Regulating human enhancement technologies: the role of the law and human dignity

This article offers a critique on the potential role of the law in human enhancement technologies and its interaction with our perceived understandings of human dignity. The author outlines the initial hurdles of defining human enhancement and human dignity while maintaining that there is the necessity for a distinction to be established between enhancement and therapy. The author then discusses the role of regulation and outlines possible different approaches: self-regulation, "legislative pre-emption" or a balance. The author concludes by examining these issues in relation to parents and their rights to "design" their children through preimplantation genetic diagnosis.