**4. Conclusions**

The reflections expressed in the previous paragraphs have highlighted how the concept of doping and its discipline, regulation appears to be a cultural product and, consequently, just as social and cultural perception leads to a certain definition of a substance as a dopant.

At the same time, it has been stressed that it is necessary to curb the phenomenon of human empowerment implemented and implemented through the use of medicines or special techniques cannot be separated from an education aimed at making the true essence of values and mentality that permeates the world of sport.

One of the peculiar and difficult aspects of definition and solution concerns the situation of athletes who, due to an endocrine disease, possess a high concentration in the blood of anabolic hormones. In other words, they are women characterized by a masculine appearance with particular reference to muscle mass or athletes with peculiar genetic conditions that allow a higher supply of oxygen in the blood.

The cases that will be analyzed have as their main characteristic to relate with athletes who, like equal climatic and training conditions, they have in the abstract an objective advantage over others precisely because of their genetic constitution.

Precisely a particular pathology from which a particular individual is affected can turn into a positive aspect in a specific situation, namely, in the case of a species a sports competition.

If this is the premise, the question that animated the bio-ethical and bio-legal debate is whether it is possible to exclude legitimately from the competition the subject that should be in that situation.

This would protect the needs of justice in the broad sense, but it would bring with it problems of discrimination: a person suffering from a genetic disease would suffer unfavorable treatment precisely because of the effect that this disease determines. In this sense it should be clarified that no subject can be recognized the merit to be born with a certain DNA profile or a certain genetic profile suitable to make it "more powerful" than others [30, 31].

The "naturally" enhanced subjects refer to the epithet that was attributed to Achilles, that is, the fastest Achilles. This expression indicates that the Achaean hero had in his point of weakness, namely the heel, his point of strength and, in the opinion of the writer, Achilles can become the paradigmatic example of naturally enhanced subjects due to a genetic mutation that characterizes them. As Achilles found his weak and strong point in the heel, athletes who possess a genetic characteristic that many times results in pathology their most important aspect compared to others during the course of a sports competition. The comparison just made could also flow into a pedagogical perspective, Educational and sports inviting to reflect how the limit of each individual subject can be transformed into the point of strength and how it is crucial to exploit their weaknesses to make them become virtues.

By adopting a strictly legal view it is stated that the objective responsibility of the athlete for doping concerns the introduction of one of the substances defined as prohibited within the body of the athlete as it is the duty of the latter to use so that no entry is made, penetration of one of the prohibited substances into his body.

In the present case, it is a biological, genetic, peculiar characteristic of that particular subject that does not derive from the intake of particular substances or from the penetration of those substances within his organism. On the contrary, its genetic peculiarity is the source of the empowerment itself.

If that is the legal response, then bioethics is faced with two alternatives. The first is the exclusion of the athlete enhanced because of his pathology in order to establish competitions reserved for subjects with the same characteristics.

The second, on the other hand, proposes the possibility of allowing other athletes to use biotechnology to make genetic endowment homogeneous. This is a very problematic solution because it is in contrast with the principles that inform sports practice to the point of shifting the focus from the importance of commitment, training to the creation and establishment of laboratories capable of studying, analyze and then administer biotechnological and genetic substances and treatments in order to make the performance of athletes homogeneous.

In addition to the risk, should it be decided to follow this second option, is to provide an almost unlimited power to the scientific technical power as the only objective that animates the life of men is to become more and more enhanced than

#### *Human Empowerment between Ethics and Law DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.96724*

the other. In this way the danger is that the other becomes more and more a model to reach and in which we see only the aspects of empowerment that he possesses when we relate to ourselves.

This is a dangerous mechanism because it risks leading to the qualification of empowerment as a right of absolute freedom [32]. But even the latter could be problematic as it is suitable to conceal the risk of a possible exploitation [33] by technology, science, biopolitics and bioeconomy excluding any judgment of lawfulness [34–36].

Human empowerment is a subject that turns out to be extremely complex mainly because of its transversality and with respect to which it is necessary to adopt an attitude of study and analysis that draws from different perspectives declining their convictions in the light the different fields of possible application [37]. In other words there is no definitive and conclusive answer as it is impossible to adopt a position of total acceptance or totally uncritical refusal [38].

The method of approaching the problem is to reflect on the circumstance that man inevitably tends to the process of improvement and that, at the same time, the advances that technical evolution [39]. The European Commission has made it possible to achieve these objectives by defining them as new instruments but at the same time considered essential for achieving the objectives.

At the same time it is necessary to reflect on the goal of improvement, that is, which objectives are pursued and relate them to one's own experience [40] in addition to past, present and future society, always remembering the existence of a limit [41]. The latter indicates the characterizing aspect of the human being and the concept of humanity beyond which it is not possible to continue to use the concept of the human being [42, 43].
