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AI Patents The Courts United States

Only Humans, Not AI Machines, Can Get a US Patent, Judge Rules (bloomberg.com) 48

A computer using artificial intelligence can't be listed as an inventor on patents because only a human can be an inventor under U.S. law, a federal judge ruled in the first American decision that's part of a global debate over how to handle computer-created innovation. From a report: Federal law requires that an "individual" take an oath that he or she is the inventor on a patent application, and both the dictionary and legal definition of an individual is a natural person, ruled U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Virginia. The Artificial Inventor Project, run by University of Surrey Law Professor Ryan Abbott, has launched a global effort to get a computer listed as an inventor. Abbott's team enlisted Imagination Engines founder Stephen Thaler to build a machine whose main purpose was to invent. Rulings in South Africa and Australia have favored his argument, though the Australian patent office is appealing the decision in that country. "We respectfully disagree with the judgment and plan to appeal it," Abbott said in an email. "We believe listing an AI as an inventor is consistent with both the language and purpose of the Patent Act. Brinkema cited cases in which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the nation's top patent court, rejected the idea of a corporation being an inventor.
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Only Humans, Not AI Machines, Can Get a US Patent, Judge Rules

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  • Why would someone apply for a patent in the name of the AI, rather than claim to have invented it themselves and say (or not say, actually) that the AI was a tool they used to help them.

    Seems like the only reason is to want the AI be the "inventor", in order to make a point. Advance the rights of non-humans, that sort of thing.

    • Or to shield the humans from responsibility.

      • by xalqor ( 6762950 )
        Having a patent in your name does not impose any liability... In any case I'd be impressed if someone actually creates an AI that can 1) decide to invent something to solve a problem, 2) want to exclude others from using the invention, 3) figure out that filing a patent application with the USPTO is the way to do that, and bonus points for international filing, 4) be able to describe the invention, 5) be able to write the claims with a balance of being as broad as possible while being detailed enough to dif
    • by Sloppy ( 14984 )

      I'm ignorant of this professor's grand vision, but I can speculate a reason why someone could want computers to own patents.

      Suppose I make a computer which invents things. Then I sell you that computer (or even better, license it to you). Then you press a button on the computer and it invents a valuable thing. I don't want that invention to be yours. Ideally, I want it to be mine. But even having it be owned by the computer, is a step up from it being yours, since I might still be that computer's master (yo

      • by galabar ( 518411 )
        The patent will be owned/created by the owner of the device.
      • by xalqor ( 6762950 )
        Why would someone buy your invention-generating computer if they won't own the output? Let's say these people exist. You can make your scheme happen with a regular contract. It doesn't require computers to be able to own things.
    • No, this is not some Robot Liberation Front thing.

      Under the rules, humans can get patents. This is relevant because humans are autonomous creatures.

      Corporations CANNOT get patents.

      Once you rule that an "AI" can get a patent, you are ruling that a CORPORATION can get a patent.

      That is ALL this is about. An "AI" is not intelligent or sapient or sentient or self determining, it is just a tool held by a corporation.

      That is all that this is for.

      • Only humans go to jail when they commit crimes. Corporations cant, and they dont.

        Human beings can not accept only the assets and refuse to accept liability. Corporations can.

        But corporations are getting all the free speech rights, and also the money is speech rights to spend money to out shout flesh and blood citizens.

        But even in this weird scenario where we are creating corporations more powerful than our own governments, knowing well they are too big to fail, too big to jail, we are continuing to ma

      • by mark-t ( 151149 )

        An A.I., by definition, is intelligent. That's what the "I" stands for.

        Because the notion of intelligence is so loosely defined, however, we end up with a perpetually moving goalposts of whether something is A.I. or not.

    • More.
      Corporations already are very long-lived persons. Since an AI (or the code that allows it to "be") can live forever, this would have made a case for long-lived patent protection, as has happened for copyright. My bet is there are those who think in future innovation will come mostly from AI and not from humans. Protect the future earnings before they're threatened in courts. As for non-humans, we'll kill them as easily as we kill humans. Not much of a point to be made there when dealing with the likes
    • You missed a story a couple weeks back about an Australian (I think) judge who said AI's can get a patent in that country. It will be interesting if there is a patent dispute between items claimed to be invented by an AI in Australia and a person in America.
  • by slazzy ( 864185 ) on Friday September 03, 2021 @11:17AM (#61759773) Homepage Journal
    Patents were created to help protect innovation. Lately, they are being used more to prevent innovation. Time for them to go!
  • Dumb (Score:5, Interesting)

    by aardvarkjoe ( 156801 ) on Friday September 03, 2021 @11:19AM (#61759775)

    If I use a calculator to work out the details of my patentable invention, I don't list the calculator as an inventor on my patent application. The AI is just a tool that the real inventor is using, and so of course it shouldn't be the one to receive the patent. This is just a publicity stunt.

    • Go here: https://thispersondoesnotexist... [thisperson...texist.com]

      Who deserves the credit for the artwork? The programmer of a simple adversarial network certainly didn't draw that face. So who did?

      Your calculator example fails in that you are using the computer to come to a pre-defined outcome - you want a specific solution -, not an undefined unique one.

      • Pollack [google.com] randomly threw blobs of paint on canvas. It was the viscosity and turbulence that created the pattern. Copyright went to the paint slinger, not to turbulence or viscosity.
      • Who deserves the credit for the artwork? The programmer of a simple adversarial network certainly didn't draw that face.

        Of course he did. He just used a nontraditional tool to do it.

        • Of course he did. He just used a nontraditional tool to do it.

          Again you're focused on the tool, not the outcome. Is an artist's painting not patentable because he used a brush? If the outcome wasn't predetermined can the programmer of the tool be said to be the inventor?

