by Edward Demenchonok
University System of Georgia
demenche@mail.fvsu.edu
distinguished American philosophical historiography on the one hand, between philosophy "in" Latin America which includes the full range of philosophical currents in this region and, secondly, the "American philosophy" at all accurate. Latin American philosophy is a movement of national thought and original philosophical. Precisely this philosophical and ethical theories created in the framework are the subject of analysis in this work.
American philosophy since its inception was motivated by the quest for the peoples of Latin America its historical-cultural identity and ways to progress. At all stages of its evolution from the "founders" to the "philosophy of liberation", that philosophy has always sought the importance of the philosophical problems of being, of man, culture, morality and freedom. Ethics is an important part of this philosophy as demonstrated by the originality of the ethical theories Carlos Vaz Ferreira, Alejandro Korn, Enrique Dussel, etc.
C. Vaz Ferreira, A. Korn, among other "founders", the philosophy originated American. Ferreira Vaz criticized positivism deny the philosophical problem. At the same time he opposed the "metaphysical dogma." According to him, the former way of thinking should be replaced by a "logic alive", he was able to reflect the phenomena in its contradictions and dynamism, ethics abstract should be replaced by "moral living, which provide a practical man in community involvement. Vaz Ferreira criticizes the ethics of pragmatism. From the position of general human values \u200b\u200borientation censorship utility and "practical fruit." He says the free will and dignity. Therefore considers that any manipulation or forced imposition of beliefs, despite their supposed operational effectiveness, is harmful and unacceptable. Vaz Ferreira
apply the methodological principles of "living logic" to the analysis of ethical issues. He sees the need to eliminate the fallacies of ethical reasoning obscure it. Taught to think critically and, in particular, to maintain the moral question. Although the moral question is suffering and distress of conscience, lack of moral questions does not prove the criterion of moral superiority (it is rather the rate of intellectual inferiority). The philosopher reveals "misitficaciones teaching" and the hypocrisy of certain ethical concepts that are characterized by a lack of respect the pain of the victims of injustice, insensitivity to injustice and evil. Vaz Ferreira proposed multilateral and dynamic approach: the social ideal must include the happiness and progress, reason and culture. He sees the moral meaning of the sign in the direction toward more love and solidarity and the "moral progress in the course of human history." 1
Alejandro Korn also criticizes positivism and emphasized the need for a new philosophy, ethics guidance, able to rescue for the American the dignity of free and conscious personality. Korn seeks the philosophical foundation of ethics and thus develops his philosophy of freedom. He relies on the philosophical ideas Kant and the "philosophy of life." The concept of free will, Korn tries to find the basis for free and creative activity of personality. According to the axiology of Korn, the values \u200b\u200bare determined by the attitude of the subject valuation. In the human personality is the common roots of all values. Values \u200b\u200btend toward the same goal: complete freedom, which is the foundation of social evolution. Man's goal is to bring the need for freedom and attain absolute freedom.
Freedom and ethics are correlative concepts. Awareness of the limitations from the world and the desire for freedom are the first steps in the formation of personality and moral self-determination. Ethics, according to Korn, it becomes the ultimate expression of personality, the latest object of free action, determined to bring natural order to a moral order. Both the economic independence and freedom ethics are equally necessary. Korn criticizes the utilitarian morality that takes the good and useful because it tends to deny the autonomous personality. He emphasizes that ethics is a subject elements Necessary for free and responsible and a penalty. We will decide and reason supports the decision taken for the same purpose: the creative freedom. The ethical attitude implies the conscious sacrifice of individual interest for purposes supra-individual (the "ethical heroism.") 2
From the 70 Latin American philosophy was crystallized in the philosophy of liberation. At its heart is the problem of human freedom. This arises primarily as national and social liberation, but also more broadly as "universal human emancipation." This presupposes the philosophical investigation of man's problem, the vital foundations, cultural and moral being. These are the issues that are discussed in the works of Leopoldo Zea, Arturo Roig, Enrique Dussel, among others. 3
E. In the philosophy of Dussel ethics occupies a central place is the "first philosophy." According to on the philosophy of the release should be ethical-political. In their work Dussel criticizes the "moral force" that justifies domination and opposes him an "ethics of liberation." 4 The ethics develops a complete critique of the socioeconomic situation of people in underdeveloped countries, the social relations of domination. Dussel in his recent work raises the philosophical and methodological bases of the "Ethics of Liberation" and develops its architecture. 5 According to him, ethics meets the requirement for the survival of a human being self-conscious and self-reliant. In the current ecological crisis, underdevelopment and other problems global ethics should serve to raise awareness of these problems and their solution.
