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[English Version] Transzendentalpragmatik, ein im Rahmen seiner auf Intersubjektivität gegründeten Moralkonzeption entwickelter Begriff Karl-Otto Apels, der die philos. Reflexion auf die Geltungsbedingungen des Argumentierens bezeichnet. In der T. findet mit den Mitteln einer Theorie des Sprach- und Zeichenhandelns die »Transformation« transzendentaler Argumente statt: Zielt in der Transzendentalphilosophie I. Kants mit der »Kopernikanischen Wende« die Frage nach den Bedingungen a priori der Mögli…

[English Version] ist ein von I. Kant geprägter Kunstterminus zur Charakterisierung seines methodischen Ansatzes einer Vernunftkritik (Vernunft). Während sich der ältere Ausdruck »transzendental« bereits von den Transzendent(al)ien, den grundlegenden Bestimmungen der Wirklichkeit, in der ma. Ontologie herleitet, ist mit T. eine zw. Erkenntnistheorie und Ontologie stehende philos. Erkenntnis gemeint, »die sich nicht sowohl mit Gegenständen,…

[German Version] Philosophy of…

[German Version] Despite discussion of the problem of culture since antiquity, cultural philosophy is an acquisition of the modern era; it began as a radical criticism of culture in the 18th century. With their attention to everything made by humans (language, science, technology, political institutions, arts), J.-J. Rousseau and the direct contemporaries of the 18th-century Enlightenment and the 19th-century critique of the Enlightenment also emphasize the historicality of humanity. Rousseau assumes conformity with a law operating like a discernible law of nature: to ¶ the same degree that culture advances, morality regresses. Against the denatured human corrupted by the luxury of culture, Rousseau conjures up the idea of the unspoiled natural human. For I. Kant this law, formulated in 1750, of the reciprocity of cultural development and moral laxity, constitutes, first of all, the solution of the problem of theodicy, in that it takes the human being as solely responsible for his/her moral corruption. But it was not long before its dualism of nature and culture lost its power to convince him. In the writings of the 1880s and in his Kritik der Urtheilskraft ( KdU; 1790; E…

[German Version] is a term and concept developed by Karl-Otto Apel in the context of his conception of morality based on intersubjectivity; it denotes philosophical reflection on the validity conditions of argumentation. In transcendental pragmatics, a “transformation” of transcendental arguments takes place through a theory of linguistic and symbolic action: in the transcendental philosophy of I. Kant with its “Copernican revolution,” the question of the a priori con…

[German Version] I. Theoretical Philosophy – II. Practical Philosophy – III. Esthetics and Nature Teleology (Apr 22, 1724, Königsberg – Feb 12, 1804, Königsberg), German philosopher whose thought on the critique of reason marks the high point of the Enlightenment and the origin of German Idealism. Kant saw ¶ his epoch as the “real age of criticism, to which everything must submit” ( Kritik der reinen Vernunft, AA 4, XI, note; ET: Critique of Pure Reason, 1881), even religion and legislation. The only auth…

[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Ethics – III. Psychology – IV. Law I. Philosophy Judgment (Lat. iudicium, Fr. jugement, Ger. Urteil) is the intellectual decision (I) that concludes the process of opinion formation or cognition. It may (b…

[German Version] (Lat. gustus/ sapor; Fr. goût; Ger. Geschmack) is the ability to discern pleasure and displeasure. Originally limited to the physical sense of tasting, since antiquity the term has been applied figuratively to perception, judgment, speech, and conduct (e.g. M.T. Cicero). In the mid-17th century, it was discussed in ethics (Gracián, French moralist literature); in the 18th century, it became a central concept of aesthetics (I) throughout Europe. Advanced theories of epistemology grounded it in the sensuality of the imagination (A. Baumgarte…

[German Version] According to I. Kant, the categorical imperative stands for the unconditionally valid moral commandment to heed the general appropriateness of one's actions: “Act only according to that maxim that you could also want to become a universal law” ( Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten [1785], Akademie-Ausgabe [AA] IV, 421; ET: Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 1997). As early as …

[German Version] (Lat. ingenium/genius; Fr. génie) is the capacity for creative discovery and production. In analogy to G.W. Leibniz's notion of the divine choice of possible worlds, genius was characterized in the 18th century as the releaser of unrealized possibilities. Through the concept of genius with its productive power of imagination (Imagination, Power of), the aesthetics (I) of the 18th century valued the naturally given, spontaneous and emotionally accented facility for creativity above th…

