342 l//-38
example, the sense of taste senses the same honey sometimes as sweet
and sometimes as bitter; and vision
times red and sometimes white. 52. Not even smell is self-consistent; at
least, someone with a headache says that myrrh is unpleasant, whereas
someone without a headache says it is pleasant. And people divinely
possessed and frenzied seem to hear voices addressing them, which we
do not hear. And the same water seems unpleasant to those with a fever,
because of an excess of heat, whereas to others it is lukewarm. 53. So,
whether someone should say that all presentations are true or these are
true and those are false, or all are false, is impossible to tell, since we do
not have an agreed upon criterion by means of which we might judge
that which we are going to decide, nor do we even have supplied to us
a true and considered demonstration, because we are still searching for
the criterion of truth by means of which it is appropriate for the true
demonstration to be decided upon. 54. For these reasons, he who thinks
it appropriate that we should put our trust in those who are in a natural
state and not in those in an unnatural state, will be absurd. For he will
not be trusted if he says this without demonstration, and he will not
have a true and considered demonstration, for the reasons given above.
- Even if someone should grant that the presentations of those in a
natural state are trustworthy and the presentations of those in an unnatural
state are not, the judgement of external objects by means of the senses
alone will still be found to be impossible. At any rate, even the sight of
someone in a natural state sometimes declares thetower sometimes
to be round and sometimes square; the taste of those well-fed declares the
same food unpleasant that the hungry declare pleasant; hearing similarly
apprehends the same sound as loud at night and soft during the day; 56.
the sense of smell of many people regards as a bad smell the same things
that tanners regard otherwise; the same sense of touch senses that the
antechamber is warm when we are entering the bathhouse and that it is
cold when we are leaving. Thus, since even the senses of those in a
natural state are in conflict with themselves and the disagreement is
undecidable, since we do not have an agreed uponby means
of which the disagreement can be decided, it is necessary that the same
problems follow. Further, it is possible to adduce many other points in
support of this conclusion, drawing from what was previously said about
the modes leading to the suspension of judgement. Therefore, it probably
would not be true that sense-experience alone is able to judge external ob-
jects. - So, let us proceed to the argument regarding the intellect. Now
as for those who think it appropriate that we should attend to the intellect
alone in the judgement of matters, first they will not be able to show