Academic Fallibilism

Classification

Position level

specific

Domains

Epistemology

Overview

Carneades developed a graded standard short of certainty: impressions differ in how persuasive they are, and stronger impressions withstand comparison and examination. This supplies a basis for deliberate action without a Stoic cognitive impression. Whether Carneades endorsed the standard or proposed it only to answer the Stoic objection is disputed.

Position on

• The Possibility of Knowledge

  Against the Stoic claim that action requires cognitive impressions, this position allows inquiry and action to follow critically examined persuasive impressions without treating them as certain knowledge.

Held by traditions

• Academic Skepticism

  Carneades developed the persuasive-impression criterion in reply to Stoic objections that skepticism made action impossible. Whether he endorsed it as his own doctrine or advanced it dialectically remains disputed.

  Question scope: The Possibility of Knowledge

Broader position

• Epistemic Skepticism

Incompatible positions

• Pyrrhonian Suspension

  Question scope: The Possibility of Knowledge

References

• Cicero, Academica II.59, 99, 108 (acting by persuasive impressions without assent)
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Carneades, §4 (the dispute over Carneades' own commitments)
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Carneades, §§3–4
• Sextus Empiricus, Outlines of Pyrrhonism I.226-231, which separates Pyrrhonism from the Academics on the ground that the Academics assent to the persuasive while the Pyrrhonist suspends assent altogether
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Ancient Skepticism