{"title":"Radical skepticism and the cognitive mechanics of doubt","authors":"Christos Kyriacou","doi":"10.1007/s44204-025-00296-6","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Pinillos (2023) provides a cognitive psychological explanation of our skeptical inclinations and utilizes this explanation for a rational explanation of various epistemic phenomena, such as skepticism in its various manifestations, obsessive compulsive disorder, conspiracy theories, relevant alternatives and more. In this paper, I raise concerns about his rational explanation of radical skepticism. That is, his attempt ‘to calm our intellectual anxiety’ by showing ‘how skeptical doubt is produced’. This is supposed to explain ‘why the skeptic’s doubt is not justified’ (2023:9). I conclude with some methodological worries about the dialectical transition from a cognitive explanation to a rational debunking explanation.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":93890,"journal":{"name":"Asian journal of philosophy","volume":"4 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2025-06-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Asian journal of philosophy","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44204-025-00296-6","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Pinillos (2023) provides a cognitive psychological explanation of our skeptical inclinations and utilizes this explanation for a rational explanation of various epistemic phenomena, such as skepticism in its various manifestations, obsessive compulsive disorder, conspiracy theories, relevant alternatives and more. In this paper, I raise concerns about his rational explanation of radical skepticism. That is, his attempt ‘to calm our intellectual anxiety’ by showing ‘how skeptical doubt is produced’. This is supposed to explain ‘why the skeptic’s doubt is not justified’ (2023:9). I conclude with some methodological worries about the dialectical transition from a cognitive explanation to a rational debunking explanation.
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