Do you know what a skeptic is?

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:44

Philosophical teachings, common in times before our era, abounded in various terms, common names and so on. Some of them "survived" to the present and are often used in everyday life. For example, who is a skeptic, even children know the meaning of the word “positive” and other expressions. However, not everyone knows where this or that name or statement comes from. Let's take a closer look at what the word "skeptic" means.

Philosophical doctrine

Skepticism originated at the turn of the 4th-3rd centuries BC. e., almost at the same time with such teachings as the Stoic school and Epicureanism.

The founder of this philosophical trend is considered to be the Greek artist Pyrrho, who introduced such alien elements for the Hellenistic school as a whole, such as the "position of indifference", "detachment", "the practice of non-judgment".

If we consider what a skeptic is from the point of view ofof that time, it can be said that he was a man who did not strive to reach the truth of nature, did not try to know the world, but accepted things as they were. And this was the main idea of the teachings of Pyrrho, who occupied a leading place among the philosophers of that era.

Stages of development

The teaching of skeptics has gone through three periods of development:

• Elder Pyrrhonism (3rd century BC). This doctrine was characterized as practical, it was based on "ethics". The founders are Pyrrho and his disciple Timon, whose doctrine influenced the worldview of the Stoics and Epicureanism.
• Academism (3-2 centuries BC). Representatives of this branch proclaimed critical skepticism in theoretical form.
• Younger Pyrrhonism. The main philosophers of this direction are Agrippa and Aenesidemus, and the supporters were doctors, among whom Sextus Empiricus is known. This period is characterized by the systematization of the arguments of the doctrine. So, in the paths presented by Aenesidemus, the basic principles are explained about the impossibility of knowing everything around with the help of the senses. Later, these arguments were reduced to a single position on the relativity of perception.

Basic Principles of the Doctrine

To give a full explanation of who a skeptic is, we will give the following information. Representatives of this doctrine did not deny the truth of this or that statement, but they did not accept it as the truth either. This applied to all areas - religion, scientific disciplines (physics, mathematics, and so on), healing and others. For example, skeptics did not deny the existence of God, butat the same time, they did not take any side, any opinion about the nature of the Most High, his qualities, and so on. According to them, what cannot be felt or understood cannot be judged. At the same time, what can be touched, tasted or felt by other organs cannot be unambiguously assessed, since perception is relative. Therefore, it is better to refrain from any judgments or designations, but simply accept everything as it is.

As mentioned above, this philosophical direction had many supporters in medicine. If we consider who a skeptic is in this area, we can single out the following statement: “The doctor should not reflect on the nature of the disease, it is enough just to state the fact of the disease and record the symptoms. It is also necessary to apply known treatment for patients.”

Consequently, we can say that a person who does not evaluate phenomena, things, and also does not appropriate his subjective opinion is a skeptic. Synonyms of this word are often used in our time, while their meaning with the original meaning is sometimes different. For example, a nihilist (a person who denies life), a little faith and even a pessimist.

In general, we can say that the doctrine played an important role in the overall development of mankind. It made it possible to get rid of erroneous judgments, prohibitions imposed by religious schools.