Commentary: Pascal, Skepticism, and the French Enlightenment

Abstract

A historian of philosophy should combine analytical rigor with an awareness of the intellectual context of the philosopher. Frasca-Spada exhibits these two features with refreshing results. By carefully taking into account the “language” spoken by the philosophers of Hume’s time, she provides a more satisfactory account of Hume’s position on the problem of the continued existence of the external world than those provided by epistemologists who try to solve the matter strictly in logical terms. She thus dispels the paradox that often results from the strictly analytical approach of a Hume who is great in pointing out philosophical problems but disappointing in solving them. Among the points of interest for Hume scholarship present in FrascaSpada’s essay, I wish to mention one that is particularly relevant to the colloquium from which the present volume stems. Frasca-Spada shows that the best way to deal with Hume’s skepticism about the external world is the revision of the usual association of Hume with an entrenched view of the modern skeptic held by contemporary philosophers, namely, that of an abstract epistemological persona deprived of any practical character who merely poses problems to dogmatist philosophers. One of the main results of the tremendous revival of the scholarship on ancient skepticism since the 1970s has been that it was above all a way of life. The epistemological difficulties raised by the skeptics were subordinated to practical goals which were thought to lead to happiness. Hume’s skepticism differs in many ways from that of the ancient skeptics except in one basic feature—often cited as one of the crucial differences between ancient and modern skepticism—which they have in common: the practical foundation of their skepticism. According to FrascaSpada, Hume’s position

is a skeptical attitude which is a true style of life, and which, among other things, makes both radical skepticism and realism appear not as opposite metaphysical attitudes, one of which we have to adopt, but rather two tendencies which, however opposed, always co-exist in the mind. Their conflict cannot be removed by a choice. Carelessness and inattention are the solution to our troubles: the difference between skepticism and realism is dissolved, thanks to them, because they allow us to appreciate the unique metaphysical instinct that keeps giving rise to both… The same carelessness and inattention also makes us keep having fun in the exercise of that instinct, in order not to be “losers in point of pleasure.