Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
Hi Peter Hi Keith ; Great detective work thanks. Outlawing patents on living organisms need not be difficult or painful for corporations. Let's say the Patent Office says that 3 years from now, the law will be effective. What would happen? Well, you could expect a rush of patent applications for life forms as the 3 year deadline comes to a close, as corporations try to get their patents approved before the window of opportunity closes. After that, no more patent applications. And since patents expire in 17 or 20 years anyway, all the previous patents which were granted would expire eventually. Problem solved. The only obstacle is our resolve to compel CONgress to act. Not only Congress, it's a global issue, WIPO et al. The World Trade Organisation's Monsanto Agreement won't help much - aka TRIPs, the WTO Agreement on Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights, which among other things effectively removes the farmers' age-old right to save their own seeds and breed their own crop varieties. The TRIPs agreement was drafted by a coalition of 13 US transnational corporations, led by Monsanto, DuPont and Pfizer, and written by PhRMA, the American pharmaceutical corporations' lobbying group. It's not so much patenting as the enabling of theft, far too often - theft for starters, along with the rest of the calamity. The corporations, having more or less wrecked patenting and IP and so on, want to abandon patents because it doesn't give them enough control - they're after something much worse. (Hence Terminator seed technology, eg.) I don't think your reasoned approach will appeal to them much. But that's no reason to give up on it, quite the opposite, strength to yer arm. All best Keith Best Regards, Peter G. Thailand .org/ ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19781-2005Feb12.html U.S. Denies Patent for a Too-Human Hybrid Scientist Sought Legal Precedent to Keep Others From Profiting From Similar 'Inventions' By Rick Weiss Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, February 13, 2005; Page A03 A New York scientist's seven-year effort to win a patent on a laboratory-conceived creature that is part human and part animal ended in failure Friday, closing a historic and somewhat ghoulish chapter in American intellectual-property law. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected the claim, saying the hybrid -- designed for use in medical research but not yet created -- would be too closely related to a human to be patentable. Paradoxically, the rejection was a victory of sorts for the inventor, Stuart Newman of New York Medical College in Valhalla, N.Y. An opponent of patents on living things, he had no intention of making the creatures. His goal was to set a legal precedent that would keep others from profiting from any similar inventions. But in an age when science is increasingly melding human and animal components for research -- already the government has allowed many patents on humanized animals, including a mouse with a human immune system -- the decision leaves a crucial question unanswered: At what point is something too human to patent? Officials said it was not so difficult to make the call this time because Newman's technique could easily have created something that was much more person than not. But newer methods are allowing scientists to fine-tune those percentages, putting the patent office in an awkward position of being the federal arbiter of what is human. I don't think anyone knows in terms of crude percentages how to differentiate between humans and nonhumans, said John Doll, a deputy commissioner for patents. Yet neither is the office comfortable with a we'll know it when we see it approach, he added: It would be very helpful . . . to have some guidance from Congress or the courts. The Newman case reveals how far U.S. intellectual-property law has lagged behind the art and science of biotechnology. The Supreme Court has addressed the issue of patenting life only once, and that was 25 years ago. It also raises profound questions about the differences -- and similarities -- between humans and other animals, and the limits of treating animals as property. The whole privatization of the biological world has to be looked at, Newman said, so we don't suddenly all find ourselves in the position of saying, 'How did we get here? Everything is owned.' Newman's application, filed in 1997, described a technique for combining human embryo cells with cells from the embryo of a monkey, ape or other animal to create a blend of the two -- what scientists call a chimera. That's the Greek term for the mythological creature that had a lion's head, a goat's body and a serpent's tail. Others had used similar methods to create a geep, part goat and part sheep. But Newman's human-animal chimeras would have greater utility in medicine, for drug and toxicity testing and perhaps as sources of organs for transplantation into people. In collaboration with Jeremy Rifkin, a Washington biotech activist and president of the Foundation on Economic Trends, he challenged the patent office: Issue the patent, which would keep others from pursuing such work for 20 years, or reject it, effectively accomplishing the same thing. The two had until Friday to appeal the latest rejection, but they decided to let it pass and declare victory. For Rifkin, the case was deja vu in reverse. When U.S. scientist Ananda Chakrabarty applied for the first patent on a living organism -- a genetically engineered bacterium able to digest oil spills -- the case ended up in the Supreme Court because the patent office did not want to patent life forms. That time Rifkin filed the main amicus brief supporting the patent office. They lost. In a 5 to 4 decision, the court declared that patents could be issued on anything under the sun that is made by man. The office has obliged, issuing patents on bacteria, yeast and, as of last fall, 436 animals. In 1987, the patent office announced it would draw the line with humans, but it offered no legal rationale or statutory backing. The paper trail created by the Newman claim offers perhaps the best explication yet for that ban. One rationale in the documents sent to Newman is that such a patent would be inconsistent with the constitutional right to privacy. After all, the office wrote, a patent allows the owner to exclude others from making the claimed invention. If a patent were to issue on a human, it would conflict with one of the Constitution's core privacy rights -- a person's right to decide whether and when to procreate. Patents on humans could also conflict with the 13th Amendment's prohibition against slavery. That is because a patent
