Should new forms of life, the creations of biotechnology, be protected by patents? Many of their inventors argue that they should. The patents would reward those inventors with a chance to profit from their inventions and encourage them to invent more. In exchange for the exclusive right to make, use, or sell their creations, the inventors would be required to disclose their discoveries, furthering the advance of science. Others argue against patenting lifeforms, most often on moral grounds; how can you patent a new kind of life? From the historian’s view, the problems of patenting biotechnology are but the latest in a long series of controversial issues in the history of the patent system.
Like the earlier disputes, this one will be settled—probably more than once—according to laws and judicial decisions based on a few words in Article I, Section 8, of the United States Constitution: “The Congress shall have Power To … promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” The Founding Fathers could not have dreamed of genetic engineering, but patent protection for this technology, as for other technologies yet unimagined, must be based on those few words. Two hundred years after its founding, the Patent Office remains a gatekeeper of American technology and innovation.
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