PYRRHIC PYRRHONISM

Abstract

In his provocative and refreshing new book, Walter Sinnott‐Armstrong argues for a position with two main components. There is a sceptical part of his view, but also a non‐sceptical part. The full title of the sceptical part is ‘Pyrrhonian scepticism about justified moral belief’. This is to be understood by contrast with its more definite cousin, Academic scepticism about justified moral belief. Academic scepticism makes the claim that nobody is ever justified in holding any substantive moral belief. Pyrrhonian scepticism is sceptical about this, and does not endorse it. But it does not deny it either. Pyrrhonian sceptics suspend belief about whether or not anyone is justified in holding any moral belief. We can of course generalize these two approaches to the justification of beliefs about any subject‐matter s. Adopting a shorthand, we could say that Academic sceptics about s‐beliefs hold that there are no justified beliefs about s, and Pyrrhonian sceptics about s‐beliefs suspend belief about whether or not there are any justified beliefs about s. Using this shorthand, Sinnott‐Armstrong is a Pyrrhonian sceptic about moral beliefs.