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Pyrrhonism is an Ancient Greek school of philosophical skepticism which rejects dogma and advocates the suspension of judgement over the truth of all beliefs. It was founded by Aenesidemus in the first century BCE, and said to have been inspired by the teachings of Pyrrho and Timon of Phlius in the fourth century BCE.
Little is known about Sextus Empiricus. He likely lived in Alexandria, Rome, or Athens. [1] His Roman name, Sextus, implies he was a Roman citizen. [2] The Suda, a 10th-century Byzantine encyclopedia, states that he was the same person as Sextus of Chaeronea, [3] as do other pre-modern sources, but this identification is commonly doubted. [4]
Most of what we know today as Pyrrhonism comes through the book Outlines of Pyrrhonism written by Sextus Empiricus over 400 years after Pyrrho's death. Most sources agree that the primary goal of Pyrrho's philosophy was the achievement of a state of ataraxia , or freedom from mental perturbation, and that he observed that ataraxia could be ...
Sexto Empírico, Outlines of Pyrrhonism, 175: "those who firmly maintain that god exists will be forced into impiety; for if they say that he [god] takes care of everything, they will be saying that god is the cause of evils, while if they say that he takes care of some things only or even nothing, they will be forced to say that he is either ...
Whether Aenesidemus re-founded the Pyrrhonist school or merely revitalized it is unknown: while Diogenes claims an unbroken lineage of teachers of Pyrrhonism from Pyrrho through Sextus, with Aenesidemus' teacher being Heraclides of Tarentum, [3] little is known about several of the names between Timon of Phlius and Aenesidemus, so this lineage ...
To bring the mind to ataraxia Pyrrhonism uses epoché (suspension of judgment) regarding all non-evident propositions. Pyrrhonists dispute that the dogmatists – which includes all of Pyrrhonism's rival philosophies – have found truth regarding non-evident matters. For any non-evident matter, a Pyrrhonist makes arguments for and against such ...
In 1603, while a student at Christ's College, Cambridge, Mede came across an open copy of Sextus Empiricus' Outlines of Pyrrhonism on another student's desk. Upon reading the book, he underwent a skeptical crisis. In search of some foundation for truth, he turned to studies of texts about the Millennium in the Bible. [9]
A c. 1549 Latin translation of Outlines of Pyrrhonism ascribe them to Sextus of Chaeronea. [ 5 ] Some historians infer that due to his relationship with Plutarch that Sextus was a Platonist . [ 6 ]