Umano, Post-umano: per una nozione di soggetto nel pensiero di H. L. A. Hart

This paper aims to analyse the epistemological definition of the legal subject in Hart’s philosophical and theoretical thought. In order to achieve this, it delves into Hart’s well-known doctrine of the minimum content of natural law, through proper references to its philosophical and methodical basis, which is reminiscent of the Oxfordian criticism of Kant’s theoretical statements. In fact, the core of the Hartian foundation of subjectivity is directly connected to the analysis of some truisms about the human nature, whose contingency is particularly emphasised by the author himself. In conclusion, this study shows how this famous and controversial doctrine can be read from a posthumanistic point of view, so that Hart’s notion of «human» is conceived as dependent on the ability to enhance our bodies through technology.