Renata Ziemińska

Epistemic externalists offer many arguments against skepticism. They modify the skeptic’s concept of knowledge, justification and meaning and point out which of his presuppositions we need not accept. Dretske claims that a skeptic wrongly presupposes that we cannot know if we do not know that we know. But knowledge need not be self-conscious . According to Nozick a skeptic wrongly presupposes the Principle of Closure . He says that although we do not know that we are not brains in a vat, a skeptic does not have the right to use this principle to argue that we do not know things that are obvious. According to Putnam the skeptical hypothesis that we are brains in a vat is incoherent when we use the external theory of meaning. If the meaning of our words depends on a causal relation with our environment, the sentence “I am a brain in a vat” is false or meaningless. Similarly, Davidson says that the external theory of perceptual beliefs excludes global skepticism. According to Williams skepticism simply presupposes a stance opposite to externalism, namely internalism . When we reject internalism, no skeptical argument can be formulated

Luca Castagnoli, Ancient Self-Refutation. The Logic and History of the Self- Refutation Argument from Democritus to Augustine, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2010, pp. XX+394. Hardback, ISBN 9780521896313. In his book Ancient Self-Refutation L. Castagnoli rightly observes that selfrefutation is not falsification; it overturns the act of assertion but does not prove that the content of the act is false. He argues against the widely spread belief that Sextus Empiricus accepted the self-refutation of his own expressions. Castagnoli also claims that Sextus was effective in answering to the self-refutation charge. The achievement of the book is the discovery that in passages where Sextus seems to embrace the selfrefutation of his expressions (PH 1.14-15), he does not use the term peritropé, technical for self-refutation, but the term perigraphé, which means self-bracketing. Selfbracketing is weakening one’s own thesis, but not overturning it. Castagnoli claims that Sextus embraces the self-bracketing of his expressions, but never accepts their selfrefutation. However, Castagnoli is not right in saying that self-refutation is a shameful mistake for everybody. The mature skeptic cannot even think that self-refutation is wrong, because it would be a dogmatic view. Sextus seems to accept self-refutation at the end of Against the Logicians, where he presents the argument against proof and the metaphor of the ladder (M 8.480-1). Regardless of Sextus’ declarations, we have reason to think that he does not avoid self-refutation in a pragmatic sense. Self-bracketing of his position is not a consistent dialectical strategy, as Castagnoli writes, but the end of a rational discussion. Sextus avoids absolute self-refutation (we cannot falsify what he suggests), but he is unable to avoid pragmatic self-refutation (there is no way to assert his position without contradiction). This is the case even if Sextus refuses to assert his position.

The paper presents four stages of author’s epistemological experience: Roman Ingarden’s autonomous theory of knowledge, the anti-naturalistic theory of knowledge by Roderick Chisholm, the naturalistic epistemology by Alvin Goldman, and the epistemology of classical problems of truth and skepticism. The conclusion is the following: epistemology should make use of human knowledge results, especially cognitive sciences and reflect on the problem of truth, the challenge of skepticism, the possibility of knowledge and human cognitive condition (science, religion, art). The social role of the epistemologist is not to resolve all these existentially important questions but to be an expert (to know the state of discussion and to deliver his/her opinions)

Academic skepticism is usually interpreted as a type of discourse without an assertion (a dialectical interpretation). I argue against this interpretation. One can interpret Carneades’ notion of approval as our notion of weak assertion and thereby ascribe to him his own views (a non-dialectical interpretation). In Academica Cicero reports the debate about the status of approval as a kind of assent among Carneades’ followers, especially the views of Clitomachus and Philo of Larissa. According to Clitomachus, approving impressions implies acting on them without taking them as true, while according to Philo of Larissa, approval is taking something as true without certainty. In more modern terms, we can say that Philo refers to the notion of weak assertion, and Clitomachus to non-assertion. Thus Clitomachus’ reading correlates with a dialectical reading, and Philo’s reading correlates with a non-dialectical reading. Philo’s reading leads to the interpretation of Carneades as a quasi-fallibilist. It is difficult to establish the precise position of the historical Carneades because he was hesitant in his oral teaching. Still, there is some basis in Carneades’ theory for interpreting approval as weak assertion (comprising three degrees of persuasiveness involving rational consideration of what seems to be truth). My aim in this essay is thus to argue that a quasi-fallibilist and non-dialectical reading is applicable to the historical Carneades.

