The article examines the principal philosophical and legal questions arising in connection with the development of the transhumanist movement. It is established that transhumanism, as an intellectual and socio-political movement advocating the radical expansion of human capabilities through technology, poses a qualitatively new challenge to legal science, calling into question the immutability of the human being as a subject of law and undermining the traditional understanding of human nature as the common foundation of equality. The article analyses four new human rights proposed in the context of neurotechnological development – the right to cognitive liberty, the right to mental privacy, the right to mental integrity and the right to psychological continuity – and critically evaluates their dual nature: while designed to protect the freedom and privacy of the human mind, they must not become an instrument for legitimising compulsory enhancement. The legal concept of morphological freedom is examined as an independent construct encompassing both the right to restore bodily functions and the right to enhance cognitive and physical capabilities, and it is argued that this right, though a legitimate subject of constitutional and civil law protection, cannot be absolute and requires a clear balance between individual self-determination and the interests of public safety and equality. Special attention is devoted to the phenomenon of «technological inequality» – a new form of inequality rooted not in social conditions but in biological capabilities acquired through technological choice – and its legal implications in the fields of labour law, the right to education and electoral rights. It is concluded that an effective legal response to transhumanism requires the development of a fundamentally new regulatory paradigm based on recognition of morphological freedom combined with the inviolable core of human dignity, prohibition of discrimination against non-enhanced persons, equal access to basic enhancement technologies, and a special legal regime for technologies directly interfering with neural processes.
A. Kregul· European Socio-Legal & H...· 0 citations
The article examines the philosophical and legal issues arising in connection with the development of transhumanism - an intellectual and socio-political movement that advocates the radical improvement of human abilities through technology. The rapid technological progress of the 21st century actualizes the problem of the immutability of man as a subject of law and calls into question the traditional principles of legal regulation of fundamental human rights in conditions when the boundary between man and machine is becoming increasingly conditional.
This article offers a comprehensive philosophical and legal analysis of transhumanism in the context of the contemporary human rights framework. Transhumanism, understood as an intellectual and socio-political movement advocating the radical enhancement of human physical and cognitive capacities through technology, poses fundamentally new challenges for legal science: whether the concept of human dignity is preserved when an individual voluntarily transcends the boundaries of biological human nature; how constitutional rights, formed within an anthropocentric paradigm, can regulate relations between technologically enhanced and non-enhanced persons; and whether the right to morphological freedom constitutes a form of constitutional liberty. The article investigates the debate between transhumanists and bioconservatives regarding the permissibility of biotechnological intervention in human nature, as well as the natural law position in these disputes. Particular attention is devoted to the emergence of new human rights in response to neurotechnology-related threats and the critical evaluation of the neurorights concept. A key new dimension of the study is the analysis of the relationship between transhumanism and the principle of equality: technological human enhancement may generate a «technological inequality» that differs fundamentally from traditional forms of inequality, as it entrenches advantages not only in the social but also in the biological dimension. The article demonstrates that transhumanism does not negate human rights but rather transforms their content, requiring constitutional law to update its normative framework to account for new anthropological realities.
A. Kregul· Analytical and Comparative J...· 0 citations
