Ripensare l'uomo: ripensare il diritto? Sui supposti fondamenti neurobiologici del diritto

Biological science in general and neuroscience in particular seem to promote a completely naturalised view of the human being. According to it, a naturalised view of law and the juridical categories finds more and more followers among the law scholars too. Nevertheless, even an anticartesian and naturalised anthropological view has to face the question about the status of the consciousness. This paper aims to show that the accounts about the structure and functions of consciousness given by some of the most famous neuroscientists make questionable such a naturalisation of the law and of the juridical experience. At the same time, the paper points out that the perspective opened by those accounts requires to modify the very common idea that the law is a pure ‘means’ or an ‘instrument’ for living together.