Münchhausen Trilemma
Also known as: Agrippa's Trilemma
Formulated by Agrippa the Skeptic (100)
Definition
A fundamental problem in epistemology demonstrating that any attempt to justify a claim of knowledge inevitably leads to one of three unsatisfactory outcomes: infinite regress (each proof requires further proof, ad infinitum), circular reasoning (the proof eventually relies on itself), or dogmatic assertion (the proof rests on an accepted axiom that is not itself proven). Originally derived from the five tropes of Agrippa the Skeptic (c. 1st century CE), the concept was formalized as a trilemma by German philosopher Hans Albert in 1968 in his Treatise on Critical Reason. The name 'Münchhausen' alludes to Baron Münchhausen, who allegedly pulled himself out of a swamp by his own hair, a metaphor for the impossibility of self-grounding justification.