Epoche and Śūnyatā: Skepticism East and West

8/14/2019 Epoche and nyat: Skepticism East and West

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Epoche and nyat: Skepticism East and WestAuthor(s): Jay L. Garfield

Source: Philosophy East and West, Vol. 40, No. 3 (Jul., 1990), pp. 285-307Published by: University of Hawai'i PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1399425.Accessed: 01/02/2011 09:49

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Jay L. Garfield Epoche and Sunyatd:Skepticism East and West

The whole modern conception of the world is founded on the illusion that the so-calledlaws of nature are the explanations of natural phenomena.Thus people today stop at the laws of nature, treating them as something inviolable,just as God and Fate were treated in past ages.And in fact both are right and both wrong: though the view of the ancients is clearerin so far as they have a clear and acknowledged terminus, while the modern systemtries to make it look as if everythingwere explained.Wittgenstein, TractatusLogico-Philosophicus, 6.371, 6.372Sextus regarded skepticism not as a nihilistic attack on our cognitive life, butrather-as he emphasizes in a variety of medical metaphors-as a form ofphilosophical therapy, to cure us of the cognitive and emotional ills born ofextreme metaphysical, moral, or epistemological positions.

. . . [T]he Sceptic's end, where matters of opinion are concerned, is mentaltranquility; in the realm of things unavoidable, moderation of feeling is theend. ... Upon his suspension of judgment there followed, by chance, mentaltranquility in matters of opinion. For the person who entertains the opinionthat anything is by nature good or bad is continually disturbed. When he lacksthose things that seem to him to be good, he believes he is being pursued, as ifby the Furies, by those things which are by nature bad, and pursues what hebelieves to be the good things. .... On the other side there is the man wholeaves undetermined the question of what things are good and bad by nature.He does not exert himself to avoid anything or to seek after anything, andhence he is in a tranquil state. (Hallie 1985, p. 41)The Sceptic wishes, from considerations of humanity, to do all he can withthe arguments at his disposal to cure the self-conceit and rashness of the dog-matists. And so just as healers of bodily ailments keep remedies of variouspotency, and administer the powerful ones to those whose ailments are vio-lent and the lighter ones to those with light complaints, in the same mannerthe Sceptic too propounds arguments. . . capable of forcibly removing thecondition of dogmatist self-conceit. (Ibid., p. 128)

(Wittgenstein also adopts the medical metaphor: "The philosopher's treat-ment of a question is like the treatment of an illness" (Philosophical Investiga-tions 255)). It should go without saying that as far as Sextus was concerned,skepticism is a moderate position, as compared with the available alternatives.

Jay L. Garfieldis Associate Professor of Philosophy in the School of Communications and Cogni-tive Science at Hampshire College.AUTHOR'S NOTE: I thank Dick Garner, David Karnos, Dan Lloyd, and the members of thePropositional Attitudes Task Force, particularlyJanet Gyatso, John Connolly, KathrynAddelson,BruceAune, Lee Bowie, IstuyaqueHaji, MurrayKiteley, MeredithMichaels, and Janice Moulton,for spirited discussion and for many useful comments and suggestions on an earlier draft of thisessay. Thanks especially to Janet Gyatso for much enlightening conversation, for assistance andsupport in my efforts to understand and to interpretBuddhistphilosophy, andfor detailed criticismof my use of the Buddhist texts I discuss here. An earlier version of this essay ("Waking Up toRegularity: Scepticism as a Meta Physick") was read to an NEH Summer Institute on Nagarjunaand Buddhist Thought, at the Universityof Hawaii in the summer of 1989. I thank David Kalupa-hana, Steve Odin, KennethInada, and Arthur Hermanfor thatopportunityandfor their commentson thepaper.Philosophy East & West, volume 40, no. 3 (July 1990). ? by University of Hawaii Press. All rights reserved.


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Moreover, Sextus argued, the serene equanimity that is the goal of skepticalpractice is to be attained by the achievement of the "suspension of belief" infavor of receiving cognitive and practical guidance from "the guidance of na-ture, the compulsion of the feelings, the tradition of laws and customs, andthe instruction of the arts" (ibid., p. 40). Again, it is important to note thatwhatever Sextus has in mind by the "suspension of belief" or the "refusal toassert," he does not mean that we are to become cognitively inert, inactive, ordisengaged, epistemically or otherwise. For neither art, custom, perception,nor appetite encourage such a life. Moreover, such a life or attitude towardsknowledge would be extreme, and, again, skepticism is a moderate position.And finally, by any standards, such a rejection of epistemic and moral lifewould be, in a straightforward sense, sick. And skepticism is intended as acure for just such ills.It is important to emphasize these points because many modern writers-following Kant and earlier usage introduced by Berkeley and muddied(though in constructive ways) by Hume-urge that a central task of philoso-phy is to "answer the skeptic": to show, presumably, that what the skepticdenies to be possible is in fact not only possible, but actual. To adopt a latermedical metaphor, this endeavor strikes me as a form of philosophical resis-tance in the psychoanalytic sense, a consequence of the very disease of whichthe skeptic intends to cure philosophers. It is more appropriate, I will argue,not to resist skeptical arguments, but to attend carefully to them. In particu-lar, I will argue that resistance to skepticism rests on a confusion of skepticismwith one of its extreme targets-typically what I follow the Buddhist skepticsin calling "nihilism." Such a confusion mistakes the point of skeptical argu-ments, the conclusions of the critical portions of the skeptical enterprise, and,most importantly, the skeptical solutions, as Hume and more recently Kripke(1982, pp. 66-68) have described them, that skepticism offers to the puzzles itgenerates.Much of the confusion I hope to clear up is understandable given theexpositions of skepticism with which many of us are most familiar. I have inmind those of Sextus, Hume, and Wittgenstein, with appropriate ancillaryfigures in tow. For a variety of historical, rhetorical, and other reasons, theseexpositions have not placed at center stage either the opposition of extremesagainst which skeptical critical attacks are addressed, or the ways in which theskeptical solutions to the problems ostensibly solved by these extreme posi-tions constitute what can simultaneously be seen as a via media between, anda complete rejection of the presuppositions of, those extreme positions. Butskeptical philosophy is a cross-cultural phenomenon. A rich skeptical tradi-tion is present in Madhyamika Buddhist philosophy, and particularly thePrasangika-Madhyamikatradition is startlingly akin to the Western skepticaltradition, in respect of its aims, methodology, and philosophical problematic.


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Nagarjuna and Candrakirti, like Sextus, emphasize the therapeutic nature ofphilosophy:

[39] If one understands how actions are devoid of inherent existence, thenhe sees the suchness of actions. When he has seen suchness, he will haveeliminated ignorance, and when there is no ignorance then actions which arecaused by ignorance cannot arise in him, and so the results of actions such asconsciousness and so forth, up to acting and death will not be experienced byhim. (Komito 1987, p. 89)