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
lol, a scanner darkly, etc. . . . :-) Or just stranger than fiction... (though it's not easy to be stranger than Philip K. Dick). Best Keith On 9/21/08, Keith Addison [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi Peter Fascinating indeed. I don't know of the outcome if any, but I'll look around. snip ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
Hi Keith ; Great detective work thanks. Outlawing patents on living organisms need not be difficult or painful for corporations. Let's say the Patent Office says that 3 years from now, the law will be effective. What would happen? Well, you could expect a rush of patent applications for life forms as the 3 year deadline comes to a close, as corporations try to get their patents approved before the window of opportunity closes. After that, no more patent applications. And since patents expire in 17 or 20 years anyway, all the previous patents which were granted would expire eventually. Problem solved. The only obstacle is our resolve to compel CONgress to act. Best Regards, Peter G. Thailand .org/ ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
Hi Peter Hi Keith ; These are ominous developments, but far worse should be expected eventually. Yes, 'fraid so. As we discussed before, the answer here is to treat life forms like perpetual motion machines. In other words, you cannot get a patent on any kind of perpetual motion machine. Similarly, you should not be able to get a patent for any life form. And for much more pressing reasons. Well put, Peter. There's widespread and growing opposition to patenting life forms and its implications, you might almost say it's a general opposition that includes just about everybody excepting those with an interest (ie paid for), who're actually quite few, though powerful and influential. The Monsantos and Robert Zoellicks of this world aren't having it all their own way, less and less so. Especially since everything seems to be falling apart right now (no big surprise) - excepting the massive and ongoing worldwide increase of ordinary people who're finding other ways of doing things, that's not falling apart at all, it goes from strength to strength. What did Arundhati Roy say... The only thing worth globalizing is dissent. I get her point, though I don't quite agree. Global village-type networking definitely empowers dissent (Seattle 1999, Cancun 2003, Doha in Geneva 2008), but I think there are a lot more benefits as well - it empowers people, and communities. We'll see, all in good time (I hope). All best Keith BR Peter G. Thailand ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
Hi Keith ; Fascinating article on this subject. But it is dated 1999, any idea of any progress that has been made? http://www.organicconsumers.org/Patent/rifikinhc.cfm US Human/Chimpanzee Life Form Patent Challenge by Jeremy Rifkin Stuart Newman Will Now Go to the Federal Courts U.S. Ruling Aids Opponent Of Patents for Life Forms By Rick Weiss Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, June 17, 1999; Page A2 The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has turned down a scientist's controversial request for a patent on creatures that would be part animal and part human--bizarre life forms that no one has made before, but that might prove useful in medical experiments. But unlike most patent office rejectees, the scientist, Stuart Newman, is celebrating. The New York Medical College biology professor never intended to make the animal-human hybrids. He applied for the patent to gain the legal standing to challenge U.S. patent policy, which allows patents on living entities. The patent office ruled in part that Newman's invention is too human to be patentable. By doing so, it opened the door to a series of legal challenges available to all patent applicants--a path that could lead to the Supreme Court. Newman hopes his appeals will force a judicial and congressional reassessment of the nation's 19-year-old policy of granting patents on life forms. That policy, based on a single court decision, has provided the foundation for today's $13 billion biotechnology industry. Some patent experts this week criticized Newman for abusing the federal patent review system to bypass the legal avenues by which patent law is normally made and changed. But even some critics confirmed that the strategy appeared to be working. In particular, said John Barton, a patent specialist at the Stanford University School of Law, the ploy has forced the patent office to acknowledge the relatively thin legal ice upon which its policies on life patents rest. The ruling also reveals the agency's apparent uncertainty about just how human a creature must be before it is no longer patentable, Barton and others said. The patent office has argued that to grant patents on people would violate the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished slavery. But neither the patent office nor Congress has ever defined human. That question is of more than philosophical import today. Already, several patents have been allowed on animals containing human genes or organs. And just this week, scientists in Massachusetts said they were creating live embryos by combining cow and human cells. When we applied for this patent a year and half ago, people reacted to it as if it was some kind of science fiction scenario, Newman said. Developments in the past year have shown that similar things are already on the table and being