Hegel's Solution to the Pyrrhonian Dilemma of the Criterion

Home , Problem of the criterion, Roderick Chisholm

CHAPTER 10

Hegel’s Solution to the Pyrrhonian Dilemma of the Criterion

60 INTRODUCTION.

Rather recently, problems about epistemic circularity, and more recently, Sextus Empiricus’ ‘Dilemma of the Criterion’ have been receiving thoughtful attention from contemporary epistemologists. Epistemic circularity is in- volved in using a source of belief in the process of assessing or justifying that source of belief; the Dilemma of the Criterion (quoted below, §61) concerns establishing basic criteria of justification in highly disputed domains. Because there are diverse and controversial views on this issue, how can basic criteria of justification be established without infinite regress, vicious circularity, or petitio principii? These problems deserve careful attention; I don’t believe contemporary epistemologists have fully realised how sophisticated a response Pyrrhonian skepticism requires.1 Roderick Chisholm (1982, 65–6) contends that there are three kinds of response to what he calls the ‘Problem’ of the Criterion’: Particularists believe they have various particular instances of knowledge, on the basis of which they can construct a general account of the nature and criteria of knowledge. Methodists believe they know the nature and criteria of knowledge, and on that basis can distinguish genuine from illegitimate particular instances of knowledge. Skeptics believe that no particular cases of knowledge can be identified without knowing the nature or criteria of knowledge, and that the nature or criteria of knowledge cannot be known without identifying particular cases of genuine knowledge. Chisholm (1982, 75, cf. 67) favours particularism, but thinks that any attempt to solve the problem must beg the question.2

1 The main points of Pyrrhonian scepticism are summarised in HER, 11–6. 2 Robert Amico (1993, 112-5) proposes to ‘dissolve’ the Problem of the Criterion by show- ing that the skeptic presupposes an impossible condition for justification, namely, settling both what count as proper criteria of knowledge and what count as proper instances of knowledge before providing an account of knowledge. Amico is right that this is an impossible condition, but wrongly ascribes to the Pyrrhonian skeptic a definite position on the nature of justification (ibid., 114). Thus he converts sophisticated, flexible, and undog- matic Pyrrhonian skepticism into dogmatic Academic skepticism. Sextus is far more sub- tle. Amico closes by noting that the interesting questions only begin once this impossible condition on justifying a theory of knowledge is rejected. Hegel’s analysis begins where Amico’s leaves off, with these interesting questions.

Paul Moser (1988, 260–5) has sought to avoid the dogmatism which arises from accepting either methodism or particularism by proposing to reach a ‘reflective equilibrium’ between our considered judgments about epistemic principles and our clearest intuitions about particular cases of knowledge or justified belief. There may be merit to this suggestion, but convincing reasons must be provided to suppose that we would equilibrate toward genuine principles of justification and genuine cases of knowledge or justified belief. Moser apparently discounts this problem due to his staunch justificatory internalism, which permits him to consider propositions as justified for particular persons, even if their principles of justification are not truth-condu- cive. As his subsequent work reveals, this is much more a capitulation, rather than a solution, to serious sceptical challenges to knowledge and to our un- derstanding of it. Subsequently, Moser (1993, 57) argued for ‘conditional ontological agnos- ticism’, the view that no agnostic-resistant, non-question-begging evidence for ontological claims (whether idealist or realist) can be found. He contends that philosophy nevertheless can undertake important semantic, explanatory and evaluative projects. His ‘explanatory project’ addresses whatever constitutes the correctness of one’s explanatory epistemic standards regarding the nature of justification; his ‘evaluative project’ addresses whatever constitutes the correctness of the evaluative epistemic standards one uses to ‘discern’ justified beliefs. These projects must avoid the dilemma of being either naïve or viciously circular. Moser’s ‘semantic project’ purports to solve that dilemma through informative answers to questions about the point and signifi- cance of one’s standards.3 The explanations his three projects involve are avowedly ‘perspectival’ because they are supported ultimately by the various semantic commitments, explanatory ends, and standards of success, i.e., by the conceptually relative ‘standpoints’, adopted by individual epistemologists.4 Moser (1993, 74–5) contends that the dilemma he identifies for his explanatory and evaluative projects is more basic that Sextus’ Dilemma of the Crite- rion. In part this is because he accepts Chisholm’s formulation of the ‘Prob- lem’ in terms of justification,5 rather than the criterial terms Sextus actually used. This precludes Moser’s recognising how basic a problem Sextus poses and how sophisticated he is in parlaying that problem into objections to all

3 Moser (1993), 70–74; 60–151. Moser’s ‘semantic project’ specifies ‘in informative terms, what it means to say that something (for example, a proposition or a belief) is epistemically justified’ (60). It requires answering the question: ‘What, if anything, constitutes the correctness (at least for myself) of my semantic standards for ‘epistemic justification’ as an answer to the semantic project regarding what it means to say that something is epistemically justified?’ (72). 4 Moser (1993), 227; on his conceptual relativism see 98–9, 152–87. 5 Moser (1993), 75; on Chisholm’s ‘Problem’ of the Criterion, see HER, 217.