Transparency, sense and self-knowledge

Tom Stoneham

pp. 103-112

in: John Biró, Petr Kotatko (eds), Frege, Berlin, Springer, 1995

Abstract

0. If you understand me, then you know what I am saying, that is, you know what my words (and sentences) mean. Understanding is an epistemic notion roughly equivalent to knowledge of meaning. The philosophy of language is particularly interested in this kind of knowledge, concentrating much energy on the question: what is it for someone to know what a sentence means? In this paper I am going to concentrate upon one particular aspect of that project, namely the question of whether knowledge of meaning is epistemologically distinguished.