Full Idea
If I obtain my conception of pain from pain that I experience, then it will be a part of my conception of pain that I am the only being that can experience it. For me it will be contradiction to speak of another's pain.
Gist of Idea
If my conception of pain derives from me, it is a contradiction to speak of another's pain
Source
Norman Malcolm (Wittgenstein's 'Philosophical Investigations' [1954]), quoted by Alvin Plantinga - De Re and De Dicto p.44
Book Reference
Plantinga,Alvin: 'Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality' [OUP 2003], p.44
A Reaction
This obviously has the private language argument in the background. It seems to point towards a behaviourist view, that I derive pain from external behaviour in the first instance. So how do I connect the behaviour to the feeling?