296 ///-22 to ///-23
that we are alive, and many other appearances in life. But concerning
the things the dogmatists assert definitely with argument, saying that
they have grasped them, we suspend judgement because of their being
non-evident, acknowledging only the states which we find ourselves in.
We concede that we see and acknowledge that we think, but as for how we
see or think, we are ignorant. That this appears white we say colloquially
without asserting definitely that it is really so. 104. Regarding the utter-
ance 'I determine nothing' and the like, we say that these are uttered
but not as dogmas. For they are unlike the utterance 'the cosmos is round.'
The latter is non-evident, whereas the former are mere admissions. So,
when we say 'we determine nothing' we are not determining this very
thing."
Again, the dogmatists say that they [the sceptics] abolish life, in the
sense that they throw out everything that goes to make up a life. But
the sceptics say that these charges are false. For they do not abolish, say,
sight, but only hold that we are ignorant of its explanation. "For we do
posit the phenomenon, but not as being what it appears to be. We do
sense that fire burns, but we suspend judgement as to whether it is fire's
nature to burn. 105. Further, we do see that someone is moving, that
someone perishes; but as for how these things occur, we do not know.
We only object," they say, "to the non-evident things added on to the
phenomena. For when we say that a picture has raised surfaces we are
elucidating what is apparent; when we say that it does not [really] have
them, we are no longer speaking about what appears, but something else.
For this reason, Timon in his Pytho says that he has not diverged from
what is customary. And in his Likenesses he says, 'But the apparent utterly
dominates wherever it goes.' And in his work On the Senses he says,
'That honey is sweet I do not posit; that it appears so I concede.' "
- Aenesidemus too in the first book of his Pyrrhonian Arguments
says that Pyrrho determines nothing dogmatically because of the existence
of contradictory arguments, but rather follows appearances. He says the
same thing in Against Wisdom and in On Investigation. And Zeuxis, an
associate of Aenesidemus, in On Twofold Arguments and Antiochus of
Laodicea and Apellas in his Agrippa posit the phenomena alone. There-
fore, according to the sceptics, the appearance is a criterion, as Aeneside-
mus too says. This is also so for Epicurus. Democritus, however, denied
that the criterion was any of the appearances, and even that the appear-
ances exist. 107. Against this criterion of appearances, the dogmatists say
that different presentations coming from the same things strike us; for
example, from a tower which presents itself as round or square; and if
the sceptic does not prefer one to the other, he will be unable to act; but
if he gives credence to one or the other, they say, he will no longer be