Posts: Science and Nature / U.S. District Court Judge Invalidates Human Gene Patent

really interesting, I had never even thought about that this before. it's really horrible that some companies actually own genes.

I'm not really familiar with U.S. patent laws, but I wouldn't be opposed to granted patents on genes if the patents themselves were extremely short (e.g. ~5 years). Just long enough for the original company to reap the initial profits before the information is made public.

agreed

on second thought, however, think of how much more progress and technology could be achieved if they used an open source system instead. this way i would imagine the costs of research and design would be reduced. everyone's working for the same goal right, saving lives? it should be more focused on that but perhaps the competition between companies, such as capitalism, facilitates the availability of treatments rather then hinders them and therefore is a better move.

Sure, individuals might be working towards a common selfless goal, but investors are generally working towards profits. An open source system might expedite some research while leaving more major research projects (eg. the human genome project) much more risky for biotech firms to fund.