So sehr die Grundfragen menschlichen Zusammenlebens und damit zunehmend auch die Fragen der Bioethik inzwischen globale Probleme geworden sind, findet die Verstandigung uber sie insbesondere auch in der Bioethik doch nicht ohne Kontext, sondern in konkreter lebensweltlicher Einbettung statt. DAs Gegensatzpaar "Normkultur / Nutzenkultur" bezeichnet dabei eine konflikttrachtige Grundpolaritat moderner Lebenswelten, die in dem vorliegenden Band erstmals phanomenologisch, aber auch unter normativem Aspekt wie unter Einbeziehung der Perspektive der beteiligten Wissenschaften dargestellt wird. DIe Beitrage aus den Bereichen Philosophie, Theologie, Recht, (...) Medizin und Naturwissenschaften zeigen die Fruchtbarkeit dieses Ansatzes in empirischer wie in systematischer Hinsicht auf. AUsgewiesene Autoren geben zugleich pragnante Antworten auf bedrangende Fragen, die der biotechnologische Fortschritt fur den Staat, die Gesellschaft und den einzelnen aufwerfen muss. (shrink)

The concept of metaphysics has undergone a significant change in the last 200 years. Beginning with Kant, there is a development in which “metaphysics” is no longer understood as a philosophical discipline but as a personal disposition which rather is an object of philosophical reflexion. For Wittgenstein and Heidegger, this has been the starting point of their understanding of the task and the end of the activity called philosophizing. For both thinkers, philosophy depends on an initial presupposition which, in order (...) to reach the result to which it is devoted, must be substantially revised within the process of philosophical thinking. And the term by which they designate that prejudice is “metaphysics”. I want to point out the genuine temporal aspect of both thinkers’ explication of this essential constellation of the philosophical activity. (shrink)

The author defends the anti-representationalist claim that the formation of the proper names (and as a consequence – scientific terms or notions) cannot happen through certain ostensive pointing at some objects given here and now (like in B. Russell’s theory) or through perceptions which are generalized inductively or by means of Kantian apperception or Anschauung. In order to answer the question about the concepts formation we have to take into account the historical and socio-cultural background of the genesis of proper (...) names which form the foundation and boundary of all classifications including the scientific ones. The author claims that there is an important difference between a personal belief or propositional knowledge and some implicit or background knowledge of the language community in its historical development. The first one could be evaluated on its truth / falseness. The second one however – being the foundation for the first one – cannot be evaluated in this manner. It simply is as it is. (shrink)