The Problem of the Skeptical Regress means to trace the reason of an argument recursively. It could be endless. Therefore, it is a problem.
To solve Skeptical Regress problem, we have three ways,
Example:
I assure you that somking is bad for your health. The surgeon general has shown that it is bad for your health(Cited Authority).
If you trust the authority, then, that’s fine. But if you have to be careful about the authority.
I believe that…
I think that…
“Nonsense!” : Get you to believe what you said is nonsense by abusing you.
“Nobody but a fool would think that…”
“Everybody knows that” : somebody is a dummy if he does not know the thing
“It’s just common sense that…” : You are telling someone that if he deny that he lacks of common sense.
So, if you don’t want to hurt other people’s feeling, be careful with these expressions.
The idea of guarding is make your premises weaker.
Example,
We should not build any nuclear power plants because they will explode. (Unjustified argument)
We should not build any new nuclear power plants because some of them might explode. (weaker)
We should not build any nuclear power plants, because I believe that some of them might explode. () even weaker).
By weak the premises, you make it more likely to be ture and less subject to objection.
Three ways to do guarding:
Use weaker terms: All $\Rightarrow$ Most $\Rightarrow$ Many $\Rightarrow$ Some.
Use probability terms: Probably, Possibly, likely and so on.
I know something something..
I believe something something..
Discounting is citing a possible criticism in order to reject it or counter it.
For example,
The ring is expensive, but it is beautiful. (This sentence does four things.)
But indicates that the sentence after is more important. You are discounting the objection.
Functions of discounting terms
But, Although, Even if, Even Though, Whereas, Nevertheless, Nonetheless…
The trick of discounting straw people
One advantage of using discounting objection is that, you get to lead the objections. This trick could make people could not see the problem with your position. Distract them !
For example, you might say,
I have 5 objections that I’m gonna respond to,
You might say this bla bla, however…
You might say that bla bla, but…
…
Then, you get to pick easy objections. The audiences might forget some hard questions.
Evaluation language is also used to stop the skeptical regress.
For example,
A member of Congress could say “You should support my budget plan because it will be good for the country.”
The premise is made more defensible here because specific standards aren’t being applied.
Two different people could agree that the budget plan will be good, but for completely different reasons.
One person may find it to be fiscally responsible while another may like the fact that it benefits a
pet project. They each agree that the plan is “good.”
The word “good” could mean meet the standards, “bad” mean not meet the standards. But it is very vague that it does not claim what is the standard. It just implies by the context.
This makes the claim more defensible since our standards cannot be questioned if they are not presented.
Reason Maker = R
Conclusion Maker = C
Assuring Term = A
Guarding Term = G
Discounting Term = D
Positive Evaluative Term = E+
Negative Evaluative Term = E-