Integration vs. Insulation

After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it -- "I refute it thus." Boswell: Life of Samuel Johnson[1]

Should our common, everyday beliefs and actions have an affect on our theoretical and philosophical beliefs? Or is there a layer of insulation between them, so that although we may doubt the reality of time and matter, we will still schedule dental appointments for next week and avoid walking into brick walls? (In the interest of conciseness I will refer to the former view as “integration” and the latter as “insulation” in this essay.) Myles Burnyeat considers this question from the viewpoint of ancient and modern attitudes towards the kinds of skeptical arguments advanced by Sextus Empiricus.[2] He notes that although the modern attitude seems to be that everyday beliefs are not in fact affected by our second-order philosophical theories, this kind of notion would be foreign to the ancient, medieval, or renaissance philosopher.

Burnyeat points out that Sextus relies on our everyday views affecting and being affected by our philosophical views in his overall project of using all manner of arguments to induce the suspension of judgment and to produce tranquility. He argues that for Sextus and his predecessors, there is no separation between first-order questions such as “is this action just?” and second-order theoretical questions such as “what is justice?” (Burnyeat 115). This is because our first-order statements involve the use of theoretical concepts such as good, evil, place and time; and if those concepts are called into question, then so are the first-order statements that make use of them. Thus, Plato may refute Protagoras’ famous dictum on grounds of self-refutation, and in a similar manner G.E. Moore may argue against skepticism concerning the reality of time and space by observing that “it is true that yesterday my body was for some time nearer the mantelpiece than the bookcase” (quoted in Burnyeat 93).

This integral view of Moore’s, however, is not widely shared today, and Burnyeat embarks on a brief overview of the history of philosophy to determine when this became the case. After going through many of the early moderns and showing how their various arguments against skepticism rely on the integration of our common beliefs with our philosophical theories, he arrives at Kant, and concludes that it is he that is responsible for first making a strict demarcation between the two. Burnyeat concludes that while Sextus “innocently” discerns no insulating gap between the empirical and the transcendental, Moore does so “naively,” since he cannot behave as though Kant did not exist.

And this is where Burnyeat leaves us, with the dictum that once lost, innocence “can never be regained” (Burnyeat 123). But on Burnyeat’s own account there are modern philosophers such as Quine who will not have “anything to do with insulation” (Burnyeat 93), and as Quine seems to escape the charge of naivete (although Burnyeat remarks that affirming a belief in integration is one thing, actually living it out is another), perhaps it is after all possible or desirable to unlearn what Kant has taught. Further, Descartes was able to maintain his views on the integration of common beliefs and theory in the face of Gassendi’s and Montagne’s insulating “country gentleman” interpretation of Sextus, so perhaps the position of Moore (and Quine) is not as untenable as Burnyeat makes it appear.

Additionally, it would seem that the integral view has certain advantages: chiefly among these is the consideration that it does seem more internally consistent that my beliefs about this or that object being in a certain spatial relation to me be informed by (and inform) my beliefs about bodies and space. After all, if my theories are not influenced by my experience of the external world, even if they are internally coherent it is an open question as to whether or not they are likely to be true.[3] Finally, I will note that the integral view forces the skeptic to deal with the apraxia objection head-on, rather than deflecting it by finding refuge in his ordinary experience.

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[1] For an interesting philosophical interpretation of this scene, cf. Douglas Lane Patey, Johnson's Refutation of Berkeley: Kicking the Stone Again. Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 47, No. 1. (Jan. - Mar., 1986), pp. 139-145.

[2] Myles Burnyeat and Michael Frede, ed., The Original Sceptics: A Controversy. Hackett, 1998, pp. 92-126.

[3] Cf. the input objection against coherentist theories of justification and the move to introduce an observation requirement: e.g. in Laurence Bonjour, Epistemology: Classic Problems and Contemporary Responses. Rowman & Littlefield, 2002, p. 208.

Pyrrhonian Skepticism and Objective Values

In her article “Doing without objective values,” (Malcolm Schofield and Gisela Striker, eds., The Norms of Nature: Studies in Hellenistic Ethics, pp. 3-29.) Julia Annas states that in Sextus Empiricus’ arguments from the tenth Mode of Anesidemus, he is confusing moral realism with moral absolutism. Sextus proposes several arguments like the following: what is good by nature should be good for all, just as fire which is warm by nature warms all (PH III 179). But since different cultures have different beliefs about what is good, and are thus not similarly affected by what is good, we may conclude that nothing is good by nature. Hence, we should give up our beliefs about this or that object being good by nature and, suspending judgment, arrive at tranquility.

But, says Annas, this is a mistake since moral realism, which Sextus is trying to argue against, is not the same position as moral absolutism, which he actually argues against. Annas states that this confusion is one that “Sextus could reasonably have been expected to avoid,” (Annas 10) for three reasons. First, Sextus seems to argue that beliefs about what is good by nature are a source of anxiety, but that if we consider that goods are relative to persons or societies then we can suspend judgment on whether something is good by nature and achieve ataraxia. However, this supposition is unwarranted, since it could still be the case that a good relative to me is a real good, and this could presumably still be a cause of anxiety. Second, Annas produces Polystratus the Epicurean as an example of a philosopher who lived before Sextus and who made the distinction between moral realism and moral absolutism. And third, she points out that moral relativism is a far cry from skepticism, since the moral relativist will still have beliefs about what is good, even if it is relatively good.

I will grant here that Annas is correct in asserting that Sextus conflates the two positions, but I will offer responses to her arguments that this is a mistake that Sextus could and should have avoided. First, given Sextus’ overall project of producing ataraxia by whatever means necessary, it is unclear what advantage he would have gained in relation to his dogmatic opponents by distinguishing between moral realism and moral absolutism, given that most of his opponents would have held to both. Annas seems to be of the opinion that Sextus overlooked the possibility of his interlocutors’ taking refuge in the position that “this is really good, but only in relation to me” (Annas, 10). But while this is perhaps a possible move, it is, I think, highly improbable that Sextus’ opponents would have actually made such a move given their philosophical commitments, and thus Sextus is not to be blamed for not attempting to counter it.

And while Annas can point to one philosopher who made the distinction between moral realism and moral absolutism, this seems an insufficient objection unless it can be shown that this position was so widely held or influential as to warrant its own branch of skeptical arguments. No doubt Sextus, if confronted by a special individual case, could produce arguments suitable to his opponent’s particular dogmas; but in a work like PH, where he spends so little time on ethical issues, I believe it is sufficient for him to address the beliefs of the majority of his audience.

As to Annas’ third objection, it seems that she assumes that Sextus was arguing for a position (relativism) in order to get his opponents to accept the conclusion of his argument. If I am in fact reading her correctly, by way of reply I need only observe that Sextus did not advance relativistic arguments in order to get his opponents to be relativists, but in order to counterbalance their other ethical beliefs in an attempt to produce epoche and ataraxia. He is not committed to the position of relativism any more than he is committed to the position that fire is actually warm by nature. Thus, in light of Sextus' overall project I think that this particular criticism of Annas' is misguided.