Pyrrho of Elis
c. 360-270 BCE · Hellenistic Philosophy · Prominent
Pyrrho founded the ancient Greek skeptical tradition later named Pyrrhonism, and his advice was to stop deciding. Things are undecidable by nature, so nothing settles what they are in themselves or how to judge them. Hold off, and the strain of needing to be right lets go. That calm, ataraxia, was the point of the exercise. You go on eating when hungry and following the customs around you.
Signature
The position Pyrrho is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain
- Knowledge
- Skepticism
Positions on the 2 axes the sources answer
- Truth
- leans Subjective (29 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain (0 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
18 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Pyrrho refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Agnosticism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Highest Good
- Peace
What is the highest good? - Good and Evil
- No Real Distinction
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Knowledge
- Skepticism
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Language
- Conventional
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Role of Emotion
- Obstacle to Reason
What is the proper role of emotion?