Dussel takes as a starting point of the ethics of human life. Against naturalism and dualism anthropology, he develops the whole concept of human life. Human life legislation an order based, requires food, shelter, security, freedom, cultural values. Dussel emphasizes the material aspect of life, the embodiment of human beings, but the unit is in the socio-cultural characteristics of the creature as being linguistic, self-conscious and ethical. Concepts such as "practical reason" material ", the" material principle "refer to life itself humanity in all its fullness.
Dussel draws a link between "judgments of fact" in relation to life and the "normative judgments" based on certain philosophical-anthropological concepts. He mentions among the constitutive moments of human self-consciousness, subjectivity and participation in the cultural world. With the ability to self-conscious reflection, self-referential, man "takes charge" responsibility for their permanence in life. To be subject means to take joint responsibility for their own "self" as a "must-be." A human being self-reliant self-reflection about their own lives and the need to keep requirements are expressed in cultural values \u200b\u200band ethical obligations. These normative statements are formulated. Human life is the true test of practice. From this criterion Dussel material based on universal ethical principle. According to this principle, all who work ethically to produce, reproduce and develop the life of each human subject in community, in the end of all mankind. It is a normative statement with truth-claim universal practice. This is the content and the ethical duty of any act, institution, or system of cultural ethics. 6
The "good" has a "material" and a "formal." The development of formal moral principle is a step in the architecture of the Ethics of Liberation. Formally, in relation the criterion of validity, based on inter-procedural principle of universality of moral consensus. Dussel develops his concept in the debate with the "discourse ethics" of Karl-Otto Apel and Jürgen Habermas. 7 The assimilated creatively innovative ideas from the perspective of the Ethics of Liberation. At the same time, he criticizes the "fallacy of formalism" discourse. Discourse ethics has drawn the moral standards of the claims of validity of the statements, but in the purely formal or consensual understanding of truth (as a result of a reductive vision of the material content). In contrast, the material principle, the concept of intersubjective validity is enriched in content. Dussel discusses the question of truth and validity. The distinction between material and moral normative statements formal. The claim of truth is material (with reference to content), while the formal claim is valid (with reference to intersubjectivity). At the same time the two are intertwined. The material first discovered the truth validates mediated discourse, the principle argues formal discourse on a truth content. The argument is how much checks and validation. According
discursive principle of validity, all who work ethically should reach the decision validates through participation in a community symmetrical communication of those affected by of argument in which each participant is recognized as equal. Any agreement presupposes the basic moral standard and requires all participants in the discussion. In his redefinition of universal moral principle of validity Dussel adds the reference to the practical truth (the orientations contained in the material principle) and to re-know each other as equals. Dussel
raises the issue of applying the principles to specific situations. The exposes the limits of discourse ethics, which specializes in justification of standards, but it puts in parentheses, the implementation issues. This is to include the "complementarity principle", but does not solve the problem, because discourse ethics is purely formal, making it difficult to enter a philosophical discussion of the content. Dussel explores the advantages of applying architectural principles. In it the moral principle of validity applicability wins without losing its universality. The universal moral principle is proposed as a formal mediation or procedural material ethical principle. It is a universal rule to implement the normative content of the statement. The first material can reveal material content, not mere form of speech. In this architecture, the use of the resources of an ethic of content material opens new possibilities for finding a solution to the problems posed by ethics discourse. 8
