between the wise and the foolish, Arcesilaus was using their own
argument against them, showing that it is self-contradictory for the wise to suspend judgment on sense
impressions that are uncertain because s/he can never know with objective certainty that any perception
is true. Thus, the wise will always suspend judgment. If the wise always suspends judgment, then s/he
cannot have true knowledge. If s/he cannot have true knowledge, then there can be no such thing as the
wise, the Stoic sage.
Carneades (214-129/8 BCE).
In antiquity it was said that if there had been no Chrysippus there would have been no Stoa. That
statement apparently recognized Chrysippus for saving the Stoa from the devastating attacks of
Arcesilaus and other members of the Middle Academy. But the disputations continued. Carneades was
the next academic to challenge the Stoics, and he often stated of himself that had there been no
Chrysippus there would have been no Carneades. Like Arcesilaus before him Carneades wrote nothing,
and was accused by some of having created nothing original other than the construction of his
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philosophical arguments against Chrysippus. When Carneades became scholarch, sometime before 155
BCE, the changes he initiated in the modification of their skeptical arguments heralded another change
in its name to the Third or New Academy.
Carneades & the Skeptical Argument
Taking both sides of any argument, showing that by arguing for and against any topic, even one as
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highly regarded as justice, the skeptical philosopher made the strongest case of all for the suspension of
judgment. Cicero thought highly enough of Carneades’ argument for and against justice when he was
an Athenian ambassador to Rome that he preserved it in his work De Republica. On the first day,
Carneades told his audience just what they probably expected to hear about justice. That is, it benefits
all by giving each one his due in a fair and equitable manner. Justice is a form of practical wisdom
characteristic of a good state and a good man. The very next day, as we’re are told, Carneades argued
against holding a good opinion of this virtue.
When Carneades spoke, he spoke not in the obscure assertions of the philosopher but in words and
examples of ordinary speech, attacking the notion that justice is always a benefit and good practice of
the wise. He first pointed out that justice as formulated in the laws of the Roman empire worked to the
benefit of Rome to the detriment of all other states, and in that case it was certainly not justice at all,
but nothing more than utilitarian self interest (strong language for an ambassador). He then explored
the concept of justice as it applies to individual cases by employing the following example:
Suppose that a good man has a run-away slave or an unhealthy and plague ridden-horse; that
he alone knows these faults and puts the things up for sale accordingly. Will he admit the faults
or will he conceal them from the buyer? If he admits them, he is certainly a good man, since he
does not cheat; but he will be judged a fool since he will be selling for a song or not selling at
all. If he conceals the facts he will be a wise man because he will consult his own interests but
also bad, because he cheats. (Rep. iii 21 [Lact.
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Inst. 5, 16, 2-4]) Long)
Unlike the dogmatist, the skeptic shows that justice and prudence or practical wisdom are not
necessarily one and the same thing. If you make a bad bargain you’re working against self-interest and
therefore not being prudent. Prudence is practical wisdom. So, what is the seller to do, be just or wise?
Even if the Stoics objected to his use of such a loose definition of prudence, he would put them in the
position of having to defend themselves with the obscure language of the philosopher and doubt has
been raised.
Carneades’ Leadership
Under Carneades’ leadership the Academy expanded Arcesilaus’ singular interest in epistemology to
include logic, ethics, theology, and natural philosophy, but still maintained a steady assault on the
Stoic’s doctrine of cognitive impressions and the criterion of truth. The Stoics (viz., Chrysippus)
rejected the attack of the academy and pointed out to them that as a practical matter, without cognitive
impressions human beings would be incapable of any action or rational investigation whatsoever. In
addition, the Stoic doctrines were the best available understanding of truth, and that the Academy was
providing no alternative, let alone a superior alternative to Stoic Dogma.
Carneades’ answer to the Stoic counter-argument significantly modified and softened the radical
skepticism of Arcesilaus. He argued that a basis for action and inquiry is not dependent upon cognitive
impressions but could be found in probable impressions. That is, human beings do have a rational
basis for action and inquiry without cognitive impressions when they use probable impressions. When
a sensory impression we receive is repeated our confidence in that impression is either increased or
decreased according to the consistent accuracy of the
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information it gives to us. Although no amount of
investigation can guarantee 100% certainty, there is a degree of probable certainty we can obtain
depending on how much or how little we have checked the consistency of this impression.
In fact, Carneades provided not one but two alternatives for the Stoics. Carneades sometimes argued
that the wise man will always suspend judgment but will follow probable impressions without holding
an opinion on anything. Sometimes he argued that the wise man will form opinions on the basis of
probable impressions but will be ready to admit that this opinion may be wrong. In short, then
Carneades’ two alternatives to the Stoic’s cognitive impressions asserted (1) the wise can live without
opinions but will follow probable impressions; or, the wise can live with opinions that are tentative and
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ready to be revised as needed with new information.
Other Attacks on the Stoics
1. Stoic Theology. The Stoics said that because belief in God is universal there must be a God.
Carneades said that all the Stoics may have proved is that there is a universal belief in God, not
that there was a God.
2. Natural Philosophy. The Stoics claim the universe is wise and rational without first proving that
it is even a living thing. Further, Stoics assert that human reason comes from and is a part of
universal reason without first proving human reason cannot be a separate and spontaneous
creation of nature.
3. Reason. The Stoics point to human reason as evidence for divine providence. But, most people
use their reason to either degrade themselves or others – so, it would appear that our reason is
more of a detriment than a benefit to our well-being.
4. Heap Argument. The heap argument got its name from the inherent difficulty in determining
where one boundary is distinguished from another on a continuum. If there are 100 widgets
thrown together in a heap and you remove one widget at a time, at what point or number does
the heap of widgets cease to be a heap? Carneades used the Heap Argument to show the Stoics
they were incapable of distinguishing a boundary between what is and what is not divine. The
same argument can be used to question the hope of immortality. If the soul is immortal and lives
after the death of the physical body, what souls qualify for immortality? Only human? What
about the more intelligent animals, such as dolphins, chimpanzees, and dogs? At what point on
the intelligence scale does one acquire a soul fit for eternal life?
Carneades (Free Will) versus Chrysippus (Determinism)
Stoic Position: Chrysippus stated that the Stoic’s determinism follows logically