Epistemology is the study of theory of knowledge, rational belief and justification. It focuses on areas like philosophical analysis of knowledge and its relation to belief, truth and justification (Sosa, 2017). It deals with skepticism and its various related problems. In epistemology, James F. McGrath gave many approaches that are applied to defeat skepticism. The denying closure, Reid’s a priori proposal, straightforward and bold posteriori proposals and contextualism greatly refutes skepticism. Skepticism is a position in philosophy in which a person refrains from disbelief, doubt and negativity (Steup, Turri & Sosa, 2013). Rather, it is the process of applying the logical reasoning and critical thinking that is used to determine validity. It also deals with the finding of a supportive conclusion that is not based on a c.
The denying closure principle greatly denies the skepticism and says that no argument succeeds in reaching to a conclusion. It is based on belief systems and does not include justification of the perceived knowledge. It is not capable of forming a structurally generating global valid skeptical argument (Turri, 2015). The closure principle marks the central approach in defeating skepticism and does not produce a skeptical argument. It does not work in accordance to skepticism and does not fulfill the demands of skepticism. The global skeptic argument claims that a person is not intended to know everything about the world, except for what a person has in his mind (Gibb, 2015). The skepticism supports that closure principle is not capable of generating a compelling argument for skepticism. The closure principles do not employ skepticism and under determination arguments are best at skeptical arguments and do on depend on closure principle. Under determination principle relies on the fact that if two theories are incompatible with each other, however, compatible with other available data, one cannot know that which theory is true and false. For example, if two theories support or justify the same observational data, we can conclude that they are incompatible but equivalent in observation. This deduces that apparent perception does not justify the belief one has in their observations. This skeptical argument does not include closure principle as it defeats skepticism. On the other hand, skepticism involves knowledge that is widely accepted and based on accepted information.
Thomas Reid’s priori proposal is based on original thoughts that are produced by the brain in prior to the stimulation of the sense organs in specific ways. In this context, the thoughts are described to be priori. It is believed that if a person’s sense organs are not stimulated in an appropriate way, the perceived knowledge is not considered to be priori rather a sensation, even if it is original (Haldane, 2016). Reid stated that there are certain principles that intend us to believe things as they are and take them for granted according to the constitution of nature. In this case, we are unable to give reason for our beliefs and consider them to be a part of our belief systems. This is called common sense that is manifested in contrary to skepticism. He strongly laid his interests in the defense of common sense as he considered it to be a type of self-evident knowledge. He believed that common sense encompass the social common sense and perceptive powers. He believed that there are no claim in any kind of perception, conception and sensation. He strongly held the common beliefs and does not demand for any absolute knowledge. He opposed skepticism and greatly emphasized on common sense that is inborn. Many rationalists believed that priori knowledge is not considered to be skeptical and there is no empirical knowledge involved in this context (McAllister, 2016). Some skeptic philosophers believe that knowledge is logical and mathematical and is not based on self-evident knowledge and it is considered as posteriori. Skepticism strongly rejects the nature of self-evident beliefs that give rise to priori knowledge. This illustrates that the priori principle is not based on skepticism and refute skepticism.
Contextualism in philosophy is considered as a collection of views that emphasizes on context of the expression, action or utterance that occurs (Atwood & Stolorow, 2014). It strongly argues that the expression, utterance or action that is relevant to that context is only perceived and conceived. It greatly deals with situational ethics and people express expressions, actions or gestures that are context sensitive. People express different feelings and prepositions in relation to context of use and perceived in different way. Contextualism greatly undermines skepticism and believes that the attributed knowledge is context-sensitive. It strongly believes that the truth of our knowledge is dependent on the context we use. The epistemological contextualism believes that truth-conditions of the perceived knowledge depend on the context and claim is made and assessed (Silk, 2016). On the other hand, skepticism claims that the knowledge that is perceived in daily life can be true and skepticism is proved to be correct. Contextualism claims that knowledge is a relative absolute term and it is anti-skeptical in nature. According to Schaffer, (2013) knowledge means certainty that implies logical reasoning and thinking and eliminates the possibility of falsehood. Contextualism relies on the expressions, beliefs and actions in relation to a particular context and are variable in nature. Contextualists divert from the knowledge of critical thinking and logical reasoning and perceive relative absolute knowledge. This shows that contextualism greatly refute skepticism and is anti-skeptical in nature.
