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References
Montaigne
(1533-1592) Classical
Skepticism Montaigne
and Skepticism The
Essays Michel
Eyquem de Montaigne
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Miguel de Montaigne
Arrogance: the human condition
Que sais-je? (What do I know?) That is the question that has driven philosophers for millennia. For many people the idea of questioning one's own knowledge seems silly. Those people make little distinction between belief and knowledge; so that if they think something is so, there is no point in questioning whether it is so. Perhaps you personally know folks like this. Perhaps some of your own beliefs are held beyond questioning. In such cases, questioning one's own knowledge (hence searching for sources and evidence) is highly unlikely
One quality that philosophers typically share is the urge to question deeply. Few philosophers remain content to stand on tradition, authority, common opinion, or unquestioning belief. Some philosophers question more deeply than others. Miguel de Montaigne is among the philosophers who question most deeply of all: the skeptics.
Perhaps it was Montaigne's experience as a magistrate (judge) that led
him to his view that few cases of dispute are ever cut and dry.
He certainly applied this 
notion
of ambiguity to philosophical, scientific, and religious theories.
So many great thinkers claim to grasp the inner truth of the world and
many people follow them. Yet over time, even the most celebrated
of thinkers and theories lose their strength and are replaced by newer
(and no less certain) claims to knowledge. People will fight, die,
and kill for their beliefs. For Montaigne, one need only glance back to
the history of abandoned truths to see the arrogance of human conviction.
Yet, in politics, religion, business, and everyday life human beings continue
as if we can know it all and that all that we come to know belongs to
us by right. Humans have consistently claimed dominion over all
of nature on the basis of a superior capacity for reason. It is
this presumed superiority that Montaigne targets with his sharp arguments.
| "Presumption is our natural and original malady. The most calamitous and fragile of all creatures is man, and at the same time the proudest. He sees and feels himself placed here in the mire and dung of the world, attached and fixed in the worst, most lifeless, and most corrupt part of the universe, on the meanest floor of the house and the farthest removed from the vault of heaven, with animals of the worst condition of the three [of those that fly, swim, and live on the ground]; and he goes installing himself in his imagination that he makes himself God's equal, that he ascribes to himself divine attributes, that he winnows himself and separates himself from the mass of other creatures, determines the share allowed the animals, his colleagues of faculties and powers as seem good to him. How does he know, by the effort of intelligence, what inwardly and secret moves the animals? By what comparison of them with ourselves does he deduce the stupidity which he attributes to them? When I play with my cat, who knows whether she is not making me her pastime more than I make her mine?" [Montaigne. 1592. In Defense of Raymond Sebond. Chapter II, Section 3, Man's superiority over the animals a delusion based on pride.] |
If you know cats, you likely understand Montaigne's suspicion.
Still, it is very difficult for any educated person to put aside the fundamental
feeling that as 
humans
we are different -- more advanced -- than other animals. We are
the top of the evolutionary chain. We have language, art, technology,
education, and culture. Animals, both wild and tame, act on instinct.
We humans may act upon the elevated powers of reason and free-will.
Such reasonings are the "delusion based on pride" that Montaigne
is out to undermine. He uses a variety of tactics to do so and created
a powerful challenge for philosophers who followed him. Skepticism
has been used throughout history as an antidote to dogmatism. Montaigne
is the first major skeptic of the modern age.
Aquinas
Aristotle
Augustine
Berkeley
Confucius
Descartes
Douglass
Foucault
Hobbes
Hume
Hypatia
Kant
Kierkegaard
Lao Tzu
Leibniz
Locke
Marx
Mill
Montaigne
Pascal
Plato
Protagoras
Rand
Russell
Schopenhauer
Socrates
Spinoza
Thales