[73]. . . With the elimination of wrong views they will have abandonedattachment, closed-mindedness and hatred and thereby attain nirvana un-stained by wrong views. (Ibid., p. 95)As it is said in the Samadhiraja Sutra, "An existential element 'desire'would be roused by something in someone; an existential element 'aversion'would be aversion in someone to something; an existential element 'illusion'

would be illusion in someone concerning something." Such an element ofexistence one cannot discover in thought nor perceive in fact. One who doesnot discover such an existential element in thought nor perceive it in fact issaid to be free of desire, aversion and illusion, to have a mind free of mis-belief, to be composed in spirit. He is said to have crossed to the other side, tohave penetrated deeply, to have attained peace. (Sprung 1979, p. 222)They, too, are concerned to develop skeptical problems and skeptical solu-tions thereto regarding the existence of the external world, personal identity,and the existence of the self, morality, and meaning. And the arguments areimmediately accessible and familiar to Western philosophers.But the Buddhist skeptics, because of the cultural and philosophical con-text in which they write, are a bit more explicit about certain features of theskeptical method than are their European counterparts. In particular, thetheory of the relation of skeptical positions to dogmatic positions is morecarefully worked out; the nature of the suspension of belief or "positionless-ness" is more explicitly characterized; and the relation between skepticalmethodology and the role of convention in the life of the skeptic is moreapparent in these accounts. There are numerous other interesting points ofsimilarity and difference between the traditions, but I want to trade on thesethree expository advantages in order to use the Prasangika-Madhyamikaformulation of skepticism to motivate and to illuminate certain obscuritiesin the skepticism of Europe. This is an essay with a complex agenda. I hopeto provide a useful reinterpretation of classical skepticism as a constructivephilosophical programme, and one which provides a compelling picture ofthe nature of the philosophical enterprise. I also hope to demonstrate thepossibility and desirability of discussing European and Buddhist skepticalarguments together, as a vehicle for their mutual illumination. Finally, Ihope to defend the skeptical enterprise as a much-needed corrective to somecontemporary philosophical confusions. This is too large a task to accomplish


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in a single essay, and the discussionmustaccordinglybe regardedas a pro-grammaticbeginning.After undertakinga cross-cultural xpositorydefense of skepticismas amoderate solution to the problemsattendanton metaphysical xtremism,Iwill undertake a bit of therapy.For much of contemporaryphilosophy,Iwould argue, is seriouslyand dogmaticallyll. One physicianon one house-call, however,cancureonlyone patient.I will endeavor o curea prominent-ly diseaseddogmatist, JerryFodor, of one of the more epidemic dogmaticills-that of causalrealism,by a judiciousapplicationof the skepticalphysic.My hope is that this curewill serve as a model, and that its ease will inspiremuch self-treatment.IThe Prasangika-Madhyamikauddhists,' like Sextus, refer to their oppo-nents as "dogmatists."They identify,for eachphilosophicalproblemsubjectto skepticaltreatment,a reificationist nd a nihilisticversionof dogmatism.This taxonomyof the relevantpathologyis important.For while it will beclear that, for example, both Sextus and Wittgensteinhave both extremeviews in mind,the failure n the European ormulation f skepticalargumentsto be expliciton this distinctionssues n the easyanddangerous onflationofskepticismwith nihilism,and the attendantdisparagement nd rejectionofskepticism.Whereasreificationism, n this philosophicaltaxonomy, is theassertionof the ultimaterealityof that whosereality (or reality n thatsense)the skepticdenies (forexample,of material ubstance,of a persistent elf, ofan independentrealmof mathematical r moraltruth,of a "thirdworld" ofmeaningsor of primitivesemantic acts), nihilism s the philosophicaldenialof the existenceof that which-at least in somesense-clearly exists,ormoreaccurately f the warrantof what are in factclearlywarranted laims.A nihil-ist hencemightdenythatanyof ourstatementsabout externalobjects,aboutourselvesor our moralresponsibility, r aboutthe meaningsof wordsaretrueor warranted,or that one can makesense of any of the practicesassociatedwith such beliefs.It is important o see that nihilism s a forensicdeviceforskepticism:n thelanguageof Hume, aptly appropriated y Kripke,the nihilisticchallenges oour beliefsandpracticespose "skepticalproblems."The taskof the skeptic sto provide "skepticalsolutions"-to respondto the nihilisticattack on therealityorwarrant f a classof entities, beliefs,orpracticesn awaythatat thesametime does not capitulate o the metaphysical xcessesof reificationism.

A sceptical solution of a sceptical philosophical problem begins... by con-cedingthat the sceptic'snegativeassertionsare unanswerable.Neverthelessour ordinary practiceor belief is justifiedbecause-contrary appearancesnotwithstanding-it need not requirethe justification he sceptichas shownto be untenable.And muchof the value of the scepticalargumentconsists


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precisely in the fact that he has shown that an ordinarypractice, if it isto be defended at all, cannot be defendedin a certainway. (Kripke1982,pp. 66-67)As Kripkepointsout in the contextof his expositionof Wittgenstein's kep-ticalresponseto semanticnihilism,2 his form of skepticalresponse typicallyconsists ngranting he principalarguments f the nihilistagainst he possibil-ity of the kindof knowledge,certainty, ustification,or entitythe nihilistre-pudiates,but also in pointingout thatin factthe practices he nihilistseekstoundermineare not in fact groundedon things of thatkind, but are ratherfounded in conventionsthat remainuntouchedby nihilisticargumentsandwhich n no way presuppose he reification f the entitieswhose existence s atissuebetween nihilistand reificationist.This is the sense in whichskepticismconstitutesa "middleway"or a moderateposition.A few quickexampleswhosedetailsare familiarmayhelpmake this criticaldistinctionbetween skepticismand nihilismand the relation between themclearer.Considerskepticismabout the existence of the external world. Thereificationistarguesthat since we apprehendqualities,there must be somematerial ubstance n whichtheyinhere-that thereis a substantial,ndepen-dent externalworld, whose furnitureconsistsin materialsubstanceand itsattributes.The nihilist,on the other hand(perhapsBerkeleyor a Yogacarafellow-traveler3) rguesthat we can make no sense of the concept of suchmaterial ubstanceor substratum, r that if we can,we can neverhave knowl-edge of it. So, s/he argues,there is no externalworld,or at leastwe have noknowledgeof anysuchworld.4The skeptic-think of Hume ("that unintelligible himeraof a substance"(Treatise,p. 222))or Nagarjuna "[47]Form s not apprehended s inherentlyexisting"5Komito, p. 90)), or Candrakirti"You may say:Althougha mate-rialcauseof objectsis in this way not logicallypossible,nonethelessobjectsexist in factas effectsand because of their realexistence matteras causewillexist as well. This would be so if the objectas effectexisted,but it does not"(Sprungp. 99).)-concedes to the nihilist that we have no idea of materialsubstanceas a permanentsubstratumor attributes,or that if we had a con-ceptof sucha thing,we couldnever haveknowledgeof its existence. But theskepticdenies that ourordinarydiscourseabout and use of materialobjectsinany way implicatesthe conceptof a substancewith attributes.Instead, theskepticargues,our conventionsandpractices egardingheuseof, talkabout,and justificationof knowledge claims regardingexternalobjects get theirpoint just from their role in our individualand collective lives. It is thesepractices hat give sense to talk aboutobjects, and not the existence of sub-stancethat makes these practices ntelligible.

Or considerskepticismwithregard o the existenceof the self. The reifica-tionist (for example, Descartesor the typicalBrahman)arguesthat experi-ence presupposesa persistent elf as its subject.The nihilist(Humein setting


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up the problem, or Sextus) argues that in virtue of the incoherence of such anotion, or in virtue of its unknowability, there can be no such self, or at leastno self-knowledge. The skeptical reconstruction proceeds by noting that theself is, as Hume puts it, a "forensic" or, as Tsong Khapa puts it, a "conven-tional" concept. The identification and discussion of selves presupposes not asubstance to which we have privileged access, but conventions regarding theapplications of names, attribution of responsibility, and so forth.Think of skepticism with regard to meaning. The reificationist (Frege, OldTestament Wittgenstein) argues that there are particularsemantic facts whichconstitute or determine the meanings of words and which we grasp when weknow word meaning. The semantic nihilist (Bhartrhari on some readings orWittgenstein's imaginary interlocutor in the New Testament) argues thatthere can be no such facts, or that we could never know them, and hence thatthere is nothing that constitutes the meaning or correct use of terms. Theskeptical solution developed by Wittgenstein and Tsong Khapa concedes thelack of any such special semantic facts, but requires us to note that wordmeaning and the assertability of correctness regardingword use rest not uponsuch facts but upon a network of social conventions regarding word use.

