G.C. Lichtenberg on Self-Consciousness and Personal Identity

Abstract

Abstract:

A Defence of Lichtenberg

“… 1 I do not claim this to be the only or the most exegetically accurate interpretation of Lichtenberg's objection to the cogito , though see Tester (2013) for a defence. As I am understanding it here, the dispute between the ‘Cartesian’ and the ‘Lichtenberg’ view rests on three substantive presuppositions: first, that we can be introspectively aware of our own mental states (or, equivalently, that there is such a thing as introspective awareness); second, that we can sensibly ask what one can know or justifiedly believe on the sole basis of introspective awareness (or, equivalently, that we can isolate the contribution of introspective awareness from that of other epistemic sources); third, that, even if forming the belief that one exists on the basis of one's introspective awareness of one's own conscious thinking is a reliable method for forming true beliefs, there remains a question as to whether the beliefs formed through this method are justified (or, equivalently, that there is a workable notion of epistemic justification that is not purely reliabilist).…”