The first step in the argument is to make the skepticism bear on particular cases. If we cannot perceive material objects, then, presumably, we cannot see the table we are working on or the pen with which we write. Next, a situation is sketched in which, ordinarily, no one would hesitate to affirm just the opposite. If the light is excellent, our eyes open, our sight unimpaired, the table directly before us, and so on, then we should ordinarily have no qualms about stating that we see a table.
The argument would be weak if it relied merely on the fact that people would ordinarily have no doubts in such situations, for it does not follow from this that they state the truth. But the argument claims something more for the kind of situations it describes. It holds that they are indisputably examples of seeing a table because of their relationship to the meaning of the expression "seeing a table." Typically, this relationship is brought out by saying that such a situation is just what we call "seeing a table" or that it is just the sort of circumstances in which one might teach someone the meaning of the expression "seeing a table." Generalizing and taking the strongest interpretation of the force of these remarks, one might ask: "If this is just what we call X, then in saying that it is X, how can we fail to state the truth? If this is a situation in which we might teach the meaning of X, then how can it fail to be a case of X?" In denying that anyone ever sees a table, the skeptic seems to be placed in the position of refusing to apply the expression "seeing a table" to the very situation to which that expression refers.
This is a free page. This page contains 149 words. This
article contains 5,316 words (approx. 18 pages at 300
words per page).
Read the rest of this Article with our Paradigm-Case Argument Access Pass.
