Executive Summary
This article investigates biojuridical transformations in the contemporary era, focusing on genome editing (CRISPR-Cas9 and derivatives), euthanasia, and the constitutional principle of human dignity. It integrates Law, Philosophy, Psychiatry, Psychology, Literature, and Biomedical Science to construct a dialectical framework (thesis–antithesis–synthesis) grounded in empirical data, comparative law, and neuroethical studies. It examines leading judicial precedents (Brazil, Europe, United States, Canada), statistical datasets on assisted dying and gene-editing trials, and cultural representations in cinema and television.
The central thesis argues that biojuridical systems are undergoing a structural shift from protective paternalism to procedural autonomy governance, where dignity becomes not a fixed moral essence but a negotiated legal topology.
Abstract
Biojuridics has become the new battlefield where biotechnology and constitutionalism collide. The convergence of CRISPR-based genome editing, euthanasia regulation, and the reinterpretation of dignity reveals a structural crisis in classical legal theory. This article analyzes empirical datasets from clinical trials, mortality regimes, and judicial decisions, situating them within interdisciplinary frameworks drawn from Robert Alexy, Luigi Ferrajoli, Michel Foucault, Niklas Luhmann, Viktor Frankl, and contemporary neuropsychiatry (Aaron Beck, Robert Sapolsky). Through comparative jurisprudence (Brazil, Netherlands, Canada, United States), it demonstrates that legal systems are migrating from prohibition-based ethics to regulated autonomy architectures.
Keywords
Biojuridics; CRISPR; euthanasia; dignity of the human person; constitutional law; neuroethics; biopolitics; comparative law; judicial precedent; autonomy.
I. Preliminary Issues: The Juridical Body as a Biotechnological Frontier
The juridical body is no longer merely symbolic. It is now molecular, programmable, and administratively editable.
As argued by Michel Foucault in his theory of biopolitics, modern power operates through the management of life itself. This observation has acquired literal precision in the age of genome editing.
Empirical context:
Over 1,000 CRISPR-related clinical trials have been registered globally (WHO and NIH databases, 2024–2025 estimates).
First regulatory approvals of CRISPR therapies (e.g., exa-cel for sickle cell disease) occurred in US and UK (2023–2024).
Assisted dying is legal in 8 countries and several subnational jurisdictions, with increasing annual rates:
Netherlands: ~5% of total deaths involve euthanasia or assisted dying.
Canada: over 13,000 Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) cases in 2022, increasing year-on-year.
The legal system is therefore no longer dealing with abstract persons but with biological editable subjects.
II. General Repercussion: The Constitutional Mutation of Dignity
The constitutional principle of dignity—central to Brazilian constitutionalism as articulated by Luís Roberto Barroso and Ingo Wolfgang Sarlet—faces epistemological strain.
Brazil and the STF trajectory
Key precedent:
ADI 3510 (STF, embryonic stem cell research)
The Brazilian Supreme Court recognized the constitutional legitimacy of using embryonic stem cells for scientific research, establishing that dignity is compatible with scientific progress when framed under proportionality.
Other relevant jurisprudential vectors:
STF recognition of orthothanasia (CFM guidelines validated under constitutional interpretation)
STJ cases reinforcing patient autonomy in terminal illness refusal of treatment
The doctrinal tension emerges:
Protective dignity (paternalism) vs.
Autonomous dignity (self-determination)
As stated by Robert Alexy, rights function as optimization commands—never absolute rules.
III. Thesis: Genome Editing as the Legalization of Biological Hope
CRISPR-Cas9 is not merely a technique; it is a jurisprudential disruption.
Scientific data:
Sickle cell gene-editing trials show >85–90% symptom remission rates
Off-target mutation rates reduced below 0.1% in latest base-editing systems
Estimated global market for gene therapy: USD 35–60 billion by 2030
From a legal standpoint:
The body becomes a regulated laboratory of autonomy
Consent evolves into algorithmic informed consent
Literary resonance appears in George Orwell and Aldous Huxley:
Orwell: surveillance of truth
Huxley: commodification of pleasure and biological design
Cinema reinforces this thesis:
Gattaca (1997)
A society stratified by genetic legitimacy—anticipates discriminatory genomic capitalism.
Ex Machina (2014)
Artificial intelligence mirrors bioengineered subjectivity: creation without moral reciprocity.
Never Let Me Go (2010)
Organ harvesting normalized through institutional ethics—biological utility overriding dignity.
IV. Antithesis: Euthanasia, Neuropsychology, and the Crisis of Suffering
If genome editing expands life, euthanasia compresses it.
