Comment & Debate
“Patenting life is owning life.” Third World Network: “whilst I create my carburettor out of materials that have nothing to do with delivering measured amounts of petroleum, I introduce genes or traits into an organism only if they already exist as such in another organism or organisms. Can I patent a car because I fit it with a different kind of carburettor from another car? Therefore breeding and genetic engineering reorganise something existing; they do not create anything de novo. Considering achievements in reorganising as if they were inventions, is a distortion of meaning, with the aim of distorting reality. This distortion is made for a specific purpose, for controlling living things in the same way as one can control machines one has invented.”