Examining the Possibility of Refuting Philosophical Skepticism by Accepting Semantic Externalism

According to semantic externalism, the meaning of some words and thus the content of some of our mental states is determined at least partly by features of the external world. For the first time, Putnam has tried to argue that accepting externalism leads to the rejection of skepticism about the external world. However, it is widely argued that this argument does not work; therefore, some philosophers have tried to provide an alternative argument that, by accepting the semantic externalism approach, will succeed in rejecting skepticism about the external world. Nevertheless, these arguments are subject to further criticisms. In this paper, I attempt to develop some arguments to show that none of these externalist arguments succeed in rejecting skepticism. On the other hand, using the basic idea of skepticism in rejecting the possibility of acquiring knowledge, I suggest a new externalist argument on which basis it can be correctly claimed that skepticism is an untenable position.