Contextualism and global doubts about the world

Several recent contextualist theorists (e.g. David Lewis, Michael Williams, and Keith DeRose) have proposed contextualizing the skeptic. Their claim i s that one should view satisfactory answers to global doubts regarding such subjects as the external world, other minds, and induction as requirements for justification in certain philosophical contexts, but not in everyday a nd scientific contexts. In contrast, the skeptic claims that a satisfactory answer to a global doubt in each of these areas is a context-invariant req uirement for justified belief. In this paper, I consider and reject the arg uments Michael Williams develops in his book Unnatural Doubts that are inte nded to show that the skeptic's interpretation of the significance of globa l doubts is mistaken. In addition, I argue that Williams' general strategy in opposing the skeptic is extremely interesting and worth further investig ation, even if his particular execution of it is unsuccessful. To this end, I clarify the general strategy, distinguish it from a variety of others, a nd discuss its prospects as an answer to the skeptic.