In philosophy, the straightforward greatly believes that whatever we see is real in nature. In this context, people might claim sightings of things that do not exist in real world (Atkins & Nance, 2014). This approach does not have any grounds on which people prove these kinds of sightings. This is strongly opposed by skepticism which is based on rationality and critical thinking. There is another reason for the straightforward approach defines that things what we see is real and there is no space for logical reasoning. This approach strongly rejects the intuitively accepted concepts and facts. The perceptions and beliefs of others are accepted by people as we do know that these things are not real and do not exist. It favors naturalism in which a person believes the unreal things that are recommended and explained in the natural sciences (Vavova, 2014). It encompasses the complex beliefs that are logical and may be true in different perspectives, whereas skepticism is based on arguments in analysis and conclusion. According to Emmaneul Kant, the posteriori knowledge is dependent on experiences. The word posteriori explains the knowledge that is perceived after the incident has taken place. This kind of knowledge greatly opposes the priori knowledge that is based on one’s perceptions and self-based beliefs (Stuchlik, 2017). There is requirement of empirical knowledge or experience that is based on justification and evident knowledge. The personal knowledge and science also plays an important role in this kind of knowledge. The posteriori comes with argument about an incident that is based on experiences and comes with a conclusion based on that particular experience (Hawke, 2017). This greatly defeats skepticism as it involves the knowledge related to knowledge and nothing outside our human minds.
The four approaches given by McGrath are used to refute skepticism and defeats skepticism in many aspects. Among the above stated approaches, the denying closure approach is the best in defeating skepticism. It is greatly based on the beliefs of the people and denies the skepticism. Moreover, it relies on the knowledge that they perceive in regard to their beliefs that is there in their minds. A person would not know anything outside their mind and is not intended to know everything about the world. This greatly refutes skepticism as it is absolute knowledge involving logical arguments and critical thinking. Therefore, among the McGrath approaches, denying closure approach efficiently defeats skepticism.
References
Atkins, P., & Nance, I. (2014). A problem for the closure argument. International Journal for the Study of Skepticism, 4(1), 36-49.
Atwood, G. E., & Stolorow, R. D. (2014). Structures of subjectivity: Explorations in psychoanalytic phenomenology and contextualism. Routledge.
Gibb, S. (2015). The Causal Closure Principle. The Philosophical Quarterly, pqv030.
Haldane, J. (2016). Giovanni Grandi (ed.), Thomas Reid: Selected Philosophical Writings.
Hawke, P. (2017). Can Modal Skepticism Defeat Humean Skepticism?. In Modal Epistemology After Rationalism (pp. 281-308). Springer International Publishing.
McAllister, B. (2016). Re-evaluating Reid’s Response to Skepticism. Journal of Scottish Philosophy, 14(3), 317-339.
Schaffer, J. (2013). Causal contextualism. Contrastivism in philosophy, 33-63.
Silk, A. (2016). Discourse Contextualism: A framework for contextualist semantics and pragmatics. Oxford University Press.
Sosa, E. (2017). Epistemology. Princeton University Press.
Steup, M., Turri, J., & Sosa, E. (Eds.). (2013). Contemporary debates in epistemology. John Wiley & Sons.
Stuchlik, J. (2017). Circling to Scientia: Reading Descartes in Light of the Debate Between Stoic Dogmatists and Academic Skeptics. Journal of the History of Philosophy, 55(1), 55-81.
Turri, J. (2015). An open and shut case: epistemic closure in the manifest image. Ann Arbor, MI: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library.
Vavova, K. (2014). Moral disagreement and moral skepticism. Philosophical Perspectives, 28(1), 302-333.
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