Williams on Descartes and Skepticism

Stéphane Marchand has called my attention to a talk that Michael Williams will give in Lyon on December 9: "Dreamers, Drunkards and Doppelgängers: the Originality of Descartes’s First Meditation." Complete information can be found here.

Free Access to IJSS

Excellent news: until December 31st, you can access the International Journal for the Study of Skepticism for free. Follow these four steps:

1. Go to booksandjournals.brillonline.com.

2. Register to create your own user account.

3. Go to my account and click on "add content."

4. Enter access token SKEP4U and manage your publication alerts.

(If you happen to have a problem with any of these steps, let me know.)

Doubt, Ignorance, and Science

Another interesting event will take place in Paris in a couple of weeks: "Doubt, Ignorance and Science: New Perspectives on Knowledge," a workshop that will be held at the École Normale Supérieure, on December 2 and 3. For complete information, click here.

Skepticism, Pragmatism, and Ordinary Language

On December 7th, 2013, the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne will host the conference "Scepticism, Pragmatism and Ordinary Language Philosophy." Complete information can be found here.

The Skepticism of John of Salisbury

The study of skepticism in medieval philosophy has undergone significant progress in the last few years. Our understanding of this topic will be further improved by the recent publication of Christophe Grellard's Jean de Salisbury et la renaissance médiévale du scepticisme (Les Belles Lettres, 2013).

New Issue of IJSS

Issue 3/4 of the International Journal for the Study of Skepticism is now out. This issue includes three articles on skepticism in contemporary philosophy as well as a critical notice and three reviews of books on ancient and modern skepticism.

Ethical Irrealism

The latest issue of Ratio is a special issue entitled "Irrealism in Ethics". I haven't been able to read it yet, but Richard Joyce and Hallvard Lillehammer usually write excellent things.

Schellenberg's Religious Skepticism

In his recent book, Evolutionary Religion (OUP, 2013), John Schellenberg (Mount Saint Vincent) offers an intriguing evolutionary argument for skepticism that is based on the acceptance of deep time.

Ioppolo on Academic Skepticism

Anna Maria Ioppolo's collected essays on Hellenistic philosophy have just been published under the title Dibattiti filosofici ellenistici: Dottrina delle cause, Stoicismo, Accademia scettica (Academia Verlag). The volume, edited by B. Centrone, R. Chiaradonna, D. Quarantotto, and E. Spinelli, contains five papers on Academic skepticism. Of these, I particularly liked "The Academic Position of Favorinus of Arelate" and "Gli accademici “νεώτεροι” nel secondo secolo d.C.", which I read a few years ago.

Burnyeat's Papers on Skepticism

I just discovered that last year CUP published Explorations in Ancient and Modern Philosophy, a two-volume work that collects Myles Burnyeat's papers on ancient and modern philosophy. The first volume contains his papers on skepticism.

On Sosa and Skepticism

Springer recently published Virtuous Thoughts: The Philosophy of Ernest Sosa, edited by John Turri. Two of the contributions deal with skepticism, namely, John Greco's "Reflective Knowledge and the Pyrrhonian Problematic," and Baron Reed's "Historical Reflections: Sosa’s Perspective on the Epistemological Tradition."

The New Atheism and Its Critics

The latest issue of Midwest Studies in Philosophy is devoted to the so-called "New Atheism". It features contributions by Gary Gutting, Richard Fumerton, and Jonathan Kvanvig, among several others. It's definitely a debate worth reading.

Two Recent Papers on Ancient Skepticism

A few days ago, I received copies of these two papers by Ramón Román Alcalá:

"Evidencias del escepticismo de Diógenes Laercio en el libro IX de sus Vidas," Estudios filosóficos 61 (2012): 69-82.

"La invención de una 'escuela escéptica' pirrónica y radical," Revista de filosofía 37 (2012): 111-130.

Review of In Praise of Reason

My review of Michael Lynch's In Praise of Reason (MIT Press, 2012) recently appeared in Philosophy in Review. As expected, Lynch's defense of the value of reason against skepticism does not strike me as successful.