Tacit Knowledge: A Wittgensteinian Approach by Zhenhua Yu

In the ongoing discussion of tacit knowing/knowledge, the Scandinavian Wittgensteinians are a very active force. In close connection with the Swedish Center for Working Life in Stockholm, their work provides us with a wonderful example of the fruitful collaboration between philosophical reflection and empirical research. In the Wittgensteinian approach to the problem of tacit knowing/knowledge, Kell S. Johannessen is the leading figure. In addition, philosophers like Harald Grimen, Bengt Molander and Allan Janik also make contributions to the discussion in their own ways. In this paper, I will try to clarify the main points of their contribution to the discussion of tacit knowing/knowledge.

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Johannessen observes:

It has in fact been recognized in various camps that propositional knowledge, i.e, knowledge expressible by some kind of linguistic means in a propositional form, is not the only type of knowledge that is scientifically relevant. Some have, therefore, even if somewhat reluctantly, accepted that it might be legitimate to talk about knowledge also in cases where it is not possible to articulate it in full measure by proper linguistic means.

Johannessen, using Polanyi’s terminology, calls the kind of knowledge that cannot be fully articulated by verbal means tacit knowledge.