considered seriously. In its rejection letter, the patent office says Newman's invention embraces a human being, but it does not say why other creatures with human components do not embrace a human being, said Washington patent attorney Patrick Coyne, who filed Newman's application. This puts a big question mark on all commercial interests involving human embryos and embryonic . . . cells, said biotechnology activist Jeremy Rifkin, a co-applicant on Newman's claim, who has rallied religious leaders against patents on life forms. The agency concedes in its letter that in the Supreme Court's single foray into the topic--a 5 to 4 decision in 1980 allowing a patent on a microbe--the justices did not include humans on their list of nonpatentable life forms. But Stephen Kunin, the patent office's deputy assistant commissioner for patent policy, said the agency believes that Congress did not intend to allow patents on humans or on creatures that are essentially human when it passed the National Patent Act in 1956. The agency, however, offers no basis for that belief, Coyne said. Biotechnology executives have said that without access to patents on gene-altered animals and other living entities, they would not make the investments needed to develop new drugs and other products. Yesterday, some criticized Newman's legal attack. The net outcome of this attempt may hurt valuable medical research and ultimately deny therapies for patients who need them, said Carl Feldbaum, president of the Biotechnology Industry Organization. Undaunted, Newman yesterday filed an appeal to the patent office. Private ownership of inventions is not the only way progress has been made in the history of science and the history of medicine, Newman said. ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
Hi Peter Fascinating indeed. I don't know of the outcome if any, but I'll look around. Undaunted, Newman yesterday filed an appeal to the patent office. It's great when people get undaunted. Private ownership of inventions is not the only way progress has been made in the history of science and the history of medicine, Newman said. Indeed not if you measure progress according to the principles of science and medicine, or virtually any other principles, but I don't think Monsanto measures it that way, the bottom-line isn't a principle. Anyway, what's human? What's not human? Don't we all know non-humans who turn out to be a lot more human than some of the humans we know? How do you separate humans from the rest of life? I don't think you can, or anyway not without distortion and hubris. If it isn't biologically alive then I guess it isn't human (eg Monsanto, which doesn't run on DNA), otherwise maybe it is. So, no genes to patent, sorry about that. The whole thing's nuts, and psychopathic, frankly. When we applied for this patent a year and half ago, people reacted to it as if it was some kind of science fiction scenario, Newman said. It IS a science fiction scenario, only it's real (like quite a lot of science fiction scenarios). Thanks Peter. All best Keith Hi Keith ; Fascinating article on this subject. But it is dated 1999, any idea of any progress that has been made? http://www.organicconsumers.org/Patent/rifikinhc.cfm US Human/Chimpanzee Life Form Patent Challenge by Jeremy Rifkin Stuart Newman Will Now Go to the Federal Courts U.S. Ruling Aids Opponent Of Patents for Life Forms By Rick Weiss Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, June 17, 1999; Page A2 The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has turned down a scientist's controversial request for a patent on creatures that would be part animal and part human--bizarre life forms that no one has made before, but that might prove useful in medical experiments. But unlike most patent office rejectees, the scientist, Stuart Newman, is celebrating. The New York Medical College biology professor never intended to make the animal-human hybrids. He applied for the patent to gain the legal standing to challenge U.S. patent policy, which allows patents on living entities. The patent office ruled in part that Newman's invention is too human to be patentable. By doing so, it opened the door to a series of legal challenges available to all patent applicants--a path that could lead to the Supreme Court. Newman hopes his appeals will force a judicial and congressional reassessment of the nation's 19-year-old policy of granting patents on life forms. That policy, based on a single court decision, has provided the foundation for today's $13 billion biotechnology industry. Some patent experts this week criticized Newman for abusing the federal patent review system to bypass the legal avenues by which patent law is normally made and changed. But even some critics confirmed that the strategy appeared to be working. In particular, said John Barton, a patent specialist at the Stanford University School of Law, the ploy has forced the patent office to acknowledge the relatively thin legal ice upon which its policies on life patents rest. The ruling also reveals the agency's apparent uncertainty about just how human a creature must be before it is no longer patentable, Barton and others said. The patent office has argued that to grant patents on people would violate the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished slavery. But neither the patent office nor Congress has ever defined human. That question is of more than philosophical import today. Already, several patents have been allowed on animals containing human genes or organs. And just this week, scientists in Massachusetts said they were creating live embryos by combining cow and human cells. When we applied for this patent a year and half ago, people reacted to it as if it was some kind of science fiction scenario, Newman said. Developments in the past year have shown that similar things are already on the table and being considered seriously. In its rejection letter, the patent office says Newman's invention embraces a human being, but it does not say why other creatures with human components do not embrace a human being, said Washington patent attorney Patrick Coyne, who filed Newman's application. This puts a big question mark on all commercial interests involving human embryos and embryonic . . . cells, said biotechnology activist Jeremy Rifkin, a co-applicant on Newman's claim, who has rallied religious leaders against patents on life forms. The agency concedes in its letter that in the Supreme Court's single foray into the topic--a 5 to 4 decision in 1980 allowing a patent on a microbe--the justices did not include humans on their list of nonpatentable life forms. But Stephen Kunin, the patent office's deputy assistant commissioner for patent policy, said the
