DIRITTO E TECNOLOGIA

Abstract

The intervention starts from the observation that technology is a tool for the transformation of reality that is itself “neutral”, i.e. usable for different and even opposite purposes, while law is a tool to orient, to condition and to govern human behaviours in relation to social ends, that is to say, what is right or better for society. Hence the intrinsic “finalism” of law, and the fundamental difference between the “power” of technology and the juridical power that is exercised for social purposes and to settle conflicts of interests between individuals and between communities. It then examines the potential and limitations of the use of computer techniques to perform legal acts; the new role of law in the face of the growth of technological “powers” of data collection and use; the demand to adapt the regulation of relationships between individuals (such as labour relationships) in the face of technological changes in reality; the problems of “relocation” of the law related to the development of the Internet; the new demands to legal powers to regulate phenomena such as the genetic manipulation of the human being and the use of artificial intelligence, with a view to safeguarding the essence of being “human”.