Questions whether the logic of language underlying Habermas's theory of communicative action is in fact the defining feature of conversational practice.

For a writing to be a writing it must continue to "act" and to be readable even when what is called the author of the writing no longer answers for what he has written, for what he seems to have signed, be it because of a temporary absence, because he is dead or, more generally, because he has not employed his absolutely actual and present intention or attention, the plenitude of his desire to say what he means, in order to (...) sustain what seems to be written "in his name" (Derrida 1988, p. 8). Ein Buch ist ein spiegel; wenn ein Affe hineinguckt, so kann freilich kein Apostel heraussehen (A book is a mirror; if an ape peers into it an apostle will never peer out.) (Lichtenberg 1949, p. 297). (shrink)

A central supposition of the "communicative ethics controversy" in modern social theory has been either that there exist universal standards against which we can judge the validity of speech and moral argumentation or, conversely, that there are no determinate standards to which moral claims can be held answerable, and hence no methods by which disputes over contested claims can rationally be resolved. In this paper it is argued that the basic terms of this debate are miscast. The "order without rules" (...) thesis maintains both that the search for universal standards of valid moral arguments is likely to end in disappointment, and that nonetheless there are discoverable methods by which arguments are evaluated, facts constituted, and disputes settled, and for which appeals to general standards of validity are neither requested nor forthcoming. Wittgenstein's numerous remarks on rules and rule following are considered in support of this thesis. (shrink)