[German Version] from Greek κρίνειν/ krínein, “distinguish, decide, judge,” is methodical evaluation based on well-founded criteria. In everyday usage, the word is identified with negative assessment; in philosophical usage, however, it denotes the weighing of both positive and negative values and the discussion of validity claims. The ancient Greeks already distinguished epistemological, practical (political), and philological concepts of criticism (Pre-Socr…

[German Version] is an artificial technical term coined by I. Kant to characterize his methodological approach to a critique of reason. While the earlier expression transcendental derived from the transcendentals, the fundamental properties of reality in medieval ontology, transcendental philosophy refers to a form of philosophical cognition, between epistemology and ¶ ontology, “that is occupied not with objects but with the way that we can possibly know objects even before we experience them” ( KrV, 21787, 43). As a philosophy of “pure, merely specu…

[German Version] (Jul 28, 1874, Breslau – Apr 13, 1945, New York), Germa…

[English Version] I. Philosophisch Ph. (griech. ϕαn̆τασι´α/phantasi´a, lat. phantasia; lat./engl./franz. imaginatio[n], »Erscheinung, Bewußtseinsbild, Vorstellung«; vgl; auch griech. ϕα´n̆τασμα/pha´ntasma, »Erscheinung, Traumbild, Vision«) ist die in Erinnerung und Neuschöpfung wie im Traum dominierende bildhafte Vorstellungskraft, deren elementare Leistung aber auch an wiss. Erkenntnis, technischer Erfindung und künstlerischem Schaffen mitwirkt. Die Philos. setzt sich seit der Antike im Kontext erkenntnistheor…

[English Version] I. Philosophisch W. ist ein Urteil, in dem etwas als wertvoll oder wertlos eingeschätzt wird. Im Unterschied zum Tatsachenurteil als auf Fakten bezogene deskriptive Behauptung mit dem Anspruch auf wiss. beweisbare Objektivität stellt das W. als…

[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Theology I. Philosophy Aesthetics is the discipline concerned with reflective perception, feelings, and the beautiful in nature and art. The discussion of “aesthetics” has used this term, however, only in the modern era. In the context of metaphysics and ontology, epistemology and practical philosophy, poetics and rhetoric, however, the …

[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Practical Theology I. Philosophy Irony (from Gk εἰρωνεία/ eironeía, “dissimilation,” attested since the 4th cent. bce; Lat. dissimulatio) is disingenuous speech for the purpose of demonstrative exposure or derisive goading: through the expressive characterization of ambiguity, the opposite of what is meant is said. Rectification through reversal is the method of irony, which is employed as an aesthetic means, in the broader sense, of gaining reflexive distance in philosophy, politics, literature and in the service of cognition and moral critique. In the context of philosophy, Plato makes fruitful use of irony, already described in ancient rhetoric, in Socrates's critical maieutics (“the art of midwifery”): through naive questions asked in feigned ignorance, the philosopher requires his discussion partner to examine his (apparent) certitudes. Cicero uses irony as a means of expression in political rhetoric, and in modern literature it becomes a narrative perspective (Cervantes, W. Shakespeare, Romanticism, H. Heine, T. Mann, and many others). In difference from F. Schlegel and others who reflected on romantic irony as a philosophical principle of poetry for the purpose of raising something above all contingency, G.W.F. Hegel rejected it as infinitely absolute negativity and mere empty subjectivism. S. Kierkegaard strengthened this critique for religious and ethical motives, but recognized the truth of Socratic irony. His distinction between …

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[German Version] I. Philosophy A value judgment is a judgment by which something is assessed as valuable or valueless. In contrast to the judgment of fact, which co…

[German Version] I. Philosophy The expression the sublime (Ger. das Erhabene) refers to our experience of objects that by virtue of their greatness (physical or metaphysical), power, or perfection make us conscious of our own exaltation, often with an accompanying awareness of the limits of our own capacity. In the debate with poetic enthusiasm (I) in antiquity, the sublime was discussed using the term ὕψος ( hýpsos, “height”) as a category of poetics and rhetoric (I): in ¶ the works of writers like Plato, Aristotle, Aristophanes, and Pseudo-Longinus, the issue was the functional adequacy of the techniques used by language to elevate or exalt the soul. The sublime attracted the greatest attention in the 18th century, with its increased interest in questions of aesthetics. In the works of writers like Lord Shaftesbury (the Younger), Joseph Addison (1672–1719), E. Burke, I. Kant, and J.C.F. v. Schiller, it denotes the object of an aesthetic feeling contrasting with pure and serene delight in beauty of form – an overpowering feeling of fascination and awe, which …