Indigenous Maize: Who Owns the Rights to Mexico’s ‘Wonder’ Plant?

Post by tomc1985 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 6:31 AM UTC

colordrops wrote: post #7

amerine wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A simple upvote is not enough of a show of agreement for this perspective. Genetics should not be own-able.

Genetics is information. Do you believe information should not be ownable? I think we should not be able to own any information. Information is like fire. It takes no space and costs nothing to replicate. Taking the concept ownership developed with physical objects and applying it to information is ridiculous. It's like owning clouds.

Post by ijidak » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 8:22 AM UTC

ciconia wrote: post #12

msh wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a difference between information naturally occuring and created by someone.

Information is always created by someone. Creation does not necessarily mean ownership.

Post by harimau777 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 11:43 AM UTC

13of40 wrote: post #9

taylorfinley wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with your sentiment, I do see some nuance here though. This phenotype is very valuable in how it could reduce inputs across industrial agriculture--and industrial agriculture is an extremely competitive and well-developed market. Entrenched interests are change-averse (unless they themselves are exploiting the change), so the very powerful industry will either squash this plant if it threatens their dominance…

> can we find a way to reward the farmers who genetically engineered this plant by selecting for the strongest individuals for the last several thousands years? In a very concrete sense we cannot, because the people who did it are dead. We're really talking about rewarding (the people we presume to be) their descendants. Is that something we would do in a completely European context? For example, if we found a strain…

Post by kop316 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 2:32 PM UTC

etaioinshrdlu wrote: post #2

I'm quite against the private ownership of biological lifeforms, whether the owner is Monsanto or an indigenous village.

Post by kop316 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 2:43 PM UTC

mutt2016 wrote: post #18

kop316 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So question based on this, is this a reason to be for non-GMOs? I would imagine that a lot of GMO crops have such patents, and as such, by purchasing them, you are supporting the patent holders. On the other hand, non-GMO craps would not have such patents, so you are not supporting them. I imagine there could be a flaw in this logic, but I welcome thoughts to it.

Everything is GMO to a degree, and without GMO people starve as long as we all live in cities. So start a farm with a group of like minded people, or be dependent on corporate farms