The third principle on the basis of ethics is feasibility. The principle of feasibility or operators within the scope of whom is possible (téctica, economically and politically) to carry out what is permissible ethically-made within the framework defined by the formal and material principle. Dussel seeks to achieve the synthesis of formal and material point from a feasibility of the two to achieve a real unity of ethics. He plays the critical issues of instrumental reason and the critique of utopian reason. Makes a critical analysis of the feasibility of Franz Hinkelammert. Dussel interpreted this principle as the subsumption of strategic-instrumental reason. Since new types of rationality, it is possible to overcome the dualism and proactive juxtaposition of "ethics of intention" and "ethics of responsibility" by Max Weber. Strategic and instrumental reason full ethical sense if it meets the demands of reproduction and development of human life from the valid decision of those affected. This provides an action or system of ethics can be truly validated. The "good" is a measure that integrates the material ethics, morality and feasibility formality. 9
The analysis of the issue of ethics in its basic structure and the reconstruction undertaken by Dussel, with new approaches. This part of "fundamental" provides the basis for the development of "ethical criticism" or properly Ethics of Liberation. In the critical part of its architecture, the three ethical principles above is for their negativity dialectic: the first critical material, the critical discourse principle and the "Principle-Liberation." The exercise of the right ethical criticism is necessary because the existing social order produces its victims, who may judge as "evil." From the perspective of the victims (the Other), ethics can be judged critically at the "totality" of a given system of ethics. Ethical criticism begins with the ethical affirmation of life denied to victims (for poverty and marginality), and re-understanding of their dignity and their asymmetric or exclusive position in the non-discursive participation. Victims themselves, in formal inter-hegemonic discourse, acquire critical consciousness (as an example, the author mentions the "pedagogy of liberation" by Paulo Freire). This creates solidarity and shared responsibility to build dialectically possible alternatives. Finally, we deny the systemic denial of the victims and built, positively, new moments (rules, institutions) of what is to the praxis of liberation. Dussel concludes that the victims themselves are asymmetrically located in the community hegemonic makers to build a new symmetry.
The foundation of ethics by Dussel gives an original answer to the theoretical problems discussed today in moral philosophy. On the other hand, ethics provides guidance for understanding the consequences of underdevelopment in the countries of Latin America and other regions "peripheral" as one of global problems. His articulation of these problems have much in common with the "ethics of historical responsibility" of Apel. These two philosophers represent the different models of foundation of ethics, from their respective contexts. His current argumentative dialogue contributes to the search universal normative basis, rationally founded, for solving the problems of the contemporary world. 10
Notes (1) Vaz Ferreira, Carlos. Ferment. Montevideo, 1938.
(2) Korn, Alejandro. Works. La Plata, 1938, vol. I, pp. 120-144.
(3) See: Zea, Leopoldo. Dialectic of American consciousness. Mexico: Alianza Editorial Mexicana, 1976, Roig, Arturo. Face and Latin American philosophy. Mendoza: EDUNC, 1993, etc.
(4) Dussel, Enrique. For a Latin American liberation ethics. Buenos Aires: Siglo XXI, 1973, t. 1-2.
(5) Dussel, Enrique. Architecture of an Ethic of Liberation. Madrid-Mexico: Trotta-UAM, 1998.
(6) Dussel, Enrique. "The architectonic of the ethics of liberation." Philosophy & Social Criticism. vol. 23 No 3 (1997): 1-35.
(7) Dussel, Enrique. The Underside of Modernity: Apel, Ricoeur, Rorty, Taylor, and the Philosophy of Liberation. New Jersey: Humanities P, 1996.
(8) This issue is addressed in the first part of the work of Dussel Architectural Ethics of Liberation.
(9) Dussel, Enrique. "Principles, mediation and the 'good' as a synthesis (From Discourse Ethics to the Ethics of Liberation)." Paper presented at the Congress of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy, Lexington, Kent, on 19 October 1997.
(10) See Apel, K.-O., Dussel, E., Fornet-Betancourt, R. Foundation of ethics and philosophy of liberation. Mexico: Siglo XXI, 1992, debate about the ethics of Apel's discourse. North-South philosophical dialogue from Latin America. E. Dussel (Ed). Mexico: Siglo XXI, 1994.
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