1857.What Gamwell

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What Gamwell does, in effect, is to show that there is a metaphysics of distinctively human existence and an ethics corresponding thereto. This he does by transcendental arguments from any claim to moral validity to its meta-ethical implications or presuppositions, which cannot be denied consistently with making or implying any such claim. He then shows how these meta-ethical implications or presuppositions in turn imply a minimal ethics, i.e., the universal formative principle of communicative respect, which is articulated in certain universal human liberties/rights/duties, public as well as private, as well as a democratic form of government. in all t!zeir actions and utterances they are potential participants in a discussion" (quoted in "The Purpose of Human Rights," Process Studies 29, 2 [Fall-Winter 2000]: 332; italics added).

But, surely, the same conclusion could-and, arguably, should-be reached by arguing, not from moral validity claims in particular, but from any validity claims whatever-as Apel appears to confirm when he says, "All beings who are capable of linguistic communication must be recognized as persons since

26 December 2002