Residency period: April 4, 2022 and April 3, 2023
IEAT resident, Brunello Stancioli graduated in Law from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (1996), where he also completed his master’s degree (2000) and doctorate (2007). He was Academic Visitor at the Uehiro Center for Practical Ethics (Faculty of Philosophy), at the University of Oxford (May 2011 to March 2012), receiving a CAPES scholarship. He is Associate Professor II, in exclusive dedication, at UFMG. He is Resident Professor at IEAT (Institute for Advanced Transdisciplinary Studies) at UFMG -2022-2023. He is Professor of the Permanent Body of the Graduate Program in Law at UFMG. He is also Professor of the Permanent Body of the Graduate Program in Technological Innovation at UFMG. He was a collaborating professor in the philosophy graduate course at UFMG, ethics line. He was a member of the Teaching, Research and Extension Council (CEPE), at UFMG, and of the Coordination of Transfer and Technological Innovation (CTIT) at UFMG, as a representative of the Humanities area. He was a member of the Ethics Committee for Research with Human Beings, at UFMG, for three years. He has experience in teaching and research in Law, with a transdisciplinary approach. He is the coordinator of the Persona Group, which studies the person and personality in all its nuances, from a transdisciplinary perspective. He is a member of the NEPC-Nucleus of Contemporary Thought Studies, of a supra-departmental and interdisciplinary nature, chaired by Prof. doctor Ivan Domingues. He develops studies in the following themes: Natural Person, Bioethics, Law and Genetics, Law and Information Theory, Autonomy, Human Improvements, Neuroethics, Fundamental Rights, Civil Law.
FROM THEOLOGY TO TECHNOLOGY: HOW TECHNOLOGY AFFECTS THE CONCEPT OF THE HUMAN BODY AND FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS
Law has always been thought of “from the top down”. It is the product of a rationality (sometimes transcendental) that, only in a second moment, will reach the bodies. In general, Ethics and Law tend to protect people from technological advances that act on human bodies (scientific research, privacy as a right to be alone, etc.). It is proposed here to think about this phenomenon in an inverse way.
Law can be seen as a system that emerges from bodies (including the mind, seen as an emergent property of matter). In this sense, one can think that the technosciences that act on the human body lead to a new personality. After all, all human action is mediated by the body. The body changes, the person changes. The most classic case is that of Phineas Cage, who had his brain crossed by an iron bar. He survived but totally changed his behavior.
In other cases, use of oxytocin, modafinil, SSRI, methylphenidate, etc. create new personalities and new readings of Fundamental Rights. Do bionic arms and legs promote a new reading of the right to physical integrity? Pacemakers, cochlear implants, intracranial pacemakers lead to new rights. It is possible, then, to state that, after the action of technosciences on human bodies, a new reading (and reconstruction of Law – especially fundamental rights) will emerge.