Pyrrho 289
times they are used positively and negatively, as when we say "virtue
benefits more than it harms," we signify that virtue benefits and does
not harm.
- The sceptics, however, even abolish the very utterance "no more
this than that" for as providence is no more than it is not, so "no more
this than that" is no more than it is not. So Timon says in the Pytho,
the utterance ["no more this than that"] signifies determining nothing
and refusing to assent. The very utterance "for every argument there is
an opposing argument" also concludes to suspension of judgement, for
when the facts are disputed, but there is equal force in the [opposing]
arguments, ignorance of the truth follows. Even this argument [i.e., that
every argument has an opposing argument] has an opposing argument,
[namely, there is an argument which has no opposing argument] so that
when it has destroyed every other argument it turns on itself and is
destroyed by itself, just like purges which first purge the foreign matter
and then themselves are purged and destroyed ....
- The Pyrrhonian strategy, according to Aenesidemus in his Outline
for Pyrrhonian Topics, is a kind of display of appearances or thoughts
according to which they are all juxtaposed and when compared are found
to have much inconsistency and confusion. As for the contradictions
found in their investigations, first they show the modes by which things
persuade us and then how confidence is eliminated by the same modes.
For they say that we are persuaded when things are consistently perceived,
when they never or at least rarely change, when they become familiar to
us and when they are determined by customs and when they are delightful
and marvellous. 79. They thus showed that on the basis of indications
contrary to those that persuaded in the first place, [conclusions] opposite
to those we accepted were equally plausible.
The problems which they raised for the [supposed] agreement of
appearances or thoughts were set down according to ten modes [or
dialectical moves, tropot], corresponding to the ways in which the facts
appeared to differ. These are the ten modes they laid down:
[1] The first mode is based on the differences among animals with
respect to pleasure and pain and harm and benefit. By this mode it is
inferred that animals do not receive the same presentations from the
same things, and that for this reason suspension of judgement follows
upon this conflict. For among animals some are conceived without inter-
course, such as the animals that live in fire, the Arabian phoenix, and
worms; whereas some are conceived through intercourse, such as men
and other animals. 80. Further, some are structured in one way, some
in another. Therefore, they differ in sense-experience; for example, hawks
have the keenest sight, whereas dogs have the most acute sense of smell.
