Begins with Barry Stroud’s reconstruction of Descartes’s dream argument; lays out the critique of the argument that emerges from what Austin wrote in “Other Minds”; describes the long-standing consensus on how, and why, Austin’s way with skepticism goes wrong; shows how poorly this consensus view, of why Austin wrote as he did, fits with what Austin said about why he wrote as he did; explains how Austin’s requirement, that our epistemology be faithful to what we would ordinarily say and do, is properly to be understood, and why he endorsed it; defends Austin’s fidelity requirement against the charge that it fails to take proper account of (i) our failure to agree on what we would ordinarily say, (ii) the pragmatic factors that influence what we ordinarily say, (iii) the attitude of philosophical detachment with which epistemology is conducted, and (iv) the role intuitions play in epistemology.