          This may seem like it has an easy answer, but in the legal world we've had precisely two test cases. On here about what the USA's legal system thinks. And one in Australia which reached the opposite conclusion.

          • Is an artist's painting not patentable because he used a brush?

            First off, while I didn't mention it in reference to your last comment, paintings are are not patentable. They fall under copyright. However, you seem to have to wrong impression -- of course the artist's painting is copyrightable. If an artist uses an AI tool to generate a face, that image would be copyrightable as well.

            If the outcome wasn't predetermined can the programmer of the tool be said to be the inventor?

            I'm not sure why you think a predetermined outcome is at all relevant. Do you think that accidental discoveries should not be patentable?

      • by gtall ( 79522 )

        If bot "invents" something, then make it public domain. That'll put a stop this nonsense.

    • by Ichijo ( 607641 )

      Has anyone patented the use of an AI to invent things?

      That reminds me of the Monty Python sketch, How to Rid the World of All Known Diseases [fandom.com]:

      Well, first of all become a doctor and discover a marvelous cure for something, and then, when the medical profession really starts to take notice of you, you can jolly well tell them what to do and make sure they get everything right so there'll never be any diseases ever again.

  • by Rick Schumann ( 4662797 ) on Friday September 03, 2021 @11:38AM (#61759825) Journal
    What they keep trotting out to us isn't actual 'Artificial Intelligence' anyway, it's just cheesy algorithms.
    Since a Judge, Patent Office clerk, or anyone else can't have a coherent conversation with these inapproprirately termed software programs referred to as 'AI', then those machines should rightly be disqualified as a 'patent holder'.
    All these software programs are, are tools, like a hammer or screwdriver or calculator, tools human beings use to invent things. Nothing more.
    • You're looking at it the wrong way. You're too focused on the algorithm and not on the intent. A tool is something people use to achieve an outcome. But what if the outcome itself is what is unknown?
      https://thispersondoesnotexist... [thisperson...texist.com]
      Who created the face you see when you clicked the above link? I'd argue not the programmer as the result is a unique outcome which can't be predicted at the time of creating the algorithm, and if the network continues to be trained then it can't be predicted even between two diff

      • by xalqor ( 6762950 )

        Who created the face you see when you clicked the above link?

        We have been using software and hardware to create things for a while, so it's easy to see that you're asking the wrong question.

        *What* created that output? If the answer is a human, you could then ask *who* it is. But in your example the answer is software. You could then ask *who owns the copyright* to its output, or *who is liable* for its output? The answer to that might be a person, partnership, LLC, or a corporation.

      • Nope.
    • Can't have a conversation with a corporation either but that doesn't stop them from issuing patents and copyrights to corps. "Oh, but they have a human representative!" .... And an AI or code base can't have a human representative too?

    • by mark-t ( 151149 )

      That depends on how you define "Intelligence" in the first place.

      Some people subscribe to the notion that free will is an illustion, and if that is the case, are *we* even intelligent? And if we are, why can't a computer be? Where's the threshold?

      • These shitty machines and software are incapable of cognition, are not conscious, and are not 'people'. They have no more 'human rights' than a toaster. Your dog, cat, or hamster is more 'conscious' and more capable of 'cognition' than any of these so-called 'AI's. An amoeba has more cognitive ability.
        In the end all this is, is a weird attempt by humans to evade any responsibility for what the bad output of shitty excuses for 'AI' may cause. "You can't sue me, it's the machines' fault!".
        • by mark-t ( 151149 )
          I don't dispute that they aren't people, but you have, I think, completely missed the point. Try to answer the above question I asked first.
  • by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Friday September 03, 2021 @11:41AM (#61759847)

    Put it in its most basic term, AI Software just tries a bunch of different scenarios and reports the most optimal path to the objective.

    It is not inventing it is just using a lot of calculations to find an optimal method. A good AI program, runs in less time, because they are able to weed out poorly performing paths earlier.

    The AI wasn't try to invent something, it just calculated what the optimal setup that will solve that environmental condition.

  • by theshowmecanuck ( 703852 ) on Friday September 03, 2021 @11:51AM (#61759895) Journal
    After that story a couple weeks back where an Australian judge said AI could get a patent [bioworld.com]
  • The benefits of a trade agreement is you can go shopping for a system/government that will allow your patent to be accepted. https://www.abc.net.au/news/20... [abc.net.au]

  • by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Friday September 03, 2021 @12:03PM (#61759941)

    dictionary and legal definition of an individual is a natural person

    Great! Can we apply this to corporations now, so we can stop this madness of giving them rights like real people?

  • Probably a bad idea to be first in line for Skynet's shit list.

  • If you invent something and the thing becomes somehow popular and one could agree that society benefits from it. You can apply for post-invention-reward. Based on the benefit, reward, paid from the tax money, is given to you or to a company that made the invention. This means that if you invent something, you benefit from sharing it with the world and you benefit if other companies start using it. Making it worthwhile to create good instructions, tutorials etc. and simply letting your competitors know about

  • A miserable little pile or secrets! (that need to be patented)

  • Season 7 : Episode 20 : April 18, 2001

    This episode deals with the holographic doctor writing a holodeck novel which is then published without his permission. The publisher says he doesn't have to get permission because an artificial intelligence can not be given a copyright.

    It ended with the court making the decision that since the Doctor is property of Star Fleet the material is Star Fleet's and they can remove it from publication.

  • by xalqor ( 6762950 )

    The Artificial Inventor Project [artificialinventor.com] website is copyright Ryan Abbott... Why didn't he assign it to his computer? Just kidding. The entire thing looks like a marketing gimmick to sell their software.

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