Concerning ‘Humans’ and ‘Human’ Rights. Human Enhancement from the Perspective of Fundamental Rights

Abstract

This chapter investigates how, in the long term, human enhancement relates to fundamental rights. The right to equality and the right to vote, for example, can be applied to enhanced humans, although it will not always be easy to determine when a distinction is justified between enhanced and non-enhanced humans. New fundamental rights may have to be created, e.g. a right to identity, to mental integrity or to forget. In the long term, we need to determine whether robots and androids, if they function in ways comparable to natural or legal persons, could also claim legal protection through fundamental rights. Fundamental rights should also steer the development of human enhancement. Individuals have a right to improve themselves, but they must be able to resist enhancement as well. We could consider introducing a fundamental right to imperfection, to ageing and even a right to die, as well as extending the government’s duty of care to promote human diversity. Since enhancement can be a right but never an obligation, fundamental rights will have to play an important role in preventing ‘normal’ humans from becoming an underclass to enhanced humans.

Translated by Lotte Oostebrink and Lydia ten Brummelhuis.