In Understanding and Explanation: A Transcendental-Pragmatic Perspective, Apel reformulated the difference between understanding (Verstehen) and explanation (Erklärung), which originated in the hermeneutics of Wilhelm Dilthey and interpretive sociology of Max Weber, on the basis of a Peircean-inspired transcendental-pragmatic account of language. This account of the "lifeworld" would become an element of the theory of communicative action[5] and discourse ethics, which Apel co-developed with Jürgen Habermas. Strategic rationality both claim to stand in need of communicative rationality that is seen as, in several regards, more fundamental.[6] While sympathetic to Habermas's Theory of Communicative Action, Apel has been critical of aspects of Habermas's approach. Apel has proposed that a theory of communication should be grounded in the transcendental-pragmatic conditions of communication. After taking his point of departure from Apel, Habermas has moved towards a "weak transcendentalism" that is more closely tied to empirical social inquiry.
Apel also wrote works on Charles Sanders Peirce and is a past president of the C. S. Peirce Society.
An early German-speaking adversary of so-called critical rationalism, Apel published a critique of the philosophy of Karl Popper: In Transformation der Philosophie (1973), Apel charged Popper with being guilty of, amongst other things, a pragmatic contradiction.[7][8]
From the 1970s to the 1990s, Apel influenced other philosophers writing in Europe, the Americas, and Asia. Apel died on 15 May 2017 at the age of 95.[9][10]
List of works
Analytic Philosophy of Language and the Geisteswissenschaften (1967)
Hermeneutik und Ideologiekritik (1971)
Sprache, Brücke und Hindernis (1972)
Dialog als Methode (1972)
Transformation der philosophie: Sprachanalytik, Semiotik, Hermeneutik (1973)
Transformation der philosophie: Das Apriori der Kommunikationsgemeinschaft (1976)
Sprachpragmatik und philosophie (1976)
Neue Versuche über Erklären und Verstehen (1978)
Die Erklären/Verstehen-Kontroverse in Transzendentalpragmatischer Sicht (1979)
Towards a Transformation of Philosophy (1980 & 1998)
Charles S. Peirce: From Pragmatism to Pragmaticism (1981)
Understanding and Explanation: A Transcendental-Pragmatic Perspective (1984)
La comunicazione umana (1985)
Diskurs und Verantwortung: Das Problem des Übergangs zur Postkonventionellen Moral (1988)
Towards a Transcendental Semiotics: Selected Essays (1994)
Ethics and the Theory of Rationality: Selected Essays (1996)
Filosofia analitica e filosofia continentale (1997)
From a Transcendental-Semiotic Point of View (1998)
Mercier Lectures: "The Response of Discourse Ethics to the Moral Challenge of the Human Situation As Such, Especially Today" (2001)
Fünf Vorlesungen über Transzendentale Semiotik als Erste Philosophie und Diskursethik (2002)
Diskursethik und Diskursanthropologie (2002)
Paradigmen der Ersten Philosophie: Zur reflexiven – transzendentalpragmatischen – Rekonstruktion der Philosophiegeschichte (2011)
Transzendentale Reflexion und Geschichte (2017)
References
^Hösle, Vittorio (1997). Die Krise der Gegenwart und die Verantwortung der Philosophie (in German). C.H.Beck. pp. 110–115. ISBN978-3406392740.
^Reese-Schäfer, Walter (1990). Karl-Otto Apel zur Einführung (in German). Hamburg: Junius Verlag. pp. 15–21. ISBN978-3885068617.
^"Apel, Karl-Otto". d-nb.info. Deutsche National Biblothek. Retrieved 19 August 2014.
^Clement, Elizabeth; Demonque, Chantal; Hansen-Love, Laurence; Kahn, Pierre (1994). "Apel, Karl-Otto". La philosophie de A à Z. Paris: Hatier. pp. 19–20.
^Apel, Karl-Otto (1998). Towards a Transformation of Philosophy. Marquette Studies in Philosophy. Vol. 20. Translated by Adey, Glyn; Fisby, David. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press. ISBN0-87462-619-6.
Borrelli, Michele; Caputo, Francesca; Hesse, Reinhard, eds. (2020). Karl-Otto Apel, Vita e Pensiero, Leben und Denken. Cosenza. ISBN978-88-6822-916-0.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)