Basic Goods, Morality and the Dignity of Human Person

Abstract

This article contains the foundations of the natural law theory proposed by Thomas Aquinas. Specifically, it analyzes according to the explanatory-comprehensive method: 1. What are basic goods; 2. What are basic practical principles; 3. What is the foundation of morality; 4. How moral absolutes can be known; and 5. What is the link between all these points and human dignity. To this end, it deepens the considerations originally set out in topic 3.5 of the Master's Thesis in Law entitled Abortion: biological-philosophical foundations of its (anti)juridicity (RIBEIRO, 2019), which uses as an interpretative reference the works developed by the New School of Natural Law, without this implying, however, the exact reproduction of the ideas of each of the authors who compose it. The justification of this article goes back to the necessary advance of studies attentive to self-evident benefits that concern the personal fulfillment of human beings. But not just that. Due to the gaps in national literature at the juridical-philosophical level, such justification also goes back to the urgency of providing scholars with a holistic view of the lessons of the main exponent of the tradition of natural law, a kind of auxiliary itinerary for information and intellectual training.