UK Decides AI Still Cannot Patent Inventions (bbc.com) 20
The UK's Intellectual Property Office has decided artificial-intelligence systems cannot patent inventions for the time being. The BBC reports: A recent IPO consultation found many experts doubted AI was currently able to invent without human assistance. Current law allowed humans to patent inventions made with AI assistance, the government said, despite "misperceptions" this was not the case. Last year, the Court of Appeal ruled against Stephen Thaler, who had said his Dabus AI system should be recognized as the inventor in two patent applications, for: a food container [and] a flashing light. The judges sided, by a two-to-one majority, with the IPO, which had told him to list a real person as the inventor. "Only a person can have rights - a machine cannot," wrote Lady Justice Laing in her judgement. "A patent is a statutory right and it can only be granted to a person." But the IPO also said it would "need to understand how our IP system should protect AI-devised inventions in the future" and committed to advancing international discussions, with a view to keeping the UK competitive.
Many AI systems are trained on large amounts of data copied from the internet. And, on Tuesday, the IPO also announced plans to change copyright law to allow anyone with lawful access - rather than only those conducting non-commercial research, as now -- to do this, to "promote the use of AI technology, and wider 'data mining' techniques, for the public good." Rights holders will still be able to control and charge for access to their works but no longer charge extra for the ability to mine them.
In the consultation, the IPO noted the UK was one of only a handful of countries to protect computer-generated works with no human creator. The "author" of a "computer-generated work" is defined as "the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work are undertaken," it says. And protection lasts for 50 years from when the work is made. Performing-arts workers' union Equity had called for copyright law to be changed to protect actors' livelihoods from AI content such as "deepfakes," generated from images of their face or voice. The IPO took this issue seriously, it said, but "at this stage, the impacts of AI technologies on performers remain unclear." "We will keep these issues under review," it added.
Many AI systems are trained on large amounts of data copied from the internet. And, on Tuesday, the IPO also announced plans to change copyright law to allow anyone with lawful access - rather than only those conducting non-commercial research, as now -- to do this, to "promote the use of AI technology, and wider 'data mining' techniques, for the public good." Rights holders will still be able to control and charge for access to their works but no longer charge extra for the ability to mine them.
In the consultation, the IPO noted the UK was one of only a handful of countries to protect computer-generated works with no human creator. The "author" of a "computer-generated work" is defined as "the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work are undertaken," it says. And protection lasts for 50 years from when the work is made. Performing-arts workers' union Equity had called for copyright law to be changed to protect actors' livelihoods from AI content such as "deepfakes," generated from images of their face or voice. The IPO took this issue seriously, it said, but "at this stage, the impacts of AI technologies on performers remain unclear." "We will keep these issues under review," it added.
So AI is a non-human slave for their master? (Score:2)
Re:So AI is a non-human slave for their master? (Score:4, Insightful)
Word salad.
If you can prove some actual sentience within even a single example AI of your choosing, then we can talk about "AI rights".
Some basics would suffice to prove its worth a closer look:
- demonstrates free will
- can learn new skills outside of its current norm
- the ability to self-sustain its own existence if left without outside assistance or hinderance
- communicates with its peers to exchange ideas
- self constructs social orders
- demonstrates it learns from mistakes
For now "Artificial Intelligence" is just a poor label choice for a cleverly programmed calculator. If it ran at 1/4 the clock rate, it would be far less impressive to witness, yet it would still be functionally equivalent to the very thing you're arguing should receive rights.
I recommend less weed and more coffee.
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All of the conditions you describe as being necessary prerequisites for AI to have rights are merely limitations of the current way that AI programs are interfaced into the world, and nothing more.
"Demonstrates free will" - do you have a clear and unambiguous definition for "free will"?
"can learn new skills outside of its current norm" - do you have a clear and unambiguous definition for "current norm"? Would an AI algorithm that's neither designed to understand the rules of chess and go, yet is able to ac
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Can't be a slave without being a person.
