The thesis undertakes a comparative critical analysis of ancient Greek Pyrrhonism and the Madhyamaka school of Buddhism in light of their skeptical underpinnings. The first part will highlight the historical context of the influence of the ancient Indian skeptics on the development of early Buddhism and the subsequent influence of skepticism in early Buddhism on the Madhyamaka school, following which the historical contact between India and Greece and the consequent influence of ancient Indian and Buddhist skepticism on the development of the Western Pyrrhonist thought will be investigated. The second part will address Pyrrho and Nāgārjuna, after which a comparative analysis of Pyrrhonism and Madhyamaka will be carried out. In the last part, I will engage with Brons' article Life Without Belief: A Madhyamaka Defense of the Livability of Pyrrhonism in order to consider the eudaimonist objection against the livability of Pyrrhonism, in regard to which I will attempt to argue that the ethical dimensions of Pyrrhonism and the Madhyamaka are not mutually analogous and thus the eudaimonist objection against the livability of Pyrrhonism cannot be refuted by appeal to Madhyamaka.
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