“What is the human person?” This question serves as the very root for later elaborations of biomedical ethical questions involving beginning and end of life decisions, distributive justice, transhumanism, and many others.

The two pillars of twentieth century science that have influenced the meaning of the human person are evolution and quantum physics. Today, the human person, considered in light of modern science, can no longer be identified with perfect fixed being, since there are no fixed essences in evolution. Rather, nature is incomplete and subject to ongoing creativity.