The renaissance of neurolaw – basic conditions for successful human rights protection

It is now widely recognised that neurotechnological methods and applications have human rights implications from various perspectives and can lead to conflicts with such rights as privacy, freedom of thought, non-discrimination, but also with the prohibition of torture and human dignity. In this context, it is rightly pointed out that the intersections and possible links between various neurotechnologies and AI systems, which are developing at hypersonic speed, represent a completely new dimension of the issue. This makes it all the more important not to reduce the necessary protection of human rights to general promises and guarantees, but rather to place it on a basis that also works in real-world environments. In fact, all human rights documents contain comprehensive justification mechanisms that mean that (even massive) state intervention is not ultimately considered a violation of the relevant human rights guarantees. As a result, legal protection against the corresponding state measures is then also ineffective. Against this background, it is time to methodically design existing and future human rights guarantees in such a way that premature justification of state measures can be ruled out not only in theory but also in practice.