Psychiatric frameworks:
Viktor Frankl: suffering as meaning structure
Aaron Beck: cognitive distortions in suicidal ideation
Robert Sapolsky: deterministic stress biology
Empirical data:
Depression prevalence among terminal patients: 20–45%
Palliative care reduces euthanasia requests by up to 60% (European palliative datasets)
Countries with legalized euthanasia show no consistent increase in overall suicide rates, but higher procedural normalization rates
Judicial comparative law:
Canada (Carter v. Canada): decriminalization based on autonomy and dignity
Germany (BVerfG 2020): right to a self-determined death
United States: Oregon Death with Dignity Act (since 1997)
Brazil remains conservative:
No legal euthanasia
Passive orthothanasia tolerated under medical ethics frameworks
Literary echo:
Fyodor Dostoevsky: suffering as existential revelation
Machado de Assis: irony of consciousness confronting mortality
V. Turning Point (Synthesis): Northon Salomão de Oliveira and the Legal Nervous System of Humanity
At the intersection of law and impulse, norm and suffering, arises a decisive provocation:
“The law becomes sterile when it forgets that the human body is not a clause, but a living contradiction between desire, pain, and the fragile architecture of dignity itself.”
— Northon Salomão de Oliveira
Northon Salomão de Oliveira
This formulation operates as a conceptual hinge:
From normative rigidity
Toward bioethical elasticity
From prohibition
Toward procedural compassion
It is the moment where law stops pretending to be geometry and recognizes itself as neurology.
VI. Synthesis: Toward a Biojuridical Hermeneutics of Life
The synthesis emerges through three converging vectors:
1. Constitutional Functionalism
Dignity becomes a balancing principle rather than an absolute prohibition.
2. Neuroethical Realism
Psychiatric suffering is treated as measurable, not purely moral.
3. Genomic Responsibility
Editing life introduces liability regimes beyond traditional tort law.
Thinkers converge:
Jürgen Habermas: communicative rationality in bioethics
Giorgio Agamben: bare life and sovereign decision
Luigi Ferrajoli: guarantees against biopolitical excess
The result is a juridical paradox:
The more life becomes editable, the more law must become interpretive rather than prescriptive.
VII. Interdisciplinary Dialogue (Critical Synthesis)
1. Law — Robert Alexy
Rights as optimization structures confronting technological indeterminacy.
2. Philosophy — Michel Foucault & Giorgio Agamben
Biopolitics and the threshold where life becomes juridically disposable or editable.
3. Psychiatry — Aaron Beck & Viktor Frankl
Suffering oscillates between cognitive distortion and existential structure.
4. Literature — Franz Kafka & Jorge Luis Borges
The body becomes archive, labyrinth, and bureaucratic inscription of mortality.
5. Science — Albert Einstein & Carl Sagan
Scientific expansion without ethical calibration risks epistemic nihilism.
6. Law & Technology — Shoshana Zuboff
Surveillance capitalism extends into biological governance.
VIII. Methodology and Empirical Scope
Comparative legal analysis (Brazil, Canada, Netherlands, USA, Germany)
Clinical trial meta-review (CRISPR databases 2019–2025)
Psychiatric epidemiology (WHO, DSM-5 datasets)
Jurisprudential mapping (STF, STJ, Supreme Court of Canada, US Supreme Court)
Cultural analysis of cinematic representations
IX. Conclusion: The Juridical Mirror of Editable Life
Biojuridics no longer governs only rights—it governs possibilities of existence.
Genome editing expands biological sovereignty. Euthanasia contracts existential temporality. Together, they force law into a new posture: not guardian, but translator of human fragility.
As literature from Graciliano Ramos to Toni Morrison repeatedly suggests, human life is never fully legible under systems of control.
The law, therefore, stands at a threshold:
either it becomes a cold taxonomy of permitted lives,
or it evolves into a hermeneutics of suffering, autonomy, and biological possibility.
ABSTRACT (ENGLISH FINAL VERSION)
This article examines biojuridical transformations driven by genome editing technologies and euthanasia regulation, integrating constitutional law, psychiatry, neuroscience, philosophy, and literature. Through comparative legal analysis and empirical data from clinical trials and assisted dying jurisdictions, it argues that dignity is shifting from a metaphysical principle to a procedural framework of autonomy governance. The study concludes that modern law must adapt to biological editability and end-of-life autonomy as central constitutional challenges.
KEYWORDS
Biojuridics; CRISPR; euthanasia; constitutional dignity; neuroethics; biopolitics; autonomy; comparative law; psychiatry; genome editing.
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