History and Past Activities
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History and Past Activities |
Calvert, Jane
ESRC Centre for Genomics in Society (Egenis) - J.Calvert@exeter.ac.uk
Genomic patents and the utility requirement
This paper is concerned with patenting in genomics, specifically analysing the requirement that the invention be useful or industrially applicable. This requirement is important because broader social, political and ethical issues inevitably arise, since an invention cannot be useful in isolation from a social context, and it is necessary to ask who will benefit from using the invention. The utility requirement is also interesting because a substance becomes less ‘natural’ when it is shown to be more ‘useful’- as if by making something useful we give it properties it does not possess in nature. The paper asks how scientists, in both university and industry, understand the utility requirement, and what assumptions they make about the users of their inventions. It goes on to ask what conception of the ‘public good’ is found in genomic patenting today, and whether there is room for a notion of social utility.
Sociology of Science and Technology NETwork - last update: April 2006