Determinism and Free Will in the Age of Genetics

Every scientific discovery in genetics is very often publicized either with enthusiam or with scepticism. A very heated debate concerns the important yet controversial topic of predictive genetic tests, which predict a susceptibility, not the certainty of developing a certain desease. Many ethical questions arised with regard to political, criminal and social decisions based on the feeble assumption of susceptibility. In general, the topic of genetic tests has a transverse meaning as it can be considered a particular element of a bigger puzzle dealing with fundamental topics: the relationship between science and law and the relationship between determinism and freewill. The paper deals mainly with the use of predictive genetic tests in medical research, within a philosophical framework based on the Is-Ought Question and on the meta-ethical view of non cognitivism and non objectivism, which is used to evaluate legal provisions in this topic at different levels.