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Venter Institute Claims Patent on Synthetic Life
jimsnail writes "J. Craig Venter and the Institute that bears his name are again moving into new territory in the field of genetics. Genetic patents, that is. They are seeking a broad patent that would give them ownership of a 'free living organism that can grow and replicate' constructed entirely from synthetic DNA. The ETC Group is challenging the claim. 'Scientists at the institute designed the bacterium to have a "minimal genome"--the smallest set of genes any organism can live on. The project, which began in the early 2000s, was partly a philosophical exercise: to help define life itself better by identifying its bare-bones requirements. But it was also fraught with commercial possibilities: if one could reliably recreate a standardized, minimal life form, other useful genes could be added in as needed for various purposes.'"
I just patented DNA replication. That's right. J. Craig Vetner, along with everyone else here, must pay up now, be sued, or die.
My blog
Uh, doesnt that seem rather overbroad? I mean, there's nothing about methodology, just 'we own any synthetic life.' What utter bullshit. Why dont they try to patent nonsynthetic life while they're at it?
Come read my stupid blagablog. Rants and Giggles
Patents are a means of preventing people from making productive use of the technology and information available to them. This creates artificial scarcity, which ultimately makes a lot of money for a very few people. It also technologically and practically impoverishes the rest of the world (by preventing collaboration and also production).
I am very familiar with the economic arguments about needing to secure a return on investment, and they are bunk. The most glaring part of it is the fallacy of excluded middle (or slippery slope), stated: "If a company can't guarantee that it makes all the money that there is to be made on this idea, and that nobody else makes any money on it, then the company won't be able to make any money at all on it." Lies...there is plenty of money to be made selling a product in the face of competition...in fact our whole economy is built around the need for this.
On top of that...where there is a demand there is a supply. For example, if people need some disease cured, but no drug company wants to invest the RnD funding to make medicine for it...which is unlikely...but even if it does happen money can also come from private donations and government grants. One way or another, the problems will be solved, and patents are not needed.
So, IMO, patents give us nothing of value and deprive us of the ability to work together and to make productive use of the information available to us.
Thought control is bad.
From the article: "The researchers filed their patent claim on the artificial organism and on its genome."
These guys have created a brand new form of life from the ground up and are patenting their particular genome. It's hard work, and certainly not obvious or trivial. Given that other biological systems are patentable (e.g., the Harvard mouse, new strains of wheat), this certainly seems to clear the bar for patentability.
That's like saying "What if you're born with a pattern of freckles that spells out the text of The Da Vinci Code?" The sun will die out before it happens.
Ok, so what do we know?
Lifeforms reproduce themselves, patterning surrounding matter and
energy into more of their own form.
Over several billions of years, natural ecosystems have evolved
checks and balances on overabundance of any particular lifeform.
Other lifeforms co-evolved and the lifeforms limit each other
(by eating each other, by competing for the same resources, etc.)
The ecosystems change, but rather gradually, as many stalemates
(equilibria) in the energy and strategy balance of the
competitive patterning game evolve.
So now we have Joe or Jane Scientist, or gene-engineer, thinking
"I'm pretty damn smart. I know my sh*t.
Got it 'Piled higher & Deeper' in fact.
Why don't I just unleash my patented self-replicating, resource-patterning
machine, and let's see what happens.
On the bright side, most things they could come up with will be no match
for the 3 billion year evolved competition.
On the other side, they could be unlucky, and make something that no other
lifeform recognized, or could eat, or could compete with for resources.
Oh, too bad. Start game over.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?