Finally, consider for a moment the example with which I will be most cen-trally concerned below. The reificationist with regard to causation argues thatthe regularities we observe in nature are to be explained by a fundamentalcausal power that causes have to bring about their effects-a necessary con-nection. The nihilist argues that because we can have no clear idea of such acausal power or natural necessity, causal explanation is impossible. The skep-tical solution to the problem thus poses regarding the possibility of scientificexplanation-as Hume, Wittgenstein, Nagarjuna, and Candrakirtiargue-is,rather than to understand regularity as vouchsafed by causation, to under-stand causal explanation as grounded in regularities.6All of these examples, to be sure, are presented in telegraphic form. But Ihope that they serve to illustrate the constructive response skepticism pro-vides to the challenges posed by nihilistic critiques of reificationist positions.There is an important additional characteristic of the relationship betweenskepticism and the dogmatic extremes against which it is counterposed thatwarrants emphasis. And it is only by appreciating this feature of skepticismthat we can understand the sense in which the skeptic can be claiming to"suspend belief" or to be "positionless." To suspend belief in the senseSextus7 has in mind is not to shrug one's shoulders in indecision regardingcompeting claims. To understand suspension this way is to see skepticism as awholly negative position. I want to emphasize the essentially constructivecharacter of skeptical argument, however, and this requires a subtler under-standing of suspension. To suspend judgment in this sense is to refuse toassent to a position, while refusing to assert its negation, since either assertionwould commit one to a false or misleading metaphysical presupposition. To


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suspend udgment s henceto refuse to enter into a misguideddiscourse.Forthe skeptic,Europeanor Buddhist,both membersof any dogmaticpair,de-spitetheirapparentantagonism, haresomecommonmetaphysicalhesis as apresuppositionof theirrespectivepositions.And it is in the rejectionof thisposition-and in the consequent suspension of judgment regardingtheopposingdogmaticpositions-that skepticismconsists.8The dogmatic hesisin the case of the existence of the external world is that the existence ofphysicalobjectsand the truth of claimsaboutthempresuppose he existenceof materialsubstance.Withrespectto the existenceof the self, the thesis isthatpersonal dentityandself-knowledgearepossibleif there is a persistentsoul;withrespectto meaning, t is thatconditions or thecorrectuse of wordspresupposethe existence and grasp of semanticfacts. Finally, the causalreificationist nd nihilistagreethat causalexplanation s possible only on theconditionthat the regularitiest exploitsaregrounded n independentcausallinks. In each case, the reificationistand the nihilistdifferonly regardingwhetherthe metaphysicalpresuppositionn question s satisfied.The skepticrejectsthe presupposition f the dispute.The skepticalmove in each case consists in rejectingexactly the thesisthat the apparentlydiametrically pposed dogmaticpositionsshare. That iswhat makesskepticism o radical,so deep, andso apparentlynihilisticwhenvieweduncritically.For in each case, the thesis rejectedis an unquestionedfundamentalpresuppositionof much mainstreamphilosophicalthought-"thedecisivemove in the conjuring rick."Ineachcase,however,the skepticdetermines o arguethatthese shared undamentalmetaphysical ssumptionsregardinghe necessaryontologicalconditionsof knowledgemust be rejectedin order to understand ndexplainepistemicpractice.WhenSextusurgesus to suspendbelief, it is the metaphysicalbeliefs thatlead to dogmaticoppositionthat he urges us to suspend, and the debatesconcerning hem fromwhich he urgesus to absentourselves.When he says"not more," he urges that the externalworld is not more than what weobserve,thatpersonal dentity s notmore than anaggregation f experiencesand capacities,that meaningis not more thanconvention,that causation snot morethanregularity.Customandthe particular racticesof the arts andsciences, he urges, yield all the knowledge,certainty,and justificationweneed in order to navigatethe world, identifyourselvesandothers, speakin-telligibly,andexplainnaturalphenomena.

Now, we cannotbe entirelyinactivewhen it comes to the observancesofeveryday ife. Therefore,while livingundogmatically,we pay due regardtoappearances.This observanceof the requirements f everyday ife seems tobe fourfold,with the followingparticularheads: the guidanceof nature,thecompulsionof the feelings,the traditionof laws andcustoms,andthe instruc-tion of the arts. It is by the guidanceof nature hatwe arenaturally apableofsensation and thought. It is by the compulsionof the feelings that hungerleads us to food andthirst eadsus to drink.It is by virtue of the traditionof


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laws and customs hatin everyday ife we acceptpietyas good andimpietyasevil. And it is byvirtueof the instruction f the artsthatwe arenot inactive nthoseartswhichwe employ.All thesestatements,however,we makewithoutprejudice.(Hallie,p. 40)This thoughtis echoed by Wittgenstein'sobservation hat when we hit ex-planatorybedrock,we find not certainpropositions,butpractices:

204. Giving grounds, however, justifying the evidence, comes to anend;-but the endis notcertainpropositions' trikingus immediatelyas true,i.e. it is not a kind of seeingon our part;it is our actingwhich lies at thebottomof the languagegame.344. My life consists n my beingcontentto acceptmanythings.(On Cer-tainty)Whenthe Mahayanists rguethatphenomenaare all empty, the same in-sightis beingexpressed:materialobjectsare devoidof substance n the meta-

physician's ense;personsareemptyof immaterial ouls thatpersistthroughchange;wordsareemptyof specialsemantic actsthatdetermine heirmean-ings;andregularityn nature s emptyof specialcausalpowersthatprovide tsunderpinnings.The constructiveside to the skeptical enterprise has a characteristicstrategy,a strategy nvolving wo moves. In the firstplace, it involveswhatIlike to call the "skeptical nversion"of the orderof explanation: he nihilistchallengesus to explain the apparentlyproblematicby referenceto what,according o the reificationist, houldbe the unproblematic, ndarguesthatwe cannot.The skepticgrantsthe force of this argument,but demonstratesthatin factthe apparent xplanans-or at leastthe formsof discourse nvolv-ing vocabulary pertainingthereto-is what is problematicand obscure.Moreover,s/he argues,the veryreality-such as it is-of thatexplananss infact groundedin what was originallyproblematizedby the skepticalchal-lenge. This is a highly abstractcharacterization.Recalling a few familiarexamplesshouldclarifythe point. Hume acceptsthat we can never explainthe regularityof natureby appealto a causallink, and invertsthe orderofexplanationbyarguing hatour talk about causations to be explainedbyourfamiliaritywith regularities.Nagarjunamakesthe same move. WittgensteinandTsongKhapagrantthat the abilityof a communityof languageusers touse wordsin roughly he samewaycannot be explainedby the privategrasp-ing by each memberof the communityof the meaningsof words,andinvertthe orderof explanation,arguing hatthe possibilityof an individualusingawordmeaningfullys to be explainedby referenceto the regularityof prac-ticesin the community.Sextus, Hume,andNagarjuna rguethat ourconven-tions regardingthe identificationof persons are not to be understoodasgrounded n the referenceof eachperson's"I"to a particular nduringmen-tal substance;ratherthe talk of myself as an individual(and of others as


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individuals) s explainedby referenceto our conventionsof personal ndivid-uation,conventions hatare, as Humenotes, "forensic"n character.The second characteristicof the skeptical inversion, as should now beobvious from this briefsurveyof examples, s that an appeal o social conven-tions is central o the skepticalreconstructionf ourheretoforemetaphysical-ly or epistemologically onfuseddiscourse.In the private-languageasethisisobvious. It should also be clearin the case of personal dentityand in thatofthe skepticalreconstruction f morality. ThoughHume and Sextus are lessexpliciton thispoint, Nagarjuna,Candrakirti, ndTsongKhapaemphasize-and Hume and Sextuswould undoubtedlyagree-social convention is alsohardat workin skepticalreconstructions f discourseabout the existenceofphysicalobjectsand causation.For the boundariesof physicalobjectsarenotgivenby nature,norare the classesof events that count as "ofthe sametype"that underlie the generalizationshat vouchsafe the attributionsof explana-torysignificancenvolvingwords ike "because."Thecanonizations f sortalsand of object-boundariesdrawn in space, time, and compositionrequiresocial andlinguisticconventions.TsongKhapaputsthe pointthisway:

