ABSTRACT
Aristotle observed that “Man by nature desires to know.” Our hu man situation in this world is such that we have questions and wantnay need-to have answers. Our commitment to the cognitive enter prise of inquiry is absolute and establishes an insatiable demand for extending and deepening the range of our information. In this cogni tive sphere, reason cannot leave well enough alone, but insists upon a continual enhancement in the range and depth of our understanding of ourselves and of the world about us. But is this cognitive project realizable at all? We confront the skeptic’s long-standing challenge that it is not. In their more radical moments, at any rate-skeptics insist that there is never a satisfactory justification for accepting any claims whatsoever. And the skeptical challenge to the project of em pirical inquiry based on principles of cognitive rationality has a very plausible look about it. Our means for the acquisition of factual knowl edge are unquestionably imperfect. Where, for example, are the “sci entific truths” of yesteryear-those earth-shaking syntheses of Aristotle and Ptolemy, of Newton and Maxwell? Virtually no part of them has survived wholly unscathed. And given this past course of bitter experi ence, how can we possibly validate our present acceptance of factual contentions in a rationally convincing way?
