In a landmark judgement, the UK Supreme Court has refused a US computer scientist’s plea to let his AI system be granted two patents, as per a report by Reuters.
Stephen Thaler is a US scientist who wanted to register two patents in the name of his AI machine (his “creativity machine”, as per the report) called DABUS in the UK. But Britain’s Intellectual Property Office refused to register the patents, reasoning that for the patent to be registered, the inventor needs to be a human or an organization, not a machine.
Thaler has lost before in April 2023 in the United States, for a similar appeal for DABUS, says the report. There, the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) showed a similar response to the one showed by UK’s Intellectual Property Office. It did not agree to award a patent to his AI system for an invention. When he moved to the Supreme Court, the court upheld USPTO’s decision, stating that DABUS is not a person.
This time, Thaler tried to get some patents for DABUS approved in the UK, but the Intellectual Property Office refused to register the patents as a machine was going to be credited as the inventor.
After getting a no from the Intellectual Property Office, Thales appealed to the UK’s Supreme Court, to no avail. In a unanimous decision, the court rejected his appeal, saying that a machine cannot be granted a patent on grounds of inventing something. As per the UK Patent Law, “an inventor must be a natural person”.
The DABUS System
Stephen Thaler is reportedly the founder of an “advanced artificial neural network technology company” called Imagination Engines Inc. The company is based out of Saint Charles, Missouri.
DABUS stands for “Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience”. As per an earlier Reuters report, Thaler claimed that his DABUS system could create “unique prototypes for a beverage holder and emergency light beacon entirely on its own.”
What The Supreme Court Judge Said
“This appeal is not concerned with the broader question whether technical advances generated by machines acting autonomously and powered by AI should be patentable,” the Reuters report quotes Judge David Kitchin in his ruling.
The judge further says in his written ruling: “Nor is it concerned with the question whether the meaning of the term ‘inventor’ ought to be expanded … to include machines powered by AI which generate new and non-obvious products and processes which may be thought to offer benefits over products and processes which are already known.”
What Stephen Thaler’s Lawyers Had To Say
As per Thaler’s lawyers: “the judgment establishes that UK patent law is currently wholly unsuitable for protecting inventions generated autonomously by AI machines”.
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Utkarsh found his calling to be a writer while studying engineering and has been writing professionally for over six years now. After completing his graduation from MIT, Manipal, he cut his teeth in the ever-evolving media industry, working… read more