. . [I]npresenting earth" nd"hardness" s referentandidentity, t cannotbe done by establishingthem as the discoveredobject of the. . . analyticquest for the designativebases of the conventional ermsused for identifiedreferentandidentity,as suchthingscanonlybe presentedasexistent n termsof their mutualrelations. ...The Dialecticistaccepts[philosophical] nalysisas analysisof something'spossession or lack of ultimate status, [assertingthat] existents are merelynominal,symbolic,and conventional."Merenominality"means. . . the un-discoverability f anything hrough nvestigationntothe meaningsof conven-tionalexpressions,anddoes not mean thatnames existandthingsdo not, orthat thereis nothingwhich s not a name.Finally,although heydo not accepteverything proposed by the verbally ascriptiveconventional intellect asconventionallyexistent, neither do they accept any conventional thingssomehownot positedby conventionallyascriptive ntellect. (Thurman1984,pp. 295-296)When the skepticfollows the customof his or hercountryandparticipatesin its linguisticconventions n asserting he existenceof materialobjects, s/hedoes so in the recognitionthat it is these linguistic,explanatory,and alliedconventions hatjustifysuchtalk, rather han as a consequenceof a belief inthe givennessof objectsas independententities or in the givennessof sortalsas naturallydetermined.And, in particular,he conceptionof objectsas sub-stances and their propertiesas essential or accidentalattributes nherentinthem is rejected by the skepticas it is by the nihilist.But the skepticrejectsthis conceptionwith the realization-not sharedby the reificationistwho isthe nihilist'starget-that none of our ordinaryepistemicor social practicesregardingmaterialobjectspresuppose uch a view anyway.


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All of this allows us to characterize more explicitly the paradoxical skepticalrecommendations of equipoise (Sextus: "to come firstof all to a suspension ofjudgement and then to mental tranquility" (Hallie, p. 33), or "'All things arefalse', for example, asserts its own falsity together with that of all otherthings. . ." (p. 36)), or positionlessness (Tsong Khapa: "'[I]f I had any posi-tion, then there would arise that fault for me'. . . applies to whoever has adefinite position, but since I have no position there is no fault for me" (Thur-man, p. 331)). These recommendations are often regarded as paradoxical,because they at least appear themselves to be assertions of the kind that theskeptic rejects, or to constitute positions of the kind the Mahayanistrefuses toadopt. But closer inspection should indicate that they are not so, and Sextus'metaphor of the laxative that purges itself together with the ill it aims atcuring can be as useful here.9 The ills that skepticism aims to cure are philo-sophical ills-specifically metaphysical and epistemological ills characterizedby the obsessive search for epistemologically or ontologically primitive found-ations for knowledge, meaning, explanation, or morality that undergird ourcollective epistemic, linguistic, scientific, and moral practices. The positionsthe skeptic is concerned to undermine are specifically philosophical posi-tions.10They are positions regarding the necessary or sufficient underpinningsof what the skeptic wants to reveal as practices that stand in need of nogrounding in independent matters of fact. The skeptic does not reject thesepractices. On the contrary, Sextus recommends exactly that we follow nature,feeling, custom, and the instruction of the arts, and Nagarjuna explains that

[71] It is known in the way of the world that "this arises in dependence onthat." Such statements are not refuted. But whatsoever arises dependentlydoes not exist inherently, and how can that non-inherent existence itself haveinherent existence? In fact, that non-inherent existence must definitely notexist inherently (Komito, p. 95)That is, to understand the conventional as conventional, and as empty of anyreality or foundation beyond convention, is the goal of philosophical inquiry.Consider this remark of Tsong Khapa:

. . .[Prasangika] teaching is declared for the sake of dispelling the mentalhabits of reification and repudiation that prevent access to the ultimate-repudiation of the superficial reality of things, and reification of the existenceof things that are supposedly permanent yet that do not exist conventionally,and of the ultimate existence of form, etc. . . as they appear. Repudiation isavoided by the refutation of the literalness of statements of non-productionby demonstration that such statements are made in terms of the ultimate, andfurther by establishment of the need for accepting the existence of productionand cessation conventionally. (Thurman, pp. 277-278)The pill is skeptical inquiry. But when the poison is purged, the inquiry is nolonger necessary. The inquiry does not involve adopting one or the other ofthe disputing dogmatic positions, but rather involves making peace by reject-


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ing both-and not in favor of a third dogmatism, but rather in favor of notseeking the chimerical foundations that get the dispute going in the firstplace.It is this sense that all skeptical philosophers from Sextus and the historicalBuddha to Wittgenstein and contemporary Mahayanists have regarded skep-tical philosophy as a form of therapy: the goal is not simply the search fortruth for its own sake, or the critical appraisal of arguments, or intellectualentertainment. The goal is to cure the philosopher of the confusion attendantupon the fundamental misconceptions underlying dogmatism-that under-lying any reasonable practice must be some set of certain propositions, andthat underlying those propositions must be some convention-independent,ontologically given reality. Such misconceptions engender endless sophisticaldialectic and block clear thinking about language, explanation, morality, andontology. The skeptic endeavors to replace such dogmatic impediments tounderstanding not with an alternative theory about the chimerical substratumof our practices but rather with a contentment with those practices on theirown terms, and with their conventional status.

341. That is to say, the questions that we raise and our doubts depend onthe fact that some propositions are exempt from doubt, are as it were likehinges on which those turn.342. That is to say, it belongs to the logic of our scientific investigationsthat certain things are in deed not doubted.343. But it isn't that the situation is like this: We just can't investigateeverything, and for that reason we are forced to rest content with assumption.If I want the door to turn, the hinges must stay put. (On Certainty)

IIAll of this would be beside the point if philosophical dogmatisms were merelydiseases of a remote past, or if they were merely benign philosophical play-things. But dogmatisms in many forms are alive and well, and are, in fact,wreaking philosophical havoc. In order to recommend the skeptical purga-tive, I will consider one contemporary case of the reificationist infection andattempt to effect a skeptical cure. The variety of the disease I have in mind iscausal reificationism, a disease one might have thought to have been stampedout by the Humean vaccine. But it is still with us, and gives rise to muchneedless confusion in the philosophical foundations of cognitive science,among other places. I will articulate its consequences in Fodor's hands, anddemonstrate that a careful skeptical analysis frees cognitive science from arti-ficial dogmatic methodological bonds.Fodor, in Psychosemantics, attempts to demonstrate that all scientific tax-onomy is individualistic-that science never does, and must never, identifyphenomena for theoretical purposes qua relational, because all such tax-onomy is dependent upon the causal powers of the phenomena to be clas-


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sified, and becausecausalpowersare alwayslocal. This claim is importantand controversial, or as many (Garfield1988, Milikan1987, Burge 1979,Baker 1988, and others) have argued,psychologyoften at least apparentlydoes individuatephenomenain its domainrelationally.In particular,phe-nomena such as the propositionalattitudes are arguablyrelationaland arearguably ssentialto muchpsychological xplanation.This is also metaphysically ich stuff-the stuff of dogmaticreificationismwith respect to causation. I will argue that while scientific-includingpsychological-taxonomy must cleave nature at causally relevant joints,there is good empiricalreason to believe that the resultingcuts are oftenrelational,and no good metaphysicalreasonto believe that they can't be.Moreover,andmostimportantlyor disarminghis new realismabout causa-tion, nothing n causal ndividuation equiresone to discoveranycausalpow-ersthatthingshave.Explanationdoes notrequire uch anoccultmetaphysics.And once we appreciate he force of thisconclusion,psychological,ntention-al causal relations between naturalistically'1haracterizedrelata have asmuch claim to reality as any microphysicalcausal relations linking indi-vidualisticallyharacterized henomena.I willbeginby rehearsingFodor'sargumentn some detail, explaining usthow and whereits bizarremetaphysical ommitments nter. Once the argu-ment is clearly n view, I will arguedirectly or its unsoundness,andpresentan alternative,more moderateskepticalaccountof the natureof causation,andof the natureof causaltaxonomy n cognitivescienceinspiredby Nagar-juna, Sextus, and Hume. After consideringand dismissingsome possibleFodorianreplies,I will concludewith some generalmoralsof this discussionforpractice n cognitivescience.Fodor's nitialargumentproceedsas follows:

