The Island
Yesterday, on the spur of the moment, Supratik and I decided to head off after school to watch Island. We were fairly entertained by the movie.
The movie is about a company called Mereck (sounds a lot like Merck) in the business of growing clones of wealthy patrons in a controlled environment, so that they can be harvested for organs should the patron succumb to an accident. To prevent ethical issues involved with this process, the company keeps the whole operation a secret. As one of the characters points out, "Just because you want to eat a hamburger, doesn't mean you have to meet the cow". It seems the normal humans would rather not know how their organs were grown. . . or want to meet their clones in person. We'd rather not know how society really functions, as long as we get to live in a nice house in the suburbs and we can feel good about ourselves.
By taking the slippery slope very far, the film does present a somewhat pro-life messages. The clones are babies. They are human. Is it ethical for companies to own, grow, mate, and harvest humans for. . . the betterment of other humans. . .or the progress of science.
While I personally see great promise in Biotechnology. . . both in terms of amazing advancements in healthcare and nutrition for all humanity. . .I do sometimes wonder how these benefits will be shared and distributed. It seems, life can today be patented. This understanding led to a mad rush to patent the Neem tree and put a copyright on Basmati. This trend is pretty disturbing.
I tend to argue with my friend Amlan a lot about "evil" biotech corporations, and I usually side with the companies. . .defending their right to research biology, and justifying profits for their motivational role in driving this great machine of progress. But I often do feel, that at some point. . .capitalism has to be put in its place. At some point, one does have to ask the question: benefit/progress for who? And ask whether the system really promotes the greatest common good. If not, do the rest of us really have to accept it? For some reason, wealth is not wealth unless it is owned by an individual or corporation. . .thereby providing very little value for clean air, or the unpatented biodiversity. And once the slippery slope of drawing borders around property starts. . .the picket fences around houses, the borders around countries, even life has to be catalogued and owned. If we truly want freedom, we have to learn to share some of these things. . .so that we don't all become commodities.
Hmmm. I usually try to keep this blog politics free. This movie didn't particularly inspire me to go on this rant. But I feel there are some large forces shaping our world today. . .winds of globalization and resistance against it. . . technology making the world smaller, yet also hypnotizing us. . .dividing us into small clusters of "people just like us". I struggle to understand these forces, and try to judge the paradoxes they represent. . . never quite sure who it is that we are really working for.
Anyway. Scarlett Johansson is really cute in the movie. She starts off looking average. . .and then she starts to grow on you. Also watch Lost in Translation, and In Good Company, for more Scarlett. Overall rating B+.
4 Comments:
You need to be careful about what you mean when you say "life can today be patented". Don't forget that anything for which a patent is granted there must be novelty and non obviousness (inventive step in European terms). This prevents the type of thing you are talking about in almost all circumstances except where there has been significant effort by scientists to isolate or provide the "life form" in a way not previously available. I could discuss this with you further, but perhaps you don't want to get too political on this blog!
Couldn't agree with you more. Good read.
Anonymous,
You are absolutely right about the novelty value. . . the idea that scientists have built a new "product" that was not previously in existence. But then I often (in my ignorance) find the lines blurring between what really constitutes a new product.
Does a hybrid seed qualify? If many generations of farmers have been doing genetic modifaction on it for centuries to select for desirable characteristics? If a company inserts a transgene that gives it the characteristic? Do the same standards apply for the patentability of cows producing better milk? Or human products for better organs, as shown in the movie?
I don't really understand patent law, and it seems like there is a fairly complicated set of rules governing what can or cannot be patented. But on some level, the decisions of who gets the intellectual property, is part of a broader struggle for a piece of the profits. Biotech Companies need it to sustain their research, and drive progress. Rural farmers need it, because they are often poor.
There are consequences to decisions about what is patentable, that will determine our rate of progress, and distribution of wealth. I don't think these rules are set in stone. I think they should be debated, and the courts and government are good institutions (generally speaking) for that debate.
But I must say, the way we farm and harvest cows and chickens. . . the industrialization of the meat producing industries, does appear very unethical and repugnant to me. Personally. Judging from that, I don't think society has a very high regard for many forms of life in general. . .and I do wonder how we would treat the patentable novel forms of life that we do create.
I don't have the answers. I have lots of questions. And I have opinions on where I think society should go. In expressing them, and the facts supporting them. . . Anonymous, I will try to be careful. Especially, since I voice these opinions non-anonymously.
Thanks for reading my blog,
Subhamoy.
Let me reiterate my point. I am all for all sorts of fantastic research pushing the boundaries of what we know. However, what worries me is the way a lot of these technologies are marketed and used for irresponsible business at the cost of the lives and livelihoods of many. Ultimately , isn't the point of all this research to make lives better for the lowest common denominator, instead of irresponsibly fattening the pockets of a wealthy few.
I do think we need to be a little more cautious about introducing some of these technologies into our lives without fully understanding their long-term impacts.
As for me, I continue to avoid food that is not grown in the good old fashioned organic way, and avoid meat which is not free range and farmed without pumping in a zillion enzymes into them. As for patents... duh!!! I believe in knowledge being in the collective commons. Which never means that you cannot make money off new innovations. For centuries that is how knowledge (especially about seeds) have been treated and I see all these new fangled patent efforts as nothing short of stupidity with direct negative impacts on bio-diversity.
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