ABSTRACT
Making a list of assumptions that inhibit scientic progress (Rosen 2016), especially when the assumptions include beliefs long held and cherished by many in comparative biology, identied Donn Rosen as a skeptic. Skepticism has a long, storied, and varied history, which I will not recount, but I can probably be safe to dene skepticism as a philosophical approach that poses questions about the nature of evidence in terms of sufciency or probity that may be presented to justify propositions. The kind of doubts, the kind of sufciency, the kind of evidence, and the kind of justication associated with schools of skepticism vary widely, but sufce to say the general feel of the denition covers most forms. Thus, the simple act of questioning existing dogma or knowledge ties the schools of skepticism together. The goal of this chapter is to review and reveal Rosen the skeptic, specically with regard to his list of inhibiting assumptions. And revealing it is, with clear instances of growth of thought as his skeptical side developed.
