Attention and Practical Knowledge

Practical knowledge, in the sense made famous by G. E. M. Anscombe, is “the knowledge that a man has of his intentional actions”. This knowledge is very ordinary, but philosophically it is not easy to understand. One illuminating approach is to see practical knowledge as a kind of self-knowledge or self-consciousness. I offer an enrichment of this approach, by (1) exploiting Gilbert Ryle’s discussion of heeding (that is, paying attention), in particular paying attention to one’s own intentional action, and (2) constructing and applying a practical analogue of Kant’s apperceptive “I think”. Combining (1) and (2), I offer an argument for my main claim—paying attention to what one is doing is an exercise of practical self-consciousness – it is how practical self-consciousness gets “schematized”.
[1] Anscombe, G. E. M. 1957/63. Intention, second edition, Blackwell.
[2] Kant, Immanuel. 1781/87. Kritk der reinen Vernunft. Translated as Critique of Pure Reason, by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood, Cambridge University Press, 1998.
[3] Ryle, G. 1949. The Concept of Mind, Hutchinson.
[4] Wittgenstein, L. 1922. Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, translated by C. K. Ogden. Kegan Paul, 1922. Alternative translation by D. F. Pears and B. F. McGuinness, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1961/74.4.