Open Source Biology And Knowledge Distribution

n7lyg writes: "IEEE Spectrum has an opinion piece this month on Open-source Biology and Its Impact on Industry. The article speculates about advancements in biology and biological-based manufacturing and how it is likely impossible for anyone to keep control of the Intellectual Property around genetic engineering. If software was as easy to produce and prevalent as DNA, then it would be similarly impossible to control software as IP."

Comments

Modern day AI

[rw2]

I don't remember first hand, being only in my 30's, but I've certainly read about the early AI labs and how optimistic they were that we were just around the corner from strong AI being in the labs and then the world.

They were, obviously, wrong. Today we can't even do speech recognition with sufficient reliability to use it every day, much less get in a car, tell it were we want to go and then read the important news of the day (pre-selected by a Chevy Agent) on the drive.

So too will genetics be. We're at the beginning of an interesting period in research. But for the genetic possiblities to be realized will require something like the kind of AI imagined in the 60's to be available and well understood. There is just that much data available to process.

So, while I'm as excited as the next guy at the possibilities, I'll consider myself lucky indeed if I live to see them realized.

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Poliglut