Sc Flashcards
Define ‘Normal incredulity/doubt’.
Day to day doubts, in specific contexts/moments.
Define ‘Philosophical scepticism/doubt’.
Doubts generated deliberately, not in a specific context/moment, but instead because they are philosophically important for thinking clearly about what we can know.
State ‘The role/function of philosophical scepticism within epistemology’.
Sceptical arguments aim to completely undercut our usual justifications.
Scepticism is best understood as the claim that our usual justification for claiming our beliefs amount to knowledge is inadequate.
Define ‘Local philosophical scepticism’.
A type of Philosophical Skepticism that is applied ‘locally’ to all beliefs of some general types.
Define ‘Global philosophical scepticism’.
A type of Philosophical Skepticism that is applied ‘globally’ to (almost) all of our beliefs.
Summarise ‘Descartes’ global philosophical scepticism’.
Descartes’ global philosophical scepticism is a theory in Epistemology that proposes that in order to discover what we know we should try to find reasons to doubt the claims we make as a test.
State the claims in ‘Descartes’ global philosophical scepticism’.
(MAIN) We should try to doubt all of our beliefs.
1) We should use the most extreme arguments we can think of to do this (methodological doubt is “hyperbolic”).
2)Beliefs that can be doubted (that could be false for all we know) are not justified and so cannot be counted as knowledge.
3) This doubt is being used for a positive purpose - it is being used as a method for discovering what we know.
Summarise ‘The Illusion argument’.
The Illusion argument within Descartes’ Three Waves of Doubt is a sceptical argument in Epistemology that proposes that senses sometimes deceive and so can’t be completely trusted to give me knowledge.
State ‘The Illusion Argument’ in standard form.
P1: If my senses can deceive me then they cannot and should not always be trusted as a source of knowledge.
P2: My senses do and can deceive me (at least about objects that are small or far away).
C: Therefore, my senses cannot be completely trusted as a source of knowledge.
BUT: Descartes then says that this arguably doesn’t seem to apply so much to objects that are large or close by…
Summarise ‘The Dreaming argument’.
The Dreaming argument within Descartes’ Three Waves of Doubt is a sceptical argument in Epistemology that proposes that as can’t tell real experiences from dreamed ones, so the senses cannot give me knowledge.
State ‘The Dreaming Argument’ in standard form.
P1: In order to have perceptual knowledge of mind-independent reality, I need to know that I am not dreaming now.
P2: But I cannot know that I am not dreaming now…
because all possible accurate perceptual experiences could occur in a dream, meaning dreams are subjectively indistinguishable from accurate perceptual experiences.
C: Therefore I cannot have perceptual knowledge of mind-independent reality.
So this argument is stronger than the ‘illusion’ argument because it applies even to objects that are large or close by - they could be dreamed.
BUT: Descartes then says that this doesn’t apply to mathematical beliefs. These are true whether we are dreaming or not…
Summarise ‘The Evil Deceiver/Demon argument’.
The Evil Deceiver/Demon argument within Descartes’ Three Waves of Doubt is a sceptical argument in Epistemology that proposes that the possibility of an evil deceiver can’t be disproven, and so I cannot know anything at all.
State ‘The Evil Deceiver/Demon argument’ in standard form.
P1: It is possible that a powerful and deceptive being is continuously deceiving me in all my perceptions of the external world and reasoning so that everything I take as true is in fact false.
P2: In order to know anything I need to rule out this possibility.
P3: I cannot rule out this possibility. This is because, regardless of whether it is true or false, my experience/beliefs and my justification for them would stay the same.
C: Therefore, I cannot know anything, justifying Global Scepticism.
