num_pages: 294
description: This book raises questions about the nature of philosophy by examining the source and significance of one central philosophical problem: how can we know anything about the world around us? The author holds that scepticism -- the view that we can have no such knowledge at all -- is the only answer to the problem as traditionally posed. Theories of knowledge that give more encouraging answers are shown to miss or misconstrue the special 'external' or 'philosophical' character of the problem they propose to solve. Several related attempts to characterize the special nature of the philosophical problem -- and thereby the true significance of philosophical scepticism -- are explained and investigated, and a general pattern in the difficulties that arise suggests why no satisfactory unambiguous formulation is to be found. To that extent the very point or purpose of a philosophical theory of knowledge remains obscure. What is the difference between philosophical questions about human knowledge and scientific or everyday questions about how or whether we know certain things? What, if anything, does philosophical scepticism imply about the knowledge we possess in science and in everyday life? These questions are pursued through discussion and criticism of the views of Descartes, Kant, J.L. Austin, G.E. Moore, R. Carnap, W.V. Quine, and others. A close re-examination of the source of the problem of the external world is recommended, and some promising lines of diagnostic investigation are outlined. - from back cover of book
language: English
title: The Significance of Philosophical Scepticism
titlecomplete: The Significance of Philosophical Scepticism
genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction
ratings_count: 68
publisher: Oxford University Press