History and Past Activities
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History and Past Activities |
Hans Radder
Faculty of Philosophy, Vrije Universiteit
Amsterdam
The Netherlands
e-mail: H.Radder@ph.vu.nl
How to patent the sun
A critique of the concept and practice of product patenting
Developments in biotechnology have moved the issue of patenting scientific and technological inventions, for example genes, towards the centre of interest. One of the criteria for granting a patent is the reproducibility of the invention. However, in the practice of experimental science and technology two different types of reproducibility can be found: the reproducibility of an overall experimental or technological process under a fixed theoretical interpretation and the reproducibility of an experimental or technological result through different processes. In the first part of the paper, I explain the different uses and functions of these types of reproducibility in the practice of (experimental) science and technology.
In the second part I offer a critique of the concept and practice of product patenting, based on the distinction between the two types of reproducibility. The fundamental problem is this. While inventions require the reproducibility of a specific overall process, product patents extrapolate from this to the reproducibility of the product by means of fully unspecified and/or unknown processes. For this reason, product patents are not adequately based on actual technological inventions, and hence they should not be granted at all.
Finally, by way of a reductio ad absurdum of the concept of product patenting I offer a method for patenting the heat of the sun.
Sociology of Science and Technology NETwork - last update: April 2006