Paradox

WITTGENSTEIN AND THE DEPTH OF A GRAMMATICAL JOKE 339Wittgenstein also challenges the assumption that “pain”refers to anything. He suggests that “I have headache” doesnot report a headache; it expresses pain like a groan. Insteadof clutching your forehead in misery, you substitute a pieceof verbal behavior. “The paradox disappears only if we makea radical break with the idea that language always functionsin one way, always serves the same purpose; to conveythoughts—which may be about houses, pains, good and evil,or anything else you please.” (1958, 304) Wittgensteinencourages the development of alternatives to his avowaltheory of “pain.” Wittgenstein’s point is not to substitute aphilosophical theory with another philosophical theory. Hedoes not trace philosophy’s problems merely to the choice offalse premises. Wittgenstein thinks the real problem is thatwe feel compelled to choose premises.THE RELEVANCE OF LINGUISTIC ODDITYThe Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson was fond of a littlegirl who complained about being born on Christmas Day.Instead of receiving presents on two days of the year, she onlyreceived them on one. In his will, Stevenson bequeathed thegirl his own birthday. He appended the following clause: “If,however, she fails to use this bequest properly, all rights shallpass to the President of the United States.”Stevenson’s “bequest” shows that a birthday is not apossession that can be transferred. This moral resemblesphilosophical remarks about limits. A philosopher who isfaced with the problem of other minds remarks, “I cannotfeel your pain.” It is helpful to compare the deep privacy ofpain to the shallow privacy of birthdays.