Perspectivas ético-jurídicas do marco inicial da vida humana no contexto dos avanços biotecnológicos

Abstract

Inquiries with respect to the beginning of human life pervade society since antiquity. In the postmodern world, the advances of science and technology enhance the discussions on the subject in such a way that the debates that earlier focused around abortion also started having as object the new technologies. Thus, the contemporary questions about the beginning of human life relate mainly to two aspects: the first one is related to the termination of pregnancy and the second concerns the interventions of new technologies in the embryo and as interference in human nature. This dissertation deals with the second aspect and, in this context, aims to consider to what extent human dignity can be regarded as a (hermeneutic) reference in the construction of ethical and legal parameters for the biotechnological advances in defining the beginning of human life. In order to develop the research, the critical hermeneutic ethics is used as method of approach, whereby ethics is at the center of the process of understanding and interpretation, observing the contours of facticity. The matter will be treated with a transdisciplinary perspective, which pervades different areas of knowledge, such as bioethics, biolaw, law, philosophy, anthropology, sociology, biology and medicine. As research methods, this dissertation uses historical, comparative and monographic research, from the theoretical framework of relevant legislation and case law on the subject. As a result, it was found that there is no consensus regarding the beginning of human life. In this context, it is important dealing with the new reality which results from biotechnological advances, in order to create parameters of protection for the embryo and for the human nature, in which the human dignity is a hermeneutic reference.