Pyrrhonism Glossary

Many of the definitions of Pyrrhonist terms here reference Buddhist terms that correspond to the Pyrrhonist terms. This should be understood to mean that the terms have functional similarities, not necessarily identical meanings.

• Acatalepsia - not graspable, incomprehensible. The term is a denial of the Stoic concept of katalepsis, i.e., that one could have assured, accurate perceptions of things. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of Sunyata.
• Adiaphora - logical differentia that allows firm categorization do not exist. Corresponds with Buddhist concept of anatta.
• Adoxstous - to be without belief. Corresponds with Buddhist concepts of amoha and right view.
• Aklineis - to be uninclined. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of advesha.
• Akradantous - to be indifferent. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of alobha.
• Aphasia - non-assertion. In Pyrrhonist practice this can mean either an experience where one stops making claims about anything, or a more psychologically shocking experience where for a time one does not want to say anything. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of stilling the mind.
• Aporia - to be bewildered or at an intellectual impasse. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of not knowing.
• Aporetic - an approach to Pyrrhonist practice that emphasizes creating competing arguments in order to induce aporia and consequently epoché.
• Academic Skepticism - A derivative branch from Pyrrhonism that engages in negative dogmatism, asserting that knowledge is impossible and that one should go by what arguments seem most truth-like.
• Aneprikita - unfixed, undecidable. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of anicca.
• Appearances - the world as we experience it. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of form and conventional truth, one of the two parts of the Two Truths Doctrine.
• Astathmeta - unstable, unbalanced, not measurable. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of dukkha. This correspondence leaves out the aspect of dukkha representing suffering or unsatisfactoriness and includes only the aspect representing instability, for example, as in a cart with a bent axle is unstable.
• Ataraxia - the mental state of not being perturbed. To be without anxiety. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of nirvana.
• Criterion of truth - the standard by which one can determine the truth. This criterion does not exist, except with regard to correspondence. The problem of its nonexistence is known as the problem of the criterion, the solution to which is Pyrrhonism.
• Criterion of action - the standards by which Pyrrhonists make decisions given that truth is unknown.
• Cure by argument - the Pyrrhonist technique of setting arguments against each other in order to induce aporia.
• Dogma - beliefs about non-evident matters. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of delusion.
• Empiric School - an early school of medicine closely associated with Pyrrhonism. Their approach to medicine was the forerunner of modern empiricism.
• Ephectic - an approach to Pyrrhonist practice that emphasizes going directly to epoché.
• Epoché - suspension of judgment.
• Equipollence - equality as regards credibility and the lack of it, that is, that no belief (dogma) takes precedence over any other as being more credible.
• Evident - what can be observed about the appearances. Contrast with non-evident.
• Eudaimonia - a happy, fulfilled life. Corresponds with the Buddhist concept of enlightenment
• Non-evident - things that cannot be observed in the appearances, such as theories and speculations.
• Pathe - disturbing emotions such as anger and envy.
• Zeztetic - an approach to Pyrrhonist practice that emphasizes avoiding belief formation through on-going investigation.