Patents and Open Source Biotech

sebFlyte writes "Since Slashdot readers seem to be interesting in the issues and problems surrounding software patents, I thought they might be interested to see that Wired is running an interesting piece on patents in Biotech and the way that they can hold up important research, and how there are clear parallels with the open source software community with the way that advocates of openness are trying to solve these problems."

Comments

Simple solution ...

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Exclude living systems and their components (e.g., genes) from the patent system. Period. End of story.

For those who whine, "But then there won't be any incentive to innovate!" ... GMAFB. Innovation in biotech (and in pretty much every technical field) is done by scientists, not moneymen. And the scientists will continue to do their jobs, whether for prestige or a desire to aid their fellow man or just out of sheer intellectual curiosity. Most of them will do it, BTW, in university labs, not corporate "R&D" shops, just the way they always have.

If the suits want to make a profit, they'll have to work a little harder to figure out how. Watch me weep in sympathy.

Re:Simple solution ...

[pbody]

Not that I'm a lover of the patent system, but the scientists do not work independently of the moneymen. Government grants only go so far, but the push to patent is VERY strong in the universities. Which personally sucks for me (my field is theoretical physics), and even though I don't do patents, but I still have to justify the work to the moneymen on a regular basis :( We're (sadly?) way past the times when a person/group who wants to do experimental work can just do their jobs without big $$ support.

Re:Simple solution ...

[syphax]

2. A man must use his mind in order to survive.

So must a lion.

Since survival is the process of maintaining life, it follows from these that a man must have the right to the products of his mind - the right to own property.

This is what is known as a logical leap. Why must ownership of ideas be *exclusive*, as the parent seems to suggest (i.e. if I own an idea, you can't own the same one)? Ideas are not like diamonds; the replacement cost of sharing an idea is nil.

If you deny that men can own their ideas, then you deny that men can survive by ideas, and you deny the right of man to survive at all.

Last I checked, no lion owned a patent for "How to identify, kill, and eat aged wildebeasts," and yet somehow they are able to implement said concept and survive. Curious.

Patent and copyrights represent a pragmatic balance of power between creators and consumers, nothing more, nothing less. To the extent that they inhibit creators for borrowing from existing ideas, they can be problematic.

There are no first-principle metaphysical requirements for ownership of ideas to be exclusive, as the parent suggests.

Re:Simple solution ...

[i_should_be_working]

yes, it does suck to have to justify all resarch and make it sound like it's going to be usefull/profitable in the near term. In my group we have to make our resarch sound like an essential step on the road to a quantum computer, but to us it's just research.

But that's different than having to worry about whether your research infringes on a patent. I think what the parent post meant was that biologists and scientists in general don't want to keep their research closed and patented in order to make money themselves (Funny how the patent pushers go on about needing patents to provide incentive and progression when scientists know that science has to be open to flourish). I guess a tough situation could arise when your funding agency or university is insisting that you get a patent when you know it will be a hindrince to your field.

So maybe there should be a law. Absolutely no patents in general blue sky research. And if that lowers funding and slows down resarch, well it won't slow it down as much as this patent problem could.

Only in some sick bizzaro world can I imagine having to stop my research because it infinged on a patent, but it actually happened to a professor at my uni. He does geological resarch and was using a method of determining the density of earth at very low depths. He uses it for basic 'what is the earth made of and what's it doing' type research, but apparently some company that prospects for oil had a very vague patent on the general method and is now trying to stop him from doing his research.

What a hateful thing

So I agree with you that big money and even big corporations sometimes have to be involved. I just wish patents weren't.

Ho hum

[jd]

Biotech is filled with patents and IP. There are patents for gene sequences, for chrissakes. Because patents (unlike copyright) cover even accidental duplication, this essentially is a ban on evolution. Great for the Bible Belt, but not so great for the species.

Interestingly, you can download sizable chunks of the gene sequences for cows, chickens, humans, the SARS virus... Clearly, the researchers who have made such information available are Communists, for not protecting their IP rights and demanding the first-born from all who would see such information.

Pathetic. The bulk of serious research is done in an open environment. If you want to see quality, verifiable, useful information, you don't look in the patent office. You look up the research papers that have been published and are either freely available or damn cheap.

To the best of my knowledge, the only person known to have successfully learned something from patents was Einstein. But if you look at his best work, you look at the thought experiments, the observations of the ordinary, the stuff that is simply not ownable. THAT is where Real Science and Real R&D takes place.