11 Facts About Aenesidemus

Aenesidemus was a Greek Pyrrhonist philosopher, born in Knossos on the island of Crete.

Aenesidemus lived in the 1st century BC, taught in Alexandria and flourished shortly after the life of Cicero.

Photius says Aenesidemus was a member of Plato's Academy, but he came to dispute their theories, adopting Pyrrhonism instead.

Whether Aenesidemus re-founded the Pyrrhonist school or merely revitalized it is unknown.

Aenesidemus says that the Academics are doctrinaire: they posit some things with confidence and unambiguously deny others.

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Aenesidemus goes on in the same discourse, the first, to report in summary outline the entire way of life of the Pyrrhonists.

Aenesidemus is considered the creator of the ten modes of Aenesidemus —although whether he invented the tropes or just systematized them from prior Pyrrhonist works is unknown.

Aenesidemus argues that experiences vary infinitely under circumstances whose importance to one another cannot be accurately judged by human observers.

Aenesidemus therefore rejects any concept of absolute knowledge of reality, since each person has different perceptions, and they arrange their sense-gathered data in methods specific to themselves.

Aenesidemus was able to assert the co-existence of contrary qualities in the same object by admitting that contraries co-exist for the perceiving subject.

Unlike other Pyrrhonists who reported that following Pyrrho's prescription contained in the Aristocles passage produced ataraxia, Aenesidemus is reported to have claimed that it produces pleasure.