ABSTRACT
In my conviction the fundamentals of ethics have their roots in the biological and intercultural conditions of human life and its self-understanding.
Therefore I will start with a brief analysis of the way we understand ourselves and one another in everyday life and in our scientific endeavours. Such an experiental analysis needs neither metaphysical concepts on the one hand nor scientific concepts on the other, neither explicitly nor implicitly. On the contrary, all possible (in the sense of rationally founded) metaphysics and all possible sciences and humanities presuppose conceptually such a self understanding which is implicit in all human practice, insofar as it first of all refers to truth and to the ability of free consent to truth (or what is believed to be the truth of this or that particular case).
