Pyrrhonism as an Anti-Subversive Activity
Pyrrhonian skepticism is often presented as “radical,” yet it is anything but
We in the US have come to that quadrennial election season when various writers about philosophy and religion fall into spouting off their political opinions, basing those opinions to what they think their philosophy or religion says. Sometimes, of course, they may get these connections correctly, but a lot of it looks like rationalization, particularly via cherry picking. One sign of this is that often there is disagreement among those professing the same philosophy/religion with regard to political opinion. Perhaps the most obvious example of this is the disagreement among Christians about supporting Donald Trump versus Kamala Harris.
Massimo Piglucci describes Stoicism as a subversive activity. He seems correct with regard to Stoicism. Stoicism does entail philosophical commitments that have political implications, and these implications direct Stoics to, in certain respects, subvert the status quo. He goes on to point out, however, those implications poorly match the the current left/right political divide.
So, while Stoicism might give clear guidance on some particular issues, that’s about as far as it goes. Further, there’s no clear way of making trade-offs among these beliefs. While Stoics assert that virtue is the only good, and there appears to be widespread acknowledgment that Donald Trump is no paragon of virtue, Kamala Harris isn’t one either, although they may differ in this regard by degree, perhaps even considerably. Or perhaps not.
Moreover, ever since Machiavelli it’s been unclear whether the highly virtuous even make for good rulers. Former President Jimmy Carter was widely considered virtuous but he lost re-election due to his perceived incompetence. Theory has a habit of hitting potholes on the way to reality.
Pyrrhonism tends to get stereotyped as a politically conservative philosophy due to the respect it accords to laws, customs, and institutions that have established themselves over time. But Pyrrhonism isn’t about stopping change. Pyrrho pointed out that everything is unstable. Change appears to be one of the few certainties we have. Rather, Pyrrhonism is about eschewing rash conclusions based on theories, in favor of decisions arrived at via the experience that comes from trial and error.
The term “conservative” here is misleading with respect to the political situation. These days, the left/right divide isn’t coherently a liberal/conservative divide. To some degree, it is a theory-based divide between ideologies that are not readily classifiable as liberal or conservative. For example, the supposedly “conservative” Project 2025, if implemented, would be a radical change that would subvert the existing administrative structure. That’s not “conservative” in the normal sense of the work. On the other hand, supposed “liberals” are pursuing curtailments to free speech. This is weird as since the times of the ancient Greeks, parrhesia (παρρησία) - free speech - has been considered a liberal virtue.
In addition to being an ideological divide, it is perhaps moreso a tribal divide. Whatever principles the sides may hold, they are regularly thrown under the bus if doing so benefits an important coalition constituency.
Pyrrhonists are wrongly caricatured as suspending judgment on practical matters such as what goals one should pursue or what might improve society. Sure, we don’t have a theory about it, or a criterion of why something for sure may be true or better, but we do have the guidance of our own feelings and experiences. We don’t have to have a doctrinal reason for thinking equanimity is better than outrage; we can experience the difference, in ourselves and from watching others. We don’t have to have a doctrinal reason for thinking that communism was a failure. The body count is sufficient to prove this point. That after the failures of communism there remain advocates for it demonstrates the Pyrrhonists’ claim that dogmatism brings on delusion and madness.
One of Pyrrhonism's great benefits is that it provides explanations for why there’s so much political disagreement and why that disagreement can be so bitter. Once one understands the fundamental uncertainties, one can become more comfortable with the existence of the conflicts, leading to equanimity about them.
Alternative Facts Are Real
Political opinions differ for a variety of reasons. One of these reasons is that alternative facts are real.
What we know is based on perception. All perception comes from a perspective. Depending on the perspective, the exact same phenomena produce different perceptions. Here’s a lovely illustration of this fact.
This effect may be even greater for things that are not physical objects. People dispute whether the room is too hot or too cold. They dispute what is fair. While agreement on the facts is possible for many things, disagreement about the facts is normal for many other things - particularly political things.
Alternative Values Are the Norm
There’s no agreement on what is good and bad. For example, the Epicureans think that pleasure and pain define good and bad, whereas the Stoics think only virtue is good. The Aristotelians think that virtue, along with things such as wealth and health, are all goods. If there’s no agreement at such a basic level, it should be expected that there will be disagreements about political values.
Alternative Categorizations Are the Norm
Political discourse is filled with conflicts over categorization. Are transwomen women? Are people who are in the country without legal permission undocumented immigrants, illegals, or refugees? Is some statement free speech or is it hate speech?
More subtle than those questions, consider Stoicism’s theory known as Hierocles' circles of concern. This theory is often invoked with respect to how Stoics should address political issues.
Here’s an illustration of the circles of concern.
Hierocles said that the task of a Stoic was to draw the circles in towards the center, transferring people to the inner circles, making all human beings part of our concern.
Andrew Perlot suggests that to some degree Stoicism forces conservatives to think like liberals because conservatives and liberals empathize differently. He points out, “Liberals distribute more units to “universalist entities” like humanity, animals, and all of existence.” There are good reasons Perlot used scare quotes here, as the concept is fuzzy. It’s clear what is meant by self, but who, exactly, counts as family? For example, I’m distantly related to one of the Vice Presidential candidates. Does that mean I should vote for him? What is the dividing line between friends and acquaintances? Who is in my community? For example, in some respects, I think my readers and I share a community, but I know almost none of you live anywhere close to me and I’ve met almost none of you. I live in a tiny rural New Hampshire town, but there’s no way I could even learn the names of everyone here, much less meet them all. They’re an abstraction to me, as is pretty everything in the various circles of concern.
What Heirocles has to say may sound good, but it’s not clear that his ideas work. If you’ve read the news lately, you’ve heard about Israelis and Palestinians - and their respective supporters - constantly accusing each other of attempting genocide against one another. If you believe certain people want you dead, is it wise to draw them closer to you?
Similarly, consider the thought experiment that your child is trapped in a burning building. You can go into the building and save them. Alternatively, you can go into another part of the building and save 100 other children. There’s only enough time to do one of these rescue missions, and there’s no one but you who can do it. There’s widespread disagreement on what’s the right thing to do.
It would appear that there are good reasons these distinctions exist, and that Heirocles is mistaken in trying to collapse them.
Virtue Signaling
From a Pyrrhonist perspective, one of the most undesirable behaviors that have emerged is virtue signaling: the pronouncement of a belief to signal to others one’s superior morality. This behavior reinforces the already excessive tendencies to self identity with one’s beliefs thereby re-inforcing those beliefs. On top of that, virtue signaling leads to conceit.
It also leads to misery. It is inevitable in politics that things will not always turn out the way you’d like them to. Realize that your influence on political outcomes is tiny. Is it wise to invest so much time, energy, and emotion on political issues? Is it wise to parade your opinions about, especially opinions that implicitly morally condemn other people? Does this achieve anything good?
Or are you just subverting the tranquility and happiness of yourself and others?