(1) We want scienceto give causalexplanations o suchthings. . . as canbe causallyexplained.(P. 34)(2) Givingsuchexplanations ssentially nvolvesprojectingandconfirmingcausalgeneralizations.And causalgeneralizations ubsume the thingstheyapplyto in virtue of the causalpropertiesof the thingsthey applyto. (P. 34)(3) And ... [consider] theproperty of being a mental state of a person wholives in a world where thereis XYZ ratherthan H20 in thepuddles [as opposedto being that of a personwho lives in an H20 world].These sorts of differ-ences in the relationalpropertiesof psychological /brain/particle)tates areirrelevant o theircausalpowers;hence irrelevant o scientific axonomy..[I]f you'reinterested n causalexplanation, t wouldbe mad to distin-guishbetweenOscar'sbrain tatesandOscar2's;heirbrain tateshave identicalcausalpowers.That'swhywe individuatebrainstatesindividualistically. ndif you'reinterested n causalexplanation, t would be mad to distinguishbe-tween Oscar'smentalstates and Oscar2's;heir mental states have identicalcausalpowers.(P. 34)(4) So, [relational]taxonomywon't do for the purposesof psychology.Q.E.D.... It's truethat whenI say "water" get water and when myTwinsays"water"he getsXYZ. Butthat's rrelevanto the questionabout dentityof causal powers, because these utterances (Ithoughts) are being imagined to


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occur in differentcontexts. . . What is relevant to the question of identity ofcausal powers is the following pair of counterfactuals: (a) If his utterance(/thought) had occurred in my context, it would have had the effects thathis utterance (/thought) did have; and (b) if my utterance (/thought) hadoccurred in his context it would have had the effects that my utterance(/thought) did have. For our utterances (/thoughts) to have the same causalpowers, both of those counterfactuals have to be true. But both of thosecounterfactuals are true. .... (Pp. 34-35)Fodor then brings this all together:

So, then, to bring this all together: you can affect the relational propertiesof things in all sorts of ways-including by stipulation. But for one thing toaffect the causal powers of another, there must be a mediating law or mechan-ism. It's a mystery what this could be in the Twin (Oscar) cases; not surpris-ingly, since it's surely plausible that the only mechanisms that can mediateenvironmental effects on the causal powers of mental states are neurological.The way to avoid making this mystery is to count the mental states-and,mutatis mutandis, the behaviors-of Twins (Oscars) as having the samecausal powers, hence as taxonomically identical. (P. 41)

So here's Fodor's position: we individuate phenomena by reference to theircausal powers. Causation is local in the case of psychological phenomena, sopsychological taxonomy must be individualistic. Individualistic psychologicaltaxonomy identifies psychological phenomena with neurological phenomena.So, in order for psychological explanations to be causal, and hence scientific,psychological phenomena must be individualistic in character. And this is justbecause for Fodor causal explanations must carve nature at her joints by char-acterizing explanans and explananda under sortals that capture phenomenawhich in fact have genuine causalpowers-the ability to bring about effects ofthe right kind or to be brought about by causes of the right kind-powers thatinhere in precisely those phenomena.IIINo existents whatsoever are evident anywhere that are arisen from them-selves, from another, from both, or from a non-cause. (1)(That is, there are no sui generis phenomena, nor any power by means ofwhich one event or state can bring about another. Nor can any such power befound in any combination of phenomena or in some non-natural arena.)

The self-nature of existents is not evident in the conditions, etc. ... In theabsences of self-nature, other-nature too is not evident. (3)(Natural phenomena have no essences independent of their place in the net-work of explanatory relationships and regularities in which they occur, andthere is no privileged ontological scheme.)Activity is not constituted of conditions nor is it not non-constituted ofconditions. Conditions are neither constituted nor non-constituted. (4)(The explanatorily useful relations phenomena bear to one another-naturalregularities-are not, when conceived clearly, due to any independently pre-sent power. Ontology depends upon explanatory interests.)


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These are conditions, because depending upon them these othersarise. ... (5) (Nagarjuna, Karika, trans. Kalupahana)(None of this is to say that there are not natural regularities that are usefullyexploited in scientific explanation.)In these famous (though obscure and diversely interpreted) opening verses ofthe Karika, Nagarjuna defends a middle way between nihilism and strongrealism with respect to causation. Against the nihilist he urges that there arenatural regularities and that they can be and are exploited in explanation.Against the realist-who (with Fodor) is committed to a reification of suchregularities in a cement-of-the-universe model of causation-he argues thatnatural regularities themselves lie at the base of explanation. The use of theseregularities in explanations, Nagarjuna argues, neither demands nor profitsby the interposition of a force. For then cause and effect would each need tobe individually connected to that force by. . . 12

This moderate skepticism about causation-which finds echo in Sextus andHume and in the remarks of Wittgenstein quoted at the beginning of thispaper-provides the key to understanding what is at bottom wrong withFodor's excessive causal realism. To begin with, consider the odd pair of con-clusions concerning the predicates that are instances of is a belief thatp andthe predicate is a planet: is a planet counts, for Fodor, as a useful astronomi-cal predicate despite its relational character because being a planet affectsplanets' causal powers, namely, the power to bump or not into various things.Puzzlingly, having these causal powers is presumably supposed to be constantacross counterfactual contexts in which the nonrelational properties of theplanet are held constant-that is what makes this predicate, in Fodor's mind,individualistic despite being at the same time relational. Believes that there iswater on Mars, however, unless it can be identified with a local property of itsbearer's brain-unless it is nonrelational-fails to be individualistic, andhence fails to count as a scientifically useful predicate. For, as Twin-Earthexamples show, when relationally individuated, its causal powers are not con-stant across counterfactual contexts.

But this putative distinction cannot be maintained. The causal powers ofUranus are not constant across counterfactual contexts. Consider the worldwhere it orbits a sun with a different mass, or is a different distance fromNeptune. There, of course, its trajectory differs, and so, then, does that ofwhat it might or might not bump into. There is no principled respect in whichthis variability in powers differs from that of inscriptions, or, if Burge, Baker,and I are right, of individualistically described psychological states. They,too, have different causal powers in different counterfactual circumstances.The only difference is that in these cases, it is not the variation of mass ofnearby astronomical bodies that issues in covariation in trajectory, but ratherthe variation in social conventions and behaviorally relevant environmentthat issues in covariation in semantic character, in the conditions under which


