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The ability to patent life itself is a dangerous one. Imagine where these precedents lead when inevitably we start genetically engineering people. If you your
by RajT88 4y ago
The ability to patent life itself is a dangerous one.
Imagine where these precedents lead when inevitably we start genetically engineering people. If you yourself carry genes engineered by a biotech firm (cancer resistance or laser eye beams, you can pick according to whim), do you have to pay them royalties when you have children?
- Kalium 4y agoEven without patents, there's a whole system of plant breeder's rights. The idea is that even without patents, breeding plants for a particular set of characteristics is a ton of work and the rights system is a patent-like way to commercialize. If you have a different idea for solving this particular financial problem, I expect quite a lot of people would love to hear about it.
- RajT88 4y agoMy point is that patents are abused enough already. We should not allow patenting of genomes/genes. Full stop. We should rely on those other systems of breeder's rights.
- pfdietz 4y agoYou objection to "patenting life" seems utterly spurious and would effectively end GMO seeds (as the effort expended creating them could not be recouped.) But perhaps that's your ulterior motive. I see no legitimate motivation for your position.
- brnaftr361 4y ago$169 for a HiFi Gibson Assembly kit. Up to 8000bp for about $2200-3500. It's not as forbidding as you might think. The insistence on IP law being the only probable, legitimate incentive is what's spurious.
- pfdietz 4y agoThat's like pointing to the cost of laboratory glassware to claim drug discovery isn't expensive.
- brnaftr361 4y agoDiscovery isn't. Look at all the RCs and other designer drugs around, or Shulgin. I could pull a shit out of my ass and probably find a microbe with something noteworthy in it. A lot of this shit just happens by accident. LSD, Viagra, Penicillin off the top of my head. All had huge impacts too. It's everything post, and a bunch of overpaid jackoffs and hullabaloo. You're not going to take an RC with an open license to market because there's a billion dollars in intermediary steps between finding it and proving it's safe and effective.
- pfdietz 4y agoOh my goodness. You are completely clueless about the economics of drug discovery. It is vastly more difficult and expensive than you think.
- brnaftr361 4y agoAm I though, or am I just looking arbitrary restrictions put in place by various governments either directly or indirectly curbing deliverable drugs? Oh and pharma's shitty business practices. I don't think it's fair to call it economics when all the costs are derived from legal fictions and stakeholder disinterest.
- pfdietz 4y agoYes, drug discovery can become much easier if you don't have to show the drugs work and are safe. Any old chemical can be called a drug in that case; you don't even have to laboriously search through the exponentially vast space of possible chemicals for the winners. Snake oil, anyone?
- BeFlatXIII 4y agoLet it be abused and let nature take its course. Investors can get stiffed.