| Science and technology provide many societal | | | | innovations involve so many existing patents that |
| benefits, such as the enhancement of economic | | | | innovation is discouraged. At least one study has |
| growth or quality of life. They also can produce | | | | found the anti-commons is not yet a significant |
| negative, unintended consequences. Most societies | | | | deterrent to innovation, but that the situation should |
| promote science and technology, but this can be | | | | be monitored. |
| costly. Establishment of IPRs that protect new works | | | | IPRs can be attached to writings or products |
| and give innovators the right to profit from their | | | | regarded as dangerous or immoral, and IPRs tend to |
| creations provides incentives for expensive innovation | | | | legitimize such works by implying social approval. |
| without the need for direct government subsidies | | | | Societies must decide whether to provide protection |
| (Posner 2004). At the same time, IPRs may maintain | | | | for harmful or otherwise objectionable work. New |
| or aggravate wealth inequities. | | | | technologies, particularly those that create or |
| Rights have little meaning unless they can be | | | | replicate life, often trigger debate over whether the |
| enforced and modern technology has made IPRs | | | | work should be done at all, much less be protected |
| enforcement increasingly difficult. Photocopiers make | | | | by law. IPRs also establish ownership of particular |
| it possible for anyone with access to a machine to | | | | innovations, which may help to determine liability if a |
| reproduce works entitled to copyright protection and | | | | product causes harm. This raises questions of |
| the Internet allows anyone to make literary or | | | | whether innovators should be held responsible for |
| musical works available to the world. | | | | their products, particularly when the products are |
| Science and technology challenge intellectual property | | | | used in unintended ways. |
| systems, particularly patent laws. New fields such as | | | | Public funding for science and technology further |
| information technology and genetic engineering force | | | | complicate intellectual property issues. Who should |
| courts to decide how to apply laws made before | | | | benefit from works developed under public funding, |
| such technologies were contemplated. As knowledge | | | | the creator or the public? What balance of public |
| itself becomes more valuable, people and institutions | | | | private benefits best serves societal goals? |
| seek additional protection for control of the | | | | Academics build their reputations by producing |
| knowledge and its profits. At the same time, society | | | | intellectual works. They seek recognition for their |
| has an increasing need for access to some kinds of | | | | accomplishments, control over any economic |
| knowledge and protection from the use of others. | | | | benefits, and protection against plagiarism. IPRs |
| Abstract ideas cannot be patented but their | | | | promote release of information to the public by |
| applications can qualify for patent protection. For | | | | assuring the author of protection for the work, even |
| example, "Einstein could not patent his celebrated law | | | | after it is made public. IPRs protect authors from |
| that E MC2; nor could Newton have patented the law | | | | possible appropriation of ideas by others, including |
| of gravity. Such discoveries are 'manifestations of | | | | peer reviewers, before the work has actually been |
| Nature, free to all men and reserved exclusively to | | | | published. |
| none."' (Diamond v. Chakrabarty, p. 309, quoting Funk | | | | Ownership can be a major IPRs issue. Who owns the |
| Brothers Seed Co. v. Kalo Inoculant Co., 333 U.S. 127, | | | | product of collaborative work? At what point does a |
| 130, 1948). General ideas remain in the public domain | | | | contribution by a supervisor, graduate student, or |
| but their applications may be privatized through the | | | | coworker deserve coauthorship? When the creator |
| patenting process. | | | | works for a corporation or a university, does |
| Biotechnology, perhaps more than any other field, | | | | ownership lie with the creator or the institution? |
| has challenged courts and lawmakers to reconsider | | | | What about funding agencies? In many cases, |
| intellectual property laws. In 1972 Ananda | | | | ownership or authorship is established by disciplinary |
| Chakrabarty, a microbiologist, sought a U.S. patent for | | | | customs or by agreements among the parties |
| a genetically engineered bacterium. The U.S. Patent | | | | (Kennedy 1997). |
| Office denied the application because bacteria are | | | | Plagiarism is professionally unacceptable and |
| products of nature, and living things cannot be | | | | sometimes illegal, but timing is critical to determining |
| patented under U.S. law. The case was appealed and | | | | whether plagiarism has occurred. According to Donald |
| eventually reached the U.S. Supreme Court. The | | | | Kennedy, "To take someone else's idea and use it |
| Court restated the principle that natural phenomena | | | | before it has been placed in the public domain is a |
| cannot be patented, but found that Chakrabarty's | | | | form of theft ... [t]o make further use of someone |
| bacterium was "a product of human ingenuity," and | | | | else's idea after it has been published is scholarship" |
| therefore was patentable under U.S. law. | | | | (1997, p. 212). Of course attribution is critical even, or |
| So many biotechnology patents have been issued for | | | | especially, in scholarship, whether or not a work is |
| such small innovations that some fear the creation of | | | | protected. |
| a tragedy of the anti-commons in which new | | | | |