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they would be uttered, and in their probable consequences-hence in thepsychological or linguistic type of significant tokens. And to suggest thatthe descriptive vocabulary appropriate to describing these properties and thevariations therein is ruled out a priori is groundlessly to beg the question atissue. Why not rule out trajectory talk? Just as the latter is essential to prac-tice in astrophysics, the former is essential to practice in cognitive science.Fodor might object at this point that in each of these pairs of cases some-thing is constant-the physical counterfactual dispositions of the planets onthe one hand and of the twins on the other. And the fact that these physicaldispositions remain constant across counterfactual contexts privileges thephysical vocabulary for scientific purposes. But there are at least two thingswrong with this reply. First, as I noted above, it begs the question against theclaim that intentional predicates are as appropriate to psychology as non-intentional ones are to astronomy, and that the intentional properties ofthe twins differ. Second, it betrays an unmotivated natural essentialism. Forasserting in this context that what makes a rock the object that it is for anyand all scientific purposes are just its individualistic properties is to plump fora particular set of predicates as constituting a necessary description of it, re-gardless of one's descriptive or explanatory purposes. And how would onedefend such metaphysical extravagance? (A bit later on I will consider someslightly more sophisticated forms of this Fodorian objection.)The source of the error has yet to be identified and examined. And here iswhere Nagarjuna's insight can be pressed into service. Nagarjuna pointedout, as Hume would some sixteen centuries later, that while regularities are tobe found in nature, and while explanation must exploit regularities, appeal tosome occult causal nexus joining explanans to explanandum, or predecessorevent to successor event is both otiose and ultimately incoherent. But it isthis misguided, unreflective image of such a "cement of the universe" thatholds the natural order together, and at that in very thin mortar-joints, thatunderlies causal reificationism. There are, of course, as Nagarjuna insists,conditions-explanatorily necessary and/or sufficient conditions of explanan-da (and moreover lots of types of them, as everybody (except for Hempel anda few others) from Aristotle to Pylyshyn has emphasized). We explain-correctly-the ignition of the match by its striking in the presence of oxygen,my dialing 911 by reference to my desire to get help, and the clicking on of thethermostat by reference to its regulatory function. And explanation presup-poses both regularity and the possibility of describing explanans and expla-nandum in the vocabulary in which these regularities are properly expressed.But that is all that is presupposed. It is no set of individualistic facts about theindividual match, its striking, and its ignition at a particular time that consti-tutes the fact that the striking caused the ignition. Rather it is the regularity ofsuch successions that makes it appropriate to say that this strikingso describedcaused this ignition so described.


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The addition of causation or a causal power in the "cause" or of effectualpotential in the "effect" is unwarranted, unnecessary, and explanatorily impo-tent: it is unwarranted because there can be no evidence for such a myste-rious, occult causal link. There is plenty of evidence for the occurrences of thephenomena putatively so linked, and in the right cases there may be plenty ofinductive or theoretical evidence for the regularityof their association. But nosuch evidence can be even relevant to some mysterious necessity-some un-known force or glue-beyond what can be observed or measured. Moreover,explanation proceeds quite smoothly, as does prediction, in the absence ofany such causal glue.13 And this is the central point: our natural laws, func-tional generalizations, structural explanations, and narratives provide co-herence and intelligibility without interpolating causal glue or ascribingany modal powers to the phenomena they subsume. And even if we did addthe cement, the regressive problem would remain: what empowers causesto generate causal power, and what enables causal power to bring abouteffects?14

Once we replace Fodor's loose, metaphysically luxurious talk about causalpowers with more commonsense and methodologically sound-that is to say,skeptical-talk about explanatorily useful regularities, the central methodo-logical project underwritten by this metaphysical currency collapses. For itwas the claim that causal powers inhere in an individual object in virtue of itsparticular natural type (leaving aside the incoherence of Fodor's account ofwhat constitutes an appropriate natural type) that lay behind the claim thatscientific individuation must be individualistic. And if I am right, the obscureand unacknowledged image of causation as a kind of immaterial supergluethat can bond only adjacent surfaces of natural kinds is what lies behind the(undefended-presumably obvious) assertion that causal powers are pos-sessed only by individualistically characterized individuals.But such grand causal realism is incoherent. Regularity is as real as connec-tion gets, and subsumability under explanatorily useful regularities is as realas a natural kind gets. But here is the point: there is nothing about regularassociation in any of its forms that demands spatiotemporal locality of theregularly associated phenomena. And there is nothing, at least nothingobvious, that blocks their relational individuation. In a particular domain thetruth or falsity of individualism or naturalism would hence appear to be anempirical matter. And given the irreducibility that Fodor acknowledges toobtain generally between the vocabularies of the "special sciences," there isno reason to feel queasy about an individualistic ontology in a science of theinterior of, say, a person whose behavior in situ is best explained by subsump-tion under regularities captured by a vocabulary that individuates that per-son's states relationally.This is, of course, but a case study, and its implications must be treated withappropriate caution. But this much, I think, emerges: reificationism with re-


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gardto causation s not philosophicallybenign. It issues in a commitmentapriori o anontologically adicalandmethodologicallyestrictive ision of thenatureof mind and of cognitivescience. This vision and its attendantstric-tures on the conductof scienceandthe construction f theoriesareseen to begratuitouswhen subjectedto the constructivecriticalanalysissuggestedbyskepticismwithrespectto causation.Suchananalysisdoes not undermine hepossibilityof psychologyor our faith in its explanations.Rather t facilitatesamore naturalistically onceived theoreticalposture in that discipline-onethatcorrespondsmorecloselyto actualpractice.IVI can imagine discomfort with this skepticalview. The hyperrealistmeta-physicsof causation havebeen attackings indeed well entrenched.So I willconsiderseveralplausiblereplies.

The replythat Fodorimplicitly ndorses s whatmightbe called "theargu-mentfrom the unityof science"orperhaps he argumentromphysics.Itgoessomething ike this: The laws of the specialsciences are not properly aws atall-they areroughgeneralizationshat demandcopious,ineliminable eterisparibus clauses. What underlies their verisimilitude s the truth of closed,exceptionless,reallytrue laws-the laws of the millennialphysics.But thelaws of physics employ an individualisticaxonomy.So, insofar as a specialsciencegeneralizations true, it too mustemployanindividualisticaxonomy.Chemistry,physiology,and neurosciencepromisereductionandhence theirown volumes in the Encyclopaedia of Unified Science (Fodor 1991?) just be-cause their individuation chemespromise,whensuitablyrefined,to coincidewith thatof physics.But if psychologyrecognizesnaturalisticallyndividuatedphenomena,and seeks generalizationshat subsumethem, it does so at thecost of a gerrymander f the naturalworld that will forever condemn it totheoreticalexcommunication.Thisargumenthas a certainnostalgicpower,but, I fear, thereis not muchelse goingfor it. To note two salientdifficulties:There is no reasonto believethat explanatoryutility and reducibility o physics go hand in hand. Goodeconomics s possibleeven despitevariations n media of exchange,andgoodlinguisticsdoes not presuppose hat larynxes, nk, chalk,andother media ofexpressionshareanyessentialphysicalproperties. A more sober andcarefulargument or this point is to be found in Garfield(1988).) More significant,though, and closer to the heart of my difficultywithFodor'spositionis this:the lawsof physics-even the best laws of the bestphysics-are fraughtwithceterisparibusclauses.They are not (as Cartwright 1978)has so eloquentlyargued)true of anyactualphysicalphenomena.Nor arescientific aws meantto be. Laws of nature are true only of ideal types, and idealization s an in-eliminableaspectof scientificexplanation-the groundof the possibilityofthe universalityo whichthey aspire.This is no less true of physical aws than


