Reporting, Describing, Confessing, Narrating, Interrogating, and Silence

This chapter looks at the consequences of recalling the tetralemma and of considering the nature of things as undifferentiated, unstable, and undecided. Pyrrho’s few fragments indicate that this consequence is most simply that reality, whatever its form, can only be “apprehended” in a passive and non-committal manner. This means restricting oneself to reporting, describing, confessing, narrating, and interrogating that which is under consideration. Once these acts have fulfilled their need, then silence can only ensue because without fixed and stable differentiae dictating how things occur in human logical terms, reality most simply appears both bizarre and vertiginous leaving everyone speechless. This passive, non-committal, and silent “apprehension” of reality does not imply, in turn, living recklessly or in a state of stupor. Pyrrho avoided precipices in his life. This tells us that his passivity and lack of commitment do not, in turn, exclude an instrumental use of both reasoned and rational human logic.