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
lol, a scanner darkly, etc. . . . On 9/21/08, Keith Addison [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi Peter Fascinating indeed. I don't know of the outcome if any, but I'll look around. Undaunted, Newman yesterday filed an appeal to the patent office. It's great when people get undaunted. Private ownership of inventions is not the only way progress has been made in the history of science and the history of medicine, Newman said. Indeed not if you measure progress according to the principles of science and medicine, or virtually any other principles, but I don't think Monsanto measures it that way, the bottom-line isn't a principle. Anyway, what's human? What's not human? Don't we all know non-humans who turn out to be a lot more human than some of the humans we know? How do you separate humans from the rest of life? I don't think you can, or anyway not without distortion and hubris. If it isn't biologically alive then I guess it isn't human (eg Monsanto, which doesn't run on DNA), otherwise maybe it is. So, no genes to patent, sorry about that. The whole thing's nuts, and psychopathic, frankly. When we applied for this patent a year and half ago, people reacted to it as if it was some kind of science fiction scenario, Newman said. It IS a science fiction scenario, only it's real (like quite a lot of science fiction scenarios). Thanks Peter. All best Keith Hi Keith ; Fascinating article on this subject. But it is dated 1999, any idea of any progress that has been made? http://www.organicconsumers.org/Patent/rifikinhc.cfm US Human/Chimpanzee Life Form Patent Challenge by Jeremy Rifkin Stuart Newman Will Now Go to the Federal Courts U.S. Ruling Aids Opponent Of Patents for Life Forms By Rick Weiss Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, June 17, 1999; Page A2 The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has turned down a scientist's controversial request for a patent on creatures that would be part animal and part human--bizarre life forms that no one has made before, but that might prove useful in medical experiments. But unlike most patent office rejectees, the scientist, Stuart Newman, is celebrating. The New York Medical College biology professor never intended to make the animal-human hybrids. He applied for the patent to gain the legal standing to challenge U.S. patent policy, which allows patents on living entities. The patent office ruled in part that Newman's invention is too human to be patentable. By doing so, it opened the door to a series of legal challenges available to all patent applicants--a path that could lead to the Supreme Court. Newman hopes his appeals will force a judicial and congressional reassessment of the nation's 19-year-old policy of granting patents on life forms. That policy, based on a single court decision, has provided the foundation for today's $13 billion biotechnology industry. Some patent experts this week criticized Newman for abusing the federal patent review system to bypass the legal avenues by which patent law is normally made and changed. But even some critics confirmed that the strategy appeared to be working. In particular, said John Barton, a patent specialist at the Stanford University School of Law, the ploy has forced the patent office to acknowledge the relatively thin legal ice upon which its policies on life patents rest. The ruling also reveals the agency's apparent uncertainty about just how human a creature must be before it is no longer patentable, Barton and others said. The patent office has argued that to grant patents on people would violate the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished slavery. But neither the patent office nor Congress has ever defined human. That question is of more than philosophical import today. Already, several patents have been allowed on animals containing human genes or organs. And just this week, scientists in Massachusetts said they were creating live embryos by combining cow and human cells. When we applied for this patent a year and half ago, people reacted to it as if it was some kind of science fiction scenario, Newman said. Developments in the past year have shown that similar things are already on the table and being considered seriously. In its rejection letter, the patent office says Newman's invention embraces a human being, but it does not say why other creatures with human components do not embrace a human being, said Washington patent attorney Patrick Coyne, who filed Newman's application. This puts a big question mark on all commercial interests involving human embryos and embryonic . . . cells, said biotechnology activist Jeremy Rifkin, a co-applicant on Newman's claim, who has rallied religious leaders against patents on life forms. The agency concedes in its letter that in the Supreme Court's single foray into the topic--a 5 to 4 decision in 1980 allowing a patent on a microbe--the justices did not include humans on their list of nonpatentable
Re: [Biofuel] Climate ready GM crops: The patent race
Hi Keith ; These are ominous developments, but far worse should be expected eventually. As we discussed before, the answer here is to treat life forms like perpetual motion machines. In other words, you cannot get a patent on any kind of perpetual motion machine. Similarly, you should not be able to get a patent for any life form. BR Peter G. Thailand ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
