You Can't Hide Your Lying Eyes

A topic that is repeatedly brought up in regards to my Clarkian epistemology is this: trusting one's senses. It seems that most everyone will admit that their senses play tricks on them some times, but most will not admit that, for this reason, they should disbelieve their senses. To them this seems utterly ridiculous and impossible. In fact, Hume, probably the greatest modern "skeptic", stated that he could not help but believe his senses when he wasn't philosophizing. There is even debate whether Pyrrho the Greek skeptic had to be led around by friends; it seems that his distrust of his senses caused him to ignore dangerous obstacles in his way. However, this story is most likely false.

Many of the ancient skeptics, while believing that knowledge (epistēmē) could not be attained through the senses, did believe that one could have a non-doxastic attitude towards the senses. If, for instance, Pyrrho observed that a precipice stood before him, he did not have to believe that a precipice was actually before him, but rather could choose to act as if there was one. After all, one has to make a decision in life; one cannot do nothing, for even that is a decision. Thus this resulted in something called praxis. The skeptics would live by appearances and seek to fit in with society, while maintaining a non-doxastic attitude or stance towards the senses. If this is true, then the first sentence of this paragraph is not, strictly speaking, true. The ancient skeptics did not believe anything about the senses, knowledge or non-doxastic attitudes. In light of this, there is--as far as I am aware of--still debate as to whether: 1. the Pyrrhonians actually maintained a non-doxastic stance toward the senses, 2. the Pyrrhonians were actually committed to beliefs about beliefs by maintaining a non-doxastic attitude, and 3. whether it is actually possible to live without any beliefs.

I mention all this because I think that some good can be taken from our good friend Pyrrho. As a Clarkian I do not trust my senses to give me knowledge. It is this last clause, I think, that causes the hang up with most people. I trust my senses to give me opinions about the world, but this is not knowledge. However, opinion is often just as useful as knowledge. I whole-heartedly admit that God could be deceiving me at this moment in that I am not actually typing on my blog, but my opinion is that it is not so. (On a side note, I get so frustrated with Descartes. He, in the beginning of Meditations, affirms the Scriptures, and yet ignores the fact that God deceives people in the Scriptures. How can he, then, base his philosophy on the fact that God does not deceive?) I have no epistemic reason to believe either one way or the other, and so I do not pretend to have knowledge of this either one way or the other. I engage in a form of praxis: while I do not maintain a non-doxastic stance towards the majority (if any) of my empirical beliefs, I do simply live by appearances. And that, my friend, is all that one can ask of anyone.

So, in conclusion, I shall state that I have many empirical beliefs, but these beliefs are not useful in any manner for the pursuit of knowledge. We must use these beliefs to move about in the world as best we can, admitting that we could be mistaken about all that we see and hear. For instance: I am a scientific anti-realist; I believe that scientific theories are not meant to literally describe the world. They are meant to manipulate the environment and make predictions for our use (instrumentalism). However, since science is based upon empirical beliefs--and I do not invest any epistemic authority in my empirical beliefs--even our beliefs that a particular scientific theory is useful or has allowed us to make a large number of predictions is all opinion that may, in fact, turn out to be a fancy of our imagination.

I hope this clears the situation up a bit.