Michel de Montaigne (1533 - 1592)

For Montaigne, skepticism is a liberating force which frees one from intellectual confinement to  a particular rigid set of ideas. There's no more likelihood that this is true than that that is true. we should never make any permanent commitment to any doctrines, but instead assume a perpetual attitude of inquiry. He believes that an attitude of construtive skepticism could help prevent fanaticism, dogmatism and their concomitant social ills. For him, to be a human is to consciously weigh alternatives and control one's behaviour through an act of judgment.