Discourse Ethics as a Response to the Novel Challenges of Today's Reality to Coresponsibility

Abstract

The two main classes of novel problems may be characterized, it seems to me, as follows. First, there are problems that are completely novel in so far as they are brought about only by the present stage of civilization, that is, of human sociocultural evolution. Second, there are problems that are not completely novel, as we may recognize finally, but we are brought to full awareness of their relevance only now, that is, in connection with the realization of the first class of problems. In what follows I will first elucidate what I mean by the first class of problems, which appear to be completely novel in our time. Then, in the second part of my article, I will try to show that the second class of problems, which are not completely novel, take on a novel quality as a consequence of the rise of the first class of problems. Thus, it will turn out that both classes of novel problems imply a challenge to ethics to which most of our current types of philosophical ethics cannot provide a response. Finally, in the third part of my article, I will introduce the transcendentalpragmatic foundation of discourse ethics, and I will try to show that it may eventually provide a response to precisely those challenges that are posed by the novel problems of global justice and coresponsibility that are raised by our present-day reality.