Het enige wat ik zeker weet is dat ik niets zeker weet, en zelfs daar twijfel ik over. Maar hé.. ik ga het uitzoeken.
Aardig leerzaam artikel over de klassieke scepticus.
Wat is kennis? Wat is ware kennis?
Bestaat er ware kennis waarin je dingen met zekerheid kunt stellen?
Zo ja.. waar ligt de grens tussen aangetoond of twijfelachtig?
En zo nee.. is elke zekere stelling een dogma?
Zijn 'de atheïst' en 'de gelovige' even dogmatisch?
http://legacy.earlham.edu/~peters/writing/skept.htm
The differences between this and atheism, agnosticism, and indifference have led to confusion. All three components of the skeptics' statement are important. (1)They speak only for themselves and confess only their own ignorance. (2) They speak only for the present and do not claim that their ignorance is inescapable. They do not say that knowledge is impossible for themselves or for others. (3) And they always add that despite their own present ignorance they are inquiring for the truth of the matter. They have not given up; they are optimistic —or at least hopeful —or at least undefeated —or at least unrelenting.
Let us take them at their word, for this constitutes genuine skepticism. Someone who is insincere in any of these claims is not a genuine skeptic. Or let us instead posit a skeptic who is sincere in each of these claims, and name her Nescio ("I do not know"). Many philosophers have been called skeptics who do not resemble Nescio in this regard. I will regard them as secondary types. Nescio's type of skepticism is the primary type —the most honest, the most radical, and the most challenging.
Nescio is only one of these. The second sort prefers ignorance to knowledge; instead of seeking knowledge, she seeks grounds to justify the claim of ignorance. I will call her Nesciam ("I will not know"). While Nescio makes the three characteristic claims in a sincere attempt to describe the state of her search, Nesciam utters them more as a program to be followed or fulfilled. Nescio's sincerity in the quest for knowledge makes her failures in it a surprise and disappointment; Nesciam's determination to engineer ignorance makes the same outcome a kind of success. Nescio describes her ignorance from honesty, hopes to overcome it, and endures it with humility; Nesciam describes it with a kind of programmatic insistence, hopes to preserve it, and lives it with a kind of pride.
Dogmatism
The next important term is dogmatism, the proper opposite of skepticism. Our English word comes directly from the Greek, dogma, an opinion, belief, notion, decision, judgment, or public decree. It is related to our words "doctrine", "doctor", "orthodoxy", "paradox", and "disciple".
The dogmatist is certain that knowledge is possible, because he is certain that he has some.
