Abstract

New technologies tend to create the expectation of future happiness, but challenge the capacity of law to govern them. In the American context, human dignity is conceived to enhance individual self-determination, while in the Charter of Nice it has been set above freedoms. Also in the jurisprudence of the ECHR and in the developments of most European jurisdictions the utilitarian approach towards human life (regards embryos, particularly, and self-determination about medical treatments) has been toned dow