The unamendable body: Karol Wojtyas phenomenology of action as a criterion for demarcating therapy from enhancement in transhumanist medicine

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  • Tytuł: The unamendable body: Karol Wojtyas phenomenology of action as a criterion for demarcating therapy from enhancement in transhumanist medicine
  • Autor/Autorzy: Andrzej Skupień (Autor)
  • Nazwa czasopisma: Medicine Health Care and Philosophy
  • Rok: 2026
  • Tom: on-line
  • Numer: on-line
  • ISSN: 1386-7423
  • e-ISSN: 1572-8633
  • DOI: 10.1007/s11019-026-10416-5
  • Adres www:: https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s11019-026-10416-5.pdf
  • Strony od-do: on-line
  • Abstrakt: The transhumanist reconceptualization of health as a continuum of optimizable bio-functional capacities dissolves the traditional ethical demarcation between therapy and enhancement. While numerous critiques of transhumanism invoke "human dignity," they often fail to specify the anthropological criterion that renders certain interventions inherently incompatible with personal integrity. This paper addresses that lacuna by retrieving Karol Wojtyła’s phenomenology of action, particularly his distinction between actus humanus (conscious, self-determined action) and actus hominis (mere physiological occurrence), as developed in The Acting Person and Love and Responsibility. I argue that Wojtyła provides a robust, non-arbitrary criterion: an intervention is therapeutic when it restores the truthfulness of bodily existence as the medium of personal agency; it becomes ethically illicit enhancement when it deliberately re-engineers the body to bypass or override the person’s conscious self-determination. This criterion is then applied to two borderline cases, cognitive neuro-enhancement and anti-aging genetic interventions, to demonstrate its operational utility. The paper concludes that Wojtyła’s framework does not reject technological progress per se, but insists that health cannot be defined merely as "optimal functioning," because the body is not a machine to be optimized, but the somatic expression of an irreducibly personal subject. Ultimately, this analysis offers a clinically relevant ethical boundary for biomedical innovation in an era of accelerating technological convergence.
  • Dyscyplina: filozofia
  • 002 a The unamendable body: Karol Wojtyas phenomenology of action as a criterion for demarcating therapy from enhancement in transhumanist medicine
  • 003 b 0000-0003-0432-8444
  • 003 a Andrzej Skupień (Autor)
  • 004 a Oryginalny artykuł naukowy
  • 006 a Medicine Health Care and Philosophy
  • 008 a 2026
  • 009 a on-line
  • 010 a on-line
  • 011 a 1386-7423
  • 012 a 1572-8633
  • 013 a 10.1007/s11019-026-10416-5
  • 014 a https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s11019-026-10416-5.pdf
  • 015 a on-line
  • 020 a The transhumanist reconceptualization of health as a continuum of optimizable bio-functional capacities dissolves the traditional ethical demarcation between therapy and enhancement. While numerous critiques of transhumanism invoke "human dignity," they often fail to specify the anthropological criterion that renders certain interventions inherently incompatible with personal integrity. This paper addresses that lacuna by retrieving Karol Wojtyła’s phenomenology of action, particularly his distinction between actus humanus (conscious, self-determined action) and actus hominis (mere physiological occurrence), as developed in The Acting Person and Love and Responsibility. I argue that Wojtyła provides a robust, non-arbitrary criterion: an intervention is therapeutic when it restores the truthfulness of bodily existence as the medium of personal agency; it becomes ethically illicit enhancement when it deliberately re-engineers the body to bypass or override the person’s conscious self-determination. This criterion is then applied to two borderline cases, cognitive neuro-enhancement and anti-aging genetic interventions, to demonstrate its operational utility. The paper concludes that Wojtyła’s framework does not reject technological progress per se, but insists that health cannot be defined merely as "optimal functioning," because the body is not a machine to be optimized, but the somatic expression of an irreducibly personal subject. Ultimately, this analysis offers a clinically relevant ethical boundary for biomedical innovation in an era of accelerating technological convergence.
  • 022 a bioethics
  • 022 a Human Dignity
  • 022 a human enhancement
  • 022 a Karol Wojtyła
  • 022 a personalism
  • 022 a Phenomenology of action
  • 022 a Philosophy of medicine
  • 022 a Transhumanism
  • 966 a filozofia
  • 985 a Uniwersytet Ignatianum w Krakowie (1000000)
  • 985 b Wydział Filozoficzny [1FIL]
Repozytorium Akademii Ignatianum w Krakowie, które jest częścią Portalu Pracowniczego zostało zrealizowane w ramach projektu „Program wzmocnienia potencjału dydaktycznego Uczelni na rzecz rozwoju regionalnego” POWR.03.05.00-00-ZR10/18 współfinansowanego ze środków Unii Europejskiej w ramach Europejskiego Funduszu Społecznego.