This paper examines the role of skepticism in Western philosophy, tracing its foundations in René Descartes' method of systemic doubt and the claim that objective knowledge of the external world is unattainable. It then considers Roderick Chisholm's challenge to Cartesian skepticism, particularly his adoption of particularism as an epistemological framework, and G. E. Moore's famous attempt to prove the existence of an external world by raising his hands. The paper argues that both Chisholm's and Moore's counterarguments are ultimately circular and question-begging, concluding that the skeptical position established by Descartes remains the most logically defensible account of human knowledge.
Skepticism is a foundational component of the Western philosophical tradition. At its simplest level, it posits that human beings can never arrive at certain knowledge about the world, nor can objective truth ever be ascertained (Hooker, par. 1). While skepticism has a long history in Western civilization, its development took a crucial turn when René Descartes turned his attention to the question of how we can know anything. Modern skepticism is a derivation of Descartes' examination of the nature of knowledge and humanity's relationship to it. However, Descartes has not been accepted without question. Many philosophers refuse to accept the basic tenets of skepticism, including the claim that no one can possess objective knowledge of the external world. The skeptics assert that we know significantly less about the world than we presume to know (Steup, par. 1).
Notable among Descartes' detractors is the twentieth-century philosopher Roderick Chisholm, who viewed this issue as fundamental to any philosophical discussion (Faber, par. 2). Chisholm developed his own counterargument to the Cartesian system. However, examined with a critical eye, it becomes evident that Chisholm's argument is ultimately flawed. René Descartes established the importance of skepticism to Western civilization; Chisholm's attempts to undermine that centrality have thus far proven ineffective.
In the era of the Enlightenment, René Descartes set out to reinvent the whole of Western epistemology. He began by questioning the very basis of all philosophical thought — whether or not it is possible to actually know anything. His intent was to examine whether truth can somehow exist external to the individual mind (Hooker, par. 9). This is not as simple a question as it might seem. For those uninitiated in philosophical thought, it probably seems obvious that human beings can possess objective knowledge about the world. After all, we know that the sky is blue, that wood is hard, and that water is a molecule composed of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. But Descartes challenged all of this. He wondered how we know that we know these things. What if the whole of the external world were an illusion? How would any of us presume to know the difference?
Descartes recognized that human perception was not the most reliable means for deducing the nature of the world. Senses can lie or be distorted, and memories will fade. It must have seemed to Descartes that all of human experience was designed to facilitate doubt about the veracity of the external world. After deliberation, he realized that the very act of doubting proved at least one thing: that he himself was real — or, as he phrased it, cogito ergo sum. This was the basic proposition upon which Descartes was able to formulate other true statements (Hooker, par. 9).
Descartes laid the foundation for the Cartesian method of systemic doubt. While not generally characterized in these terms, this method is nonetheless the basis for all scientific examination and thought. The system Descartes formulated was grounded in the exacting rigor of questioning. Descartes recognized that we must continuously question all propositions. Skepticism accordingly demands that the individual be willing to doubt the whole of the external world. Propositions are tested and retested until one can arrive at a relatively true conclusion (Hooker, par. 10). Since the time of Descartes, this has been the basis of philosophical and scientific thought. Whether or not individuals realize or accept it, skepticism is the core of Western philosophy. It recognizes that the world is inherently unknowable. The best we can accomplish with any certainty, Descartes established, is that the individual subjective mind is real; all other propositions built up from this foundation remain subject to doubt and questioning.
Many philosophers have a problem with skepticism because it relentlessly attacks our ability to know anything objectively. Common sense suggests that we do know much about the external world. People want to believe that knowledge is somehow sacrosanct and objective — that it can be known, probed, and understood; that it is simply out there waiting to be found. Descartes undermined this assumption and challenged all minds never to accept the world as anything but a set of possible propositions. Doubt is the greatest tool of the thinking mind according to the Cartesian system. At issue is our ability to distinguish genuine knowledge from merely purported knowledge (Faber, par. 3). Philosophers such as Roderick Chisholm placed this question at the heart of all discussions of Western philosophy.
Chisholm was never satisfied with Descartes' skepticism and its conclusion that the external world can never be known with absolute certainty. For Chisholm, the problem reduced to two questions: (A) What do we know? and (B) What are the criteria of knowledge? While these seem straightforward, Chisholm qualified the issue precisely — neither (A) nor (B) can be adequately answered without first answering the other (Faber, par. 7). In other words, it is impossible to identify what we know without first establishing an epistemology, yet it is equally impossible to develop such an epistemology without first having some knowledge to work with.
Chisholm suggested three solutions to this problem: skepticism, methodism (which answers (B) before (A)), and particularism (which answers (A) before (B)). He rejected the first because he felt it was apparent that we do know things about the external world. He rejected the second because he felt that any system of thought that did not flow from existing knowledge was arbitrary and limiting. Chisholm settled on particularism despite the inelegance of the solution; he simply could not bring himself to accept skepticism at face value (Faber, par. 11–15).
"Moore's hand-raising argument examined and critiqued"
"Chisholm's hidden assumption exposed as circular"
In the end, we are faced with the unsettling prospect that the skeptics are right. Knowledge is unattainable in the sense that our understanding of the external world will forever be based on a series of propositions that may or may not be true. Descartes recognized centuries ago that there is no way to prove anything about the world objectively and absolutely. Counterarguments by intellectuals such as Moore and Chisholm are ultimately flawed because they attempt to counter the Cartesian system of doubt not with logical refutation but simply by proclaiming that knowledge has been attained.
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