Pyrrho of Elis:

Pyrrhonism

Is knowledge possible?

Background

Pyrrhonism was named after Pyrrho (c. 360 – c. 270 BC). He was born in Elis in south-west Greece.

He is famous for being the first Greek sceptic philosopher. Scepticism is the view that we can question whether it is possible to have knowledge about things.

Pyrrho travelled with Alexander the Great all the way to India. Perhaps his philosophy was influenced by these travels.

"...he even went as far as the Gymnosophists, in India, and the Magi. Owing to which circumstance, he seems to have taken a noble line in philosophy, introducing the doctrine of incomprehensibility, and of the necessity of suspending one's judgment...."

Diogenes Laërtius Lives of the Eminent Philosophers Book IX, Chapter 9

Ataraxia and Dogma

Pyrrho taught that the aim of philosophy was to achieve ataraxia - or tranquility, freedom from worry. And he thought that we could achieve this by rejecting all dogma - that is beliefs that we unjustifiably hold as being true.

The assumption seems to be that the anxiety comes from either holding on to beliefs that are unjustified or on having to choose what is correct in the first place. The Pyrrhonists argued that almost everything we believe is infact dogma because nothing could be known because there was nothing of which we could be certain. Therefore, we don't have to choose or believe in things because we can't. Hence, Pyrrhonism leads to ataraxia.

Pyrrho himself never wrote anything down, but his follower Timon (quoted in a book by Aristocles) summarised his philosophy like this:

"The things themselves are equally indifferent, and unstable, and indeterminate, and therefore neither our senses nor our opinions are either true or false. For this reason then we must not trust them, but be without opinions, and without bias, and without wavering, saying of every single thing that it no more is than is not, or both is and is not, or neither is nor is not."

Eusebius. "Praeparatio Evangelica Book XIV". Tertullian Project.

The five tropes (or ways) of Agrippa

The kinds of arguments employed by the Pyrrhonists were summarised by a Pyrrhonist philosopher called Agrippa. These are five reasons why we should reject most (if not all) dogma.

Dissent – The uncertainty demonstrated by the differences of opinions among philosophers and people in general.
Infinite regress – All proof rests on matters themselves in need of proof, and so on to infinity.
Relation – All things are changed as their relations become changed, or, as we look upon them from different points of view.
Assumption – The truth asserted is based on an unsupported assumption.
Circularity – The truth asserted involves a circularity of proofs.

Tasks

Explain the disagreement between the Stoics and the Pyrrhonists.
- What did they both think and argue about 'self-evident truths'?
- What did they both think about whether we can get information from our sense?
Do you think that there are self-evident truths? Why?
Do you think that we can learn things from our senses? Why?

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