The Adventures of Transcendental Philosophy: Karl-Otto Apel’s Semiotics and Discourse Ethics

Karl-Otto Apel is one of the most important German philosophers of the 20th century, but his work is still inadequately treated throughout much of the world. In this volume, critical theory scholar Eduardo Mendieta examines the philosophical origins of discourse ethics through the prism of Apel’s thought. Mendieta finds that Apel fundamentally transformed German philosophy, which had become stagnant in the years before World War II, and deeply influenced later thinkers such as Jurgen Habermas. Apel’s turn toward pragmatism and analytic philosophy helped him bring the concept of a linguistic paradigm shift to Germany.