Contemporary philosophy (at least in English-speaking world) is dominated by discussions between foundationalism and externalism on the other hand. R. Chisholm defends foundationalistic and internalistic position. Epistemological foundationalism is the thesis that there are basic beliefs which are the foundation for the justificaction of others. According to Chisholm such basic beliefs are some simple truths of reason and some beliefs about the self-presenting states like thinking, seeming or sensing. There are some problems with such basic beliefs, but Chisholm's main important argument is that here is no alternative to foundationalism in epistemology, because its opponent, the coherence theory, presupposes some form of foundationalism. The discussion between internalism and externalism is more recent. Externalism claims that what makes our beliefs justified is something external to subject, It may be truth, causal relations or counterfactual relations. According to Chisholm all externalistic theories are either empty (they reduce justification to truth) or they use some internalistic concepts. He gives some counterexamples to the theory by A. Goldman (one of the most important proponents of externalism). Internalists claim that what can make our beliefs justified must be something internal, accessible to subject

Luca Castagnoli, Ancient Self-Refutation. The Logic and History of the Self- Refutation Argument from Democritus to Augustine, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2010, pp. XX+394. Hardback, ISBN 9780521896313. L. Castagnoli in his book Ancient Self-Refutation rightly observes that self-refutation is not falsification; it overturns the act of assertion but does not prove that the content of the act is false. He argues against the widely spread belief that Sextus Empiricus accepted the self-refutation of his own expressions. Castagnoli also claims that Sextus was effective in answering to the self-refutation charge. The achievement of the book is discovery that in passages where Sextus seems to embrace the self-refutation of his expressions (PH 1.14-15), he does not use the term peritropé , technical for self-refutation, but term perigrafé , which means self-bracketing. Self-bracketing is weakening one’s own thesis but not overturning it. Castagnoli claims that Sextus embraces the self-bracketing of his expressions but never accepts their self-refutation. However, Castagnoli is not right that self-refutation is shameful mistake for everybody. The mature skeptic cannot even think that self-refutation is wrong, because it would be a dogmatic view. Sextus seems accept the self-refutation at the end of Against Logicians where he presents the argument against proof and the metaphor of the ladder (M 8.480-1). Regardless of Sextus declarations, we have reasons to think that he does not avoid self-refutation in pragmatic sense. Self-bracketing of his position is not a consistent dialectical strategy, as Castagnoli writes, but the end of rational discussion. Sextus avoids absolute self-refutation (we cannot falsify what he suggests) but he is unable to avoid pragmatic self-refutation (there is no way to assert his position without contradiction). It is the case, even if Sextus refuses asserting his position

Nozick is the author of the conditional definition of knowledge where two subjunctive conditionals replace internalistic notion of justification. If you know that p, you have true belief that p and also in the close possible worlds you would accept p when p is true and you would not accept p when p is false. Nozick agrees with skeptics that we do not know that we are not brains in the vat. But he claims that we do know all the trivial things we think we know. The only way to accept the two theses is to deny the Principle of Clousure. According to Nozick knowledge is not closed under known logical implication. But is it right to deny the principle? Our everyday knowledge implies that the skeptic is wrong. If I know that I am reading a text on Earth, it is false that I am on Alpha Centauri floating in a tank. To reject skeptic it is enough to deny the transparency principle (if I know, I know that I know). When knowledge is possible without knowledge about that knowledge, we can know even if we are not able to prove that we know