Monsanto (R) 'invents' meat. Seeks patent.

The Republicons will just luv them this, now that thanks to them corporations are people.

"In a pending patent application from Monsanto even bacon and steaks are claimed: Patent application WO2009097403 is claiming meat stemming from pigs being fed with the patented genetically engineered plants of Monsanto. A similar patent is applied for fish from aquaculture in March 2010 (WO201027788)..."

http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/1-news-items/12178-meat-claimed-as-invention-by-monsanto?tmpl=component&print=1&page

'70's. So much better!

Next up, theyll patent Americans

makes sense.

from the pig that ate the plant
that Monsanto genetically modified

and I don't know why

It is insanity. What next, GMO oxygen? You breathe it, you become property of Monsanto.

from the web page cited in the OP

""There is a process going on, multinationals are trying to gain increasing control of the whole chain of food production. Consumers, farmers and food producers are all caught by the same trap.

"This has to be regarded as an immoral attempt to abuse patent law. The company is heading for maximising its profits by filing patents on food while at the same time one billion people is suffering from hunger," says Francois Meienberg from the Berne Declaration..."

:rofl:


They are driving real farmers out of business with backhanded tactics. A new age is dawning in agriculture, and its a tad bit creepy

Plants take in Carbon Dioxide and put out oxygen, right?

So better sign up now for your MonSatan license to breathe.
:sarcasm:

an "ownership society". Some people laugh at the native Americans for not understanding "ownership" of land. Well I don't understand this new kind of "ownership" either. Corporations are taking out patents on native plants, they're saying that the rain that falls on your head is theirs. When they start charging for air, then you'll understand what the American Indian was saying.

This isn't anything specific to Monsanto. If you are angry about this, then your anger should be directed at the patent system and not at one of the many companies that uses that system.

Plants have been patentable in the United States since 1930. http://www.google.com/patents?id=7NtwAAAAEBAJ&printsec=abstract">Here is a link to the very first plant patent, for a "climbing or trailing rose".

That plants were made patentable was the result of an explicit act of Congress, the Plant Patent Act of 1930. 57 years later, in 1987, the USPTO acted without Congress to begin accepting patents of animals as well. Here is an 1988 NY Times article about the (limited) debate that took place when animal patents began.

To a large extent the USPTO was pushed to accept animal patents by the 1980 Supreme Court ruling Diamond v. Chakrabarty. In that case, the inventor was attempting to patent his invention of a bacteria that could eat crude oil to be used in fighting oil spills. Initially the USPTO refused his patent and stated that patents on living organisms (other than plants under the 1930 act) were not allowed. The Supreme Court ruled basically that "an invention is an invention" and nothing in the law prohibited patenting a bacteria.

In 1987 the USPTO conceded that polyploid oysters (oysters made sterile in order to have a longer market season) were likely patentable. In 1988 the first animal patent was granted, to Harvard University, for a mouse that was predisposed to develop breast cancer.

For better or worse, this is the world we live in. Both plants and animals can be patented. The patent owner not only has exclusive rights to his "invention", but potentially to all products made from his invention.

I'm not personally happy with the current status quo of patents on life forms. But my anger would be directed at Congress and the USPTO for creating this system, and not at inventors and companies who use the system they have been given. Monsanto is in no way unique in seeking to patent an animal and the products made from that animal.

The patent applies to their pig feed. Not meat made from pigs eating their feed.

Oh, and the novel thing about their pig feed is that it's got omega fatty acids. They haven't genetically engineered a new pig feed plant.

Did you read the patent application? The very first claim is for a "pork product for human consumption". The application has 89 claims of which maybe a quarter are for feed. The majority are for various "pork products", which is defined as "food products comprising the tissue of pigs".

... and facts are irrelevant. None of that cuts any ice w/ HFPS. You'll find that out if a thread develops.

.rog.

....every last memo his employers (MonSatan) e mail him.

Did you read the part about how it's a method patent?

:popcorn: :beer:

I think I'll just sit this one out with a few refreshments.

.rog.

Like religious extremists and other fanatics- they'll keep on pushing and pushing to the point of absurdity- and beyond.

I can just imagine the "meat" inventor shouting, "IT'S ALIVE! IT'S ALIVE!", upon his discovery!