Q&A: A Negative Defense of “Common Sense” Against Skepticism
A Negative Defense of “Common Sense” Against Skepticism
Question
With God’s help
Hello Rabbi Michael,
I’ll try to ask briefly.
I’ll start with a didactic example: questions often come up such as: how can we know that the sun will rise tomorrow? Maybe it won’t. Descartes’ demon, etc.
All these examples provide, for the explanation of common sense X, an alternative with logical possibility Y.
And I think the main negative response lies in the need to distinguish between logical possibility and “plausibility” on the one hand, and epistemic plausibility on the other, and there is no reason at all to assume that there is any identity between these categories. Because epistemic plausibility requires an additional assumption about a fit between thought (or whatever generates the logical possibility) and reality as such.
Moreover,
since the assumption of epistemic possibility requires an implicit assumption that there is some fit for us between understanding and reality, then as long as we lack that assumption there is no reason whatsoever to connect the two.
And it seems that even the skeptic (who is not an extreme skeptic) would not claim that we *experience* and assume some “fit assumption” with respect to the skeptical hypothesis (perhaps without being aware that it is coordinated).
For example, that the demon coordinates our thought about the demon with its existence.
But if in fact we do not have that direct, immediate assumption of a sense of fit, then even if, as part of the logical possibility, we claim that we have some unconscious assumption of that fit, as long as it is indeed unconscious, there is no reason to assume that the skeptical hypothesis has any chance at all with respect to reality as such. (At most, a 0 chance if one assumes uniformity across all explanations, or an impossible probability, or else this discussion too depends on the degree of fit and is at most fundamentally unanswerable.)
If so, that significantly dulls the sting of the skeptical question, even if it does not eliminate it entirely.
Because at that point the skeptic can indeed ask: who says you really are coordinated? Maybe you are… but he cannot really complete the sentence, because any such completion assumes that logical possibility has epistemic probability, yet that assumption is possible only within a framework in which we already have, behind it, the assumption of fit. At most, it allows the skeptic to doubt the fit of this system, the current one. But it does not allow him to offer any other alternative explanation with even the slightest plausibility.
Questions:
0. Do you think the argument is valid?
1. Does a state of partial fit, mentioned briefly above, undermine this argument?
Because it seems that in areas where we think we are not coordinated, we really do not speak decisively—for example, if someone asks questions on topics we do not know, say the number of people in country X. Usually we will not answer, or we will say the answer has only limited validity.
2. Does the logical possibility that assumes that the same subversive hypothesis also has some coordinating factor behind it—but together with the agreement that the person has no acquaintance with it—mean that it really lacks epistemic plausibility? That is really the sting of the argument.
3. Are there also more positive arguments for accepting the assumption of common sense, aside from faith in fit (whether conscious or latent)? Together with the assumption that this is what is plausible by definition.
Answer
I’m not sure I understood. But if I understood correctly, I disagree. Logical possibility is epistemic possibility (in my view it would be better to say: ontic possibility), not epistemic certainty. So no assumption of fit is required here. Clearly, anything that is logically possible is epistemically possible, even without any assumption of fit. In short, skepticism does not assume any fit between us and reality. On the contrary, it undermines that fit by arguing that in reality many other things may be possible as well (and perhaps even things that do not occur to me at all).
I don’t think there is an argument in favor of common sense, because any such argument would itself rest on common sense. I don’t think an argument is required. The burden of proof is on whoever opposes common sense.
Discussion on Answer
I completely lost you. I’ll repeat that in my view skepticism does not assume any fit at all. It can be formulated as “according to your view”: according to those who believe in fit, there are additional possibilities for what exists in reality. As a skeptic, I know nothing about that and do not believe in any fit.
Well then, I think we simply define skepticism differently, and that really was the point of the argument.
The whole point of the argument is to show that there are only two possibilities:
either belief in the fit of common sense (what seems plausible has ontic plausibility), or lack of belief in fit (and then there is no connection at all between thought and reality).
But there is no third possibility—such as belief in some possible covert factor “X” that we think about but do not “believe” in, or any other option or conclusion “X.”
And that is indeed the purpose of the argument: only either “common sense” or “silence.”
And then, in order to decide between the two options, what remains is positive evidence for the position of belief in common sense.
But here we were discussing a negative defense (the conclusion of the argument being that the skeptic is compelled to remain silent).
And indeed, for a positive defense it is customary to use foundationalism. But that already has to be discussed separately.
A. Interesting—actually, with your precision that it is more correct, in your view, to speak in ontic terms, it seems to me all the more so.
After all, the very assumption that what we think in our mind is supposed to reflect the ontic reality before us is impossible unless there is some fit.
As you wrote, in reality many other things may be possible as well (and perhaps even things that do not occur to me at all).
Moreover, according to your approach, the fact that there are infinitely many interpretations of a line that maintains only a generally defined relation (between the two axes, between force and acceleration), and only one line is correct, constitutes proof for intuition and a difficulty for actualism.
All the more so when we are talking about the whole system (including the axes and everything behind them).
And after all, you also agree that there is no doubt that an arbitrary system will produce false information.
If so, aside from the fact that there is no reason at all to think there is a connection between logical possibility and ontic possibility, and you gave no explanation for that—furthermore, since logical possibility is infinite, and if we assume we assign equal possibility to every explanation, although it does not sound reasonable at all to treat it that way (because we have no information even about a uniform distribution), then we are dealing with a negligible probability.
So all the more so, we have no basis to assume there is any identity between the two things (just as one can easily think of a computer writing nonsense).
If so, it is not clear why you do see an identity in saying that “logical possibility is epistemic possibility.” After all, there is no connection between things in thought and their actual realization without an additional assumption of fit, or that the brain that produces the thoughts also produces reality—but that too is a kind of fit.
B. Obviously skepticism does not assume a fit between us and reality as we understand it. But usually it does assume some explanatory framework that can be treated as a kind of fit.
For example, because Descartes’ demon causes me to see X, I see X.
That is, the demon here functions as a fit that is unknown to me (and according to some books I could never know it).
And therefore I asked whether there is reason to view this logical possibility as what I called an “epistemic explanation.” Because it seems that since it is not built on the basis of a *concrete* belief that I am coordinated, it is correct to view it and classify it like any other logical possibility.
(And this is based on the distinction I introduced in section A, between logical thinking and epistemic beliefs, and that skepticism rests on seeing an identity and conflation between them—as indeed you seem to be claiming.)
And the sting of the argument separates the two, and if so we are left with only “one belief” to weigh, namely common sense. But no competing explanation, whatever it may be, can really compete with it.
And whether to accept it would already require positive evidence, perhaps as you mentioned, although I am not sure those formulations are precise.