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it is of psychologicalaws.So if the pointof striving or an individualistic n-tologyis unitywithphysics,andif the pointof thatis the attainmentof excep-tionless truthwhen instantiatedby actualempiricalphenomena,the point ischimerical. And the source, I suspect, of this faith in the perfectibilityofphysicalscience is intuition hat it is onto causalpowers.15A closelyrelatedreplyconcernsorces. Afterall, one might argue,physicsdoes recognizecausalpowers.In fact it recognizesat present approximatelyfourof them,or maybethreeif the electroweakunification s successful.Andif further unification occurs-the ultimate unification-we will have anaccountof the genuinecausalpower,the actualcementof the universe.Thiswould be all well and good if physicscharacterized orces as powers thatphysicalphenomenahave, or as thingsthat havepowersover physicalphe-nomena. Butthat's ustnotwhattheyare. Forcesrepresentdynamic elationsbetween physical parameters.Period. They do not inhere in physicalphe-nomena,nor do theyexistindependently f them,and acton them.Physicistsseem to haveread their Hume. Or theirNagarjuna.16A finalargument an be anticipated,and this is the one thatreally betraysthe metaphysics hat Nagarjuna,Hume, and Wittgensteinare concerned todebunk:regularitiesare cheap. Not all of them are explanatory.Take theregularcoincidenceof the noon whistleandthe noon train,for example. Inorderfor a regularityo be explanatory,whatmust underlie t is a real causallink-the causalpower of the cause to bringabouttheeffect.So, if there areexplanatoryregularities,and not mere cosmic coincidences,there must becausalpowers.But hereis where we must recallthe powerfulargument romthe TractatuswithwhichI openedthispaper.The additionof a causalcementbetweencauseand effectcanaddnothingexplanatoryo anexplanation.Forone wouldstill need (as noted in the ThirdManargumentofferedabove) anexplanationof how the causebroughtaboutthe cement, and of how the ce-mentbroughtabout the effect. And as anygood masonwill tell you, addingan additionalloose joint will do nothing to improvethe bond. As Humeemphasized, t is regularities hat vouchsafe ndividualattributions f causa-tion, and networks of regularitiesthat vouchsafe particularregularities.Counterfactuals re supportedby confidenceandsuccess,and not by occultmetaphysics.And as the skeptic-Buddhist or European-will be quicktoemphasize, this amounts to the adoption of positionlessnessas a guidingprinciplein the interpretationof scientifictheories. We neither assert theexistenceof occult causalpowers,nor do we deny the explanatoryutilityofourtheoriesin virtueof theirabsence.17Someonemightwellobjectat thispointthatanyclaimof skepticalcureis atleast premature.For, it mightbe argued,the skeptichas not demonstratedthat his/heraccountof causaldiscourseas grounded n regularitys devoid ofmetaphysical ommitment.For one thing,the accountso far issketchy,and itmightwell turnout to involve non-obviousmetaphysical ommitments s it is


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elaborated. And doesn't the skeptic owe us some account of why the practiceof exploiting regularities in nature for the purposes of explanation is itselfjustified? There is a point to this objection, and the skeptical response illu-minates the structure of the enterprise. It may indeed be that the skepticunwittingly dogmatizes. But if s/he does, that fact will emerge and be treat-able by subsequent skeptical therapy. Skeptical analysis may be intermin-able analysis. But that does not undermine its utility. (On the other hand, ofcourse, it might well be-as it appears in this case-that the skeptic doesnot dogmatize, in which case the therapy is short-term.) And practices-including the broadest explanatory practices-are subject to criticism, andcan often be justified or shown to be unjustified. But the justification of apractice does not necessarily consist in producing a set of true or indubitablesentences about the way the world is upon whose truth or certainty the prac-tice rests. The justification of practices can often be simply pragmatic. Theywork; or that's the way we do things-if one wants to engage in this enter-prise, one does it this way. Scientific explanation, and the identification ofcauses may be like that. So it in no way follows from the inability of theskeptic to produce decisive arguments for the truth of competing theoriesconcerning causation, the nature of the physical world, or of the self, that theenterprise is bankrupt. The activity of producing such theories is just what theskeptic wants us to abandon. And if the skeptic is guilty of dogmatizing, thatonly shows that more analysis is required.vI conclude by drawing attention to the several skeptical morals of these dis-cussions for metaphysics and method in science. None of these conclusions isnew, but since all are called into question by what I think is a very populardogmatic causal hyperrealism, it is worth repeating them in one place.First, while it is certainly true that scientific taxonomy-including boththose of physics and psychology-individuates phenomena in response to thedemands of explanation, this does not in any way entail individualism. For,when stripped of incoherent and otiose metaphysical baggage, all that thephrase "causal powers" could ever indicate is explanatorily useful relations.And there is no good reason, once this rich metaphysics of causation is aban-doned, to believe that such relations always comprise individualistically char-acterized relata. Moreover, the claim that the relational categories of physicalscience are somehow more individualistic than those of the special sciences,for example, cognitive science, is false. Naturalism is hence not simply a hall-mark of special science, let alone immaturecognitive science.Second, reducibility to a more fundamental, or to a physical science-inparticular reduction by demonstrating a token-identity relation between phe-nomena respected by the respective taxonomies of reduced and reducingscience-is no prerequisite of respectability for cognitive sciences, or, for that


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matter,of any science. The groundfor the belief that it is is a belief in thespecialinsightof physics nto occult causalpowers.But this belief is ground-less, or atbestis groundedon a mistakenmythologyof thepeculiarperfectionof physicallaws and a failure to recognizethe central and universal roleof idealizationand ceterisparibus instantiationof ideal types in scientificexplanation.Third,a unitary,broadlyphysicalistic ntologyis compatiblewithontolog-icalpluralismat the level of the taxonomyof nature,anddoes not entail theunityof science, or even the unityof good science. One does not need to besome kind of Cartesian ubstance-pluralisto endorsethe disunityof science.Finally, and most importantly, he philosophyof science can do withoutanyrichmetaphysicsof causationor causalpowers.The superstition hat, inorder for an ontology to gripnatureby the throat so as to carve her at thejoints, it must first discoverrealrelationsbetweenphenomenaunderwrittenby causalpowers as opposed to "mere"naturalregularities s just that-asuperstition.Explanatoryregularitiesand the taxonomiesthey induce areplentyrealenough-they areas real as it gets.Moreover,I shouldemphasize hat I have presentedbut a singlecase his-tory. If the generalthrust of the initial portionof my discussion s correct,thereis an epidemicto be addressed,andmanyof us arevictims.This is butone exampleof the curethat can be wroughtby skepticalanalysis.The curemaybe difficult,and it mayleavemanyof usprofoundlydissatisfiedwith whatwe now take to be the goalsandnatureof philosophy,andwithmanyof ourown positionsand arguments.Fortunately,however,skepticalmedicine hasone salient side effect: it is good philosophical un. I hope that this providesencouragementor the view that theappropriateesponse o the skeptic s notto searchfor a replybut to take one's medicineand wakeup to regularity.

NOTES1. Fromhereon, forthe sakeof brevity, use the term"Buddhists"o referspecificallyo thePrasangika-Madhyamikachoolof Mahfayanauddhism.Thosepersonswith whose work I willprimarily e concernedareNfigfrjuna,Candrakirti,ndTsong Khapa,all majorfiguresof thisschool. Manyof the argumentsand the specifictenets I will discusswouldnot necessarilybeendorsedor understoodn thesamewayby philosophersn other schoolsof Buddhism.2. Wittgenstein, f course,frequentlydenies thathe is a skeptic:"Scepticisms not irrefut-able, but obvious nonsense.. ." (Notebooks 1914-1916 p. 44). But I would argue that the posi-tion Wittgensteindenotesby "scepticism"s whatI am callinghere "nihilism."The type ofresponseWittgenstein epeatedly ffers o theskepticalproblemsposed bynihilistic rgumentsscharacteristicallykeptical.3. At least as theYogacara re nterpreted yCandrakirtindTsongKhapa.But the Prfsan-

gika accountsof Yogfacra may well be uncharitable, nd the idealism mputedto them andattackedby the Prasangikamaywell be more extremethanany positionthe Yogacaraphilo-sophersactuallyespouse.I take no positionhere on the correctresolutionof the attendanther-meneuticaldisputes.In a similarvein, it maywell be that a correctreadingof Berkeleywould