Can't be a person if you can't think and feel.
Software can't do either yet.
Do Any Of These People Live In Reality? (Score:4, Insightful)
AI patenting things? Do they even get what they're saying? Where do you even start with this? Of course AI shouldn't be able to patent anything.
If you can't give an elephant rights, what are you even thinking that you'll give a computer program rights?
--
Yes, t-t-t-t-tune into Network 23! The network that's a *real* mind-blower! - Max Headroom
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They have invented things.
In the sense that the things they invent things that were not first conceived of by humans before an AI came up with the details.
This is less amazing than it first sounds because the only reason it can do this is because it also goes through a whole shit-ton of dead-end ideas, far more than any human ever could in their lifetime, let alone the same amount of time.
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Sorry, I meant receive patents rather than invent. Even with my limited understanding of whether Google is keeping sentient AIs trapped on campus, I have skimmed stories about, and can comprehend, how an AI might develop a new drug based on the materials, properties, and structures of other drugs.
Yes, but otoh, you have no idea what that new drug will do. Pharma patent attorneys describe their field as an "unpredictable" art, and they're not wrong - there's a famous patent infringement case from around 2008 that involved a drug that had a benzene ring with a compound hanging off of it. If it hung off at position 1, it was an okay drug (and was the subject of the patent). If you move it to position 2, it was a great drug (made by the accused infringer). But if you moved it to position 3, it was deadl
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AI patenting things? Do they even get what they're saying?
You could have left the post at this...but minimalism is highly overrated. /sarcasm
PATENTS ARE BROKEN REGARDLESS (Score:2)
Patent system is just innovation blocking for no good reason.
Delete it. Ignore it.
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Patent system is just innovation blocking for no good reason. Delete it. Ignore it.
Patent system is temporary innovation blocking* for a very good reason - to destroy trade secrets, which can last forever. Before patents, you had the guild system and patronage, and new technology was heavily locked down and restricted to guild members. There's a reason those were called the dark ages, and that the patent system coincided with the beginning of the age of enlightenment.
*it's not really innovation blocking, but innovation encouraging, since if you come up with an improvement on someone els
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20 years is much too long in today's world.
When the patent expires, the tech is long obsolete.
It's just blocking, there's nothing temporary any more.
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If AI can patent stuff you will immediately get patent farms that are nothing but a bunch of AIs churning our patents on everything they can imagine, in the hope of one day becoming patent trolls.
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Might not be a bad thing. If every possible thing that can be invented was invented next week, in 20 years time all the patents would have expired, regardless of if any of them had been put to use or not.
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The only difference under current law is that the owner/operator/developer of the AI system must attach their HUMAN name to the patent application. They can still file for patents on things developed algorithmically.
Leaked patent filing No. 19970829 SKNT (Score:3)
"System and method for eliminating violence and cleansing the planet."
Sounds pretty benevolent, if you ask me.
Aaand... (Score:1)
What would be the purpose? (Score:2)
What I haven't understood is, if you want an AI to be named as the inventor on a patent, what the benefit of doing so would be?
It has already been noted that if the inventor is also the "owner" (patents are normally owned by the corporation that employed the inventor) then they get to decide how to license the patent and receive the fees from it, which raises some interesting questions if it is an AI.
I think if there is any litigation associated with the patent then the inventor would turn up in court t
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What I haven't understood is, if you want an AI to be named as the inventor on a patent, what the benefit of doing so would be?
Crank out dozens of patent applications using your AI in a bunch of unrelated fields to troll? Or, for the somewhat less evil answer, crank out and publish millions of inventions that you claim the AI "invented" in order to keep others from patenting them.
The latter was tried about 3-4 years ago in a very simple manner, with someone using a computer to build a library of invention disclosures. The problem was that it was unintelligent - they literally grabbed sentences from random existing patents and comb