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The formulas are unpatentable "laws of nature". | 277 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
The formulas only describe what is to be done.
Authored by: jesse on Tuesday, October 09 2012 @ 05:26 PM EDT
The formulae are non-patentable... the method of grinding lenses can be
patentable (though I think the prior art on lenses make them non-patentable).

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Not Quite
Authored by: jesse on Tuesday, October 09 2012 @ 05:29 PM EDT
Then we have the questions: Is all math unpatentable?
Should be, as it was declared non-patentable.
Are all chemical reactions unpatentable?
Only the new ones.
Is all physics unpatentable?
Depends on your definition of "physics". Devices created based on the laws of physics are patentable, but the laws are not.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Yabbut...
Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, October 09 2012 @ 05:31 PM EDT
That patent was about manufacturing physical items,
lenses in this case, using a (presumably) novel
measure of distortion to improve their quality in
some respect. It's a thing, not pure information.

Software (as such) is not about creating physical
items. There is no manufacture involved when
loading and executing a program in a computer.
It is all manipulation of abstract symbols,
i.e. math. If a process for manufacture is
controlled by a computer, the patent should be
for the method, regardless of whether it is
controlled by a digital computer, an analog
controller, a skilled operator or a horde of
trained imps turning little knobs.

Software *is* information, and software executed
in a computer *manipulates* information. That is
really all it does. Clever input and output
units can make execution of software have tangible
effects in the real world, but that effect is all
caused by the choice of input and output units,
not inherent to the software.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

Optics
Authored by: FreeChief on Wednesday, October 10 2012 @ 01:19 AM EDT
I was looking at a patent for an improvement in lenses. It was optics, which is a branch of physics. The claims gave formulas for calculating distortion, which is math.
As others have said, there are bogus patents, and I don't know if this was one.

There should not be a patent on the formuae themselves. If there is a description of an actual machine that carves blocks of glass into the shape described by the formulae, then that may be worth a patent. (If novel, non-obvious, etc,)

 — Programmer in Chief

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

The formulas are unpatentable "laws of nature".
Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, October 10 2012 @ 04:16 AM EDT
In fact, all of math is also unpatentable "laws of nature", FWIW.

But yes, you just spotted an invalid and illegal patent in optics. A proper
patent in optics has to include new stuff about actually grinding lenses or
something similar, not just a law of nature.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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