Wittgenstein on Self-knowledge

Abstract

I want to examine some features of the sort of putative knowledge which persons may be said to have of themselves in Wittgenstein's later philosophy-especially in the Philosophical Investigations. I am primarily interested in one sort of putative self-knowledge in this essay. Wherever we have a first-person present-tense use of a psychological verb or verbal phrase, and one might conceivably be said to know that the verb applies truly in one's own case, issues arise over whether this really is knowledge. Now the following view is attributed to Wittgenstein by a number of philosophers, including Anthony Kenny, whose interpretation I shall scrutinize here.' In the case of 'I know that I am in pain', it is claimed Wittgenstein holds that this sort of utterance is an abuse of language, or, in a non-linguistic version, that Wittgenstein holds that I cannot know that I am in pain. It is in the spirit of such interpreters that this supposed view of Wittgenstein's is not to be confined to pain. In what follows, I shall argue that on Wittgenstein's view as expressed in various later texts self-knowledge of the sort we are considering is a possibility, in a way not allowed by the interpretation at issue. Moreover, Wittgenstein's actual view helps bring out some important features of such self-knowledge. I shall now discuss the two main passages in the Investigations usually invoked by those who hold the interpretation I am criticizing: section 246 and a set of remarks on page 222.2 These passages, invoked by Kenny, deserve comment independently of examination of other features of his position. The interpretation at issue usually involves construing in isolation the sentences of section 246 of the Investigations 'It can't be said of me at all (except perhaps as a joke) that I know I am in pain. What is it supposed to mean-except perhaps that I am in pain?' On my reading, the first paragraph of 246 should be read as an exchange of views. Sometimes in the Investigations Wittgenstein presents what amount to interpersonal dialogues or perhaps expressions of jarring views which seem to recommend themselves to one person with conflicting inclinations. Often a