Grice's razor and Moore's gambit

In this dissertation I defend and apply two principles, which I call 'Grice's Razor' and 'Moore's Gambit'. The first enjoins us to prefer simpler pragmatic explanations of linguistic phenomena to more complex semantic explanations of those phenomena. The second enjoins us to reject arguments whose conclusions offend our ordinary intuitions, on reflection, to a far greater degree than the denial of any of the premises.; Skepticism (which says that we don't know the propositions in question) and fictionalism (which says that the propositions in questions aren't true) are rejected with Moore's argument from "Four Forms of Skepticism"---I am more certain that I do know that 2+2=4 (or that 2+2 is 4) than that any of the skeptic's/fictionalist's premises are true.; We are, of course, at pains to explain why skepticism presents us with a problem in the first place. A crucial insight from Moore is that a belief can be epistemically justified without being justifiable in argument or conversation (as Moore says of his belief that he is not dreaming). A crucial insight from Grice is that in certain cases a proposition may seem true when it is in fact merely assertible (it would not be strange to find that it seems false, at least prior to reflection, that I got into bed and took off my trousers, if in fact I took the trousers off before I got into bed).; These insights explain the appeal of some common skeptical worries. It might be inappropriate to say 'I know I have hands' in some skeptical contexts, and this may generate the intuition that it would be false to say it. Such an intuition might be strengthened by the observation that the proposition that I have hands can be given no defense in argument. But given the two insights mentioned, these facts give us no reason to think that I do not know. My knowledge, however, may be unspeakable and indefensible (in some contexts). I defend this view in the dissertation and respond to some objections to it.