Other I’s, communication, and the second person

Why do we think there are other self-conscious about, other thinkers of ‘I’ thoughts, other possessors of a first-person perspective? What is the most basic manifestation of our grip on their existence? This paper develops an answer to these questions summarised under the heading: Second Person Communication Claim (SPCC), which says: Our grip on the idea that other self-conscious subjects exist is rooted in our capacity to enter into particular kinds of communicative relations with others, in which we adopt attitudes of mutual address and think of each other as ‘you’. If the SPCC is right, our grip on the existence and nature of other I’s, and on their relation to ourselves, rests essentially on a practical capacity to treat others as partners in conversation, addressors and addressees, with all that this entails. This contrasts with the traditional approach to other minds, on which our knowledge and thought of others rests on observation and is essentially third personal and theoretical.