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recognizehis idealismas more Kantianandtranscendentalhan that"dogmaticdealism"Kantand most others mpute o him. But thesequestionsof interpretation,oo, arebeyondthescopeof thisdiscussion.4. Note that hereI amlumping ogetherontologicalandepistemologicallaims.This s nottosuggestthat the rejectionof the existenceof the externalworld is the same as the rejectionofknowledge f the externalworld.It is merely o remindusof thefactthathistoricallyhe routetonihilisticontologicalclaims has often been through he assessmentof the objectsof putativeknowledge.5. There are real philosophicaland interpretiveproblemsregardingmy interpretation fNagarjuna s indicatingby "material orm"somethingakinto whatHumedisparages s "mate-rialsubstance."Thisis not the placeto defendthisinterpretationn detail,andin factthere areimportantdifferencesbetween the wayssubstanceand material ormfigure n theirrespectiveontologicalpositions.But these differences o notundermine he central laim hat nthe contextof disputesconcerninghe realityandstatus of the materialworld,theirrespectiveconceptualroles are importantly nalogous.It also should be notedin thiscontextthatNfagrjuna n thestanzasjust quotedand elsewhere n his corpusdiscusses he emptinessof material orm as asinglecentralexampleof the emptinessof phenomenaquite generally.Butagain,this rhetoricalrole of the discussion f form eavesthecomparative ointundisturbed.6. My readingof Nagarjuna's istinctionbetweencausesandconditions,and the accountofcausationandexplanation attribute o himis, I know,controversial;ndNfagrjuna's emarkson these topicsarecrypticenoughto sustaina numberof plausiblecompeting nterpretations.The view I attributeto Nfgarjuna(developedin more detail below), however, rendershisaccountof causation,of theconditions,of the natureof explanationntheworldof samsara,andof the ultimately mptynatureof causationbothcompellingandremarkablyimilar n formtohis more explicitlyarticulatedviews concerning he nature of self, of action, and of form. Iacknowledgehe somewhat endentious haracter f thereading,andthefactthat t ishard o seethese thesesexplicitlyasserted n the texts,but I standbythecogencyof the interpretation.7. ThePrasangika onceptionof suspensionsverymuch hesame.Comparewith thediscus-sionof nondualityn Book 9 of the Vimalaklrtisutra (Thurman 976).8. Thereis hence a similarity ereto Strawson's ccountof refusing o asserteitherthatthepresentkingof Frances baldorthathe is notbald, nvirtueof rejectinghe commonpresupposi-tion that the twoalternatives hare-the existenceof a presentkingof France.9. Thismetaphoralsoappearsn the Buddhist iterature,both in the earlysftras and in thelaterMahfayanaiterature.Candrakirtiuotesthe Ratnakitasutra:One forwhom, nturn,the absenceof being tself becomesa dogmatic iew I callIncurable. t is,Kasyapa,as if a sick manweregivena medicineby a doctor,but thatmedicine,havingremovedhis ills, wasnot itselfexpelled,but remained n the stomach.What do youthink,Kfayapa,willthis man be freed of his sickness?No indeed,illustrious ne, the sicknessof this man in whosestomachthe medicine,havingremovedall his ills remainsand is not expelled,wouldbe moreviolent. Theillustrious ne said:In thissense,Kfayapa, heabsenceof being s the exhaustion falldogmatic iews. Butthe one for whomtheabsenceof being tself becomesa fixedbelief,I callincurable.

10. Infact, thispointis rather omplicated.Forwhile,asTsong Khapaargues,nihilismreallyis a philosopher's iew-one to which the vulgarare not readilysusceptible Berkeley,to thecontrary, notwithstanding)-reificationismomes in two versions. We mightcall these, withTsong Khapa,"ordinary" nd"philosophical." orarguablyhe person-on-thetreet-thinks fthe physicalas substantial, hinksof causationas a real force, thinks of personal dentityasgroundedn a soul,andso forth.But theseviews areprobablynthetypical aserathernchoate.Philosophical eificationism an be seen as a carefulconceptualrefinementof this fallacyofeverydaymetaphysics.t is thejob of theskeptic o cureboth theordinary nd the sophisticatedformsof thedisease.The relativeprevalance f reificationismsopposed o nihilism nthe streetsprobablyalso lies behind the common confusion of skepticismwith nihilism. For given thisreificationistpidemic,the argumentshe skepticmustmost often musterarequasi-nihilisticncharacter, o as mosteffectivelyo undermine hatdogma.11. I use the term"naturalistic"o denoterelational,ornonindividualisticroperties rpredi-cates. The relations n questionmaybe either ntentional r nonintentional.The contrast s with


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individualistic properties or predicates-those which apply to their subjects irrespective of anyrelations they may bear to other things.12. Again, I emphasize that this interpretation of Nagarjuna on causation and explanation isnot definitive, and the extension of his expressed views on ordinary explanation to a theory ofscientific explanation must be regarded as highly tendentious.13. Fodor never comes completely clean in expressing his commitment to this "cement of theuniverse" picture of causation. The view, however, emerges quite clearly both from the passagesI have quoted above and others such as this: "Effects on causal powers require mediation by lawsand/or mechanisms, and in the Twin cases there are no such mechanisms and no such laws."If you are inclined to doubt this, notice that for any causal relation that holds between mymental states and the local water puddles, there must be a corresponding relation that holdsbetween my neurological states and the local water puddles. . . " (157, n. 6 to p. 39).And consider, ". . . [Y]ou can't affect the causal powers of a person's mental states withoutaffecting his physiology" (p. 39).But even without an explicit endorsement of this view (a view which even Fodor might acknowl-edge sounds crazy when explicitly stated) we can note that Fodor is committed to it inasmuch as,without it, there is no way to begin to make the strong locality argument about causation, or todraw the distinctions between genuine and ersatz causal relations Fodor is after.

14. This is, of course, a causal version of the "third man" argument.15. Note, however, that the question regardingwhether or not there are exceptionless naturallaws (whatever account one gives of what a natural law is) is independent both of the questionregardingindividualism in the philosophy of science generally and that regardingindividualisminpsychology.16. There is, as Lee Bowie has noted, another account of what physicists do: they posit parti-cles as bearers of forces. But this is no comfort for the Fodorian causal realist. For the behavior ofthese particles, and the nature of their interactions with other fundamental particles are againcharacterized by more-or-less exceptionless regularities, and not by reference to the bondingpowers of ghostly subatomic superglue.17. Dick Garner and an anonymous reviewer each raise the following objections at this point:Sextus, they argue, is more circumspect regardingcausal powers than I suggest, and in fact, theyargue, I am downright dogmatic about causal powers in insisting on their superfluityin scientificexplanation. For, they point out, in Sextus' chapter in the Outlines of Pyrrhonism on causation,he provides arguments both in support of the hypothesis that there are causes, and in support ofthe hypothesis that nothing causes anything, concluding "From this, then, we conclude finallythat if plausibility attaches both to the arguments. . . [for and against the plausibility of theexistence of causes] we must necessarily suspend judgement regardingthe existence of cause..."(Hallie, p. 116).

Admittedly, this is a strong exegetical case. But things are not so simple. Careful attention tothe differences between the arguments in support of the causal hypothesis and those against itreveals an important methodological insight. The arguments for the existence of causation (ibid.,p. 113) all hinge on one of two observations-the existence of natural regularitiesand our abilityto exploit these regularities in explanation and prediction. None of these argumentsor observa-tions is called into question in the succeeding discussion. The arguments against the causalhypothesis all hinge either upon the conceptual connection between cause and effect or on thelack of evidence for the existence of any tertiumquid between putative cause and putative effect.And each presupposes the relativity and explanatory utility of putative causes and putativeeffects, denying only the efficacy or occult link between them. And none of these arguments iscalled into question. When the two sides are put together carefully, we have an argument for thelack of any necessity to assert the existence of occult powers in order to vouchsafe the explana-tory utility of regularities.Moreover, there is nothing dogmatic about this position. What is at issue is the existence ofcausal powers. Neither Sextus norI either assert or deny their existence. What we both deny is theneed to posit them, and the view that they have any explanatory force. We suspend-aspointless-any judgment regarding them. But while doing so, we can accept the very scientificand explanatory practices the dogmatist thinks require the existence of causal powers.


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Epoche and Śūnyatā: Skepticism East and West

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