首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Patents and Inventions When an invention is made, the inventor has three possible courses of action open to him: first, he can g
Patents and Inventions When an invention is made, the inventor has three possible courses of action open to him: first, he can g
admin
2013-08-12
55
问题
Patents and Inventions
When an invention is made, the inventor has three possible courses of action open to him: first, he can give the invention to the world by publishing it; keep the idea secret or patent it. Secrecy obviously
evaporates
once the invention is sold or used, and there is always the risk that in the meantime another inventor, working quite independently will make and patent the same discovery. A granted patent is the result of a bargain struck between an inventor and the state, whereby, in return for a limited period of monopoly(16 years in the UK), the inventor publishes full details of his invention to the public.
Once the monopoly period expires, all those details of the invention pass into the public domain.(A)
Only in the most exceptional circumstances is the life-span of a patent extended to alter this normal process of events.(B)
The longest extension ever granted was to Georges Valensi: his 1939 patent for color TV receiver circuitry was extended until 1971.(C)
Because for most of the patent’s normal life there was no color TV to receive and thus no hope of reward for the invention.(D)
George Valensi was more fortunate than most of other inventors.
Because a patent remains
perpetually
published after it has expired, the shelves of the library attached to the British Patent Office contain details of literally millions of ideas that are free for anyone to use and, if older than half a century, sometimes even re-patent. Indeed, patent experts often advise anyone wishing to avoid the high cost of conducting a search through live patents, that the one sure way of avoiding infringement of any other inventor’s rights is to
plagiarize
a dead patent.
Likewise, because publication of an idea in any other form permanently invalidates future patents on that idea, it is traditionally safe to cull ideas from other areas of print.
Much modern technological advance is based on these presumptions of legal security.
Anyone closely involved in patents and inventions soon learns that most "new" ideas are, in fact, as old as the hills. It is their reduction to commercial practice, either through necessity, dedication or the availability of new technology, that makes news and money. The basic patents for the manufacture of margarine and the theory of magnetic recording date back to 1869 and 1886 respectively. Many of the original ideas behind television stem from the late 19th and early 20th century, well before Baird aroused public interest. Every stereo gramophone sold today owes its existence to the theory patented by Blumlein in 1931, and even the Volkswagen rear engine car was anticipated by a 1904 patent for a cart with the horse at the rear.
Such anticipations can have surprising significance. The German chemical giant, BASF, was recently refused a patent for the clever idea of pumping expanded plastics into a submerged ship and thereby floating it to the surface. The
grounds
of the refusal were that the German Examiner had once seen a Walt Disney cartoon in which Donald Duck had performed a similar trick on a sunken boat with table-tennis balls. If the BASF scheme proves successful in practice and enables valuable wrecks to be salvaged it is likely that Walt Disney will be credited as the inventor.
Even the apparently safe history of the telephone and gramophone contains some surprises. US legal case law details how an American called Drawbaugh had ideas for a telephone which anticipated Bell’s patents of 1875 —1876 by five years, but it was Alexander Graham Bell who made the system practical on a commercial level and was acknowledged and rewarded as inventor.
The future will produce many similar situations. Patents are daily being granted for ideas from inventors for schemes that cannot yet work~-but that one day, following massive investment by industry, will become a reality. It is remarkably easy to sit in the comfort of an armchair and patent pipe dreams which are nothing more than prophecies of the future and problems for others to solve.
From Paragraph 2, we can infer all the following statements EXCEPT that
选项
A、extension of a patent’s life-span is usually limited
B、if there is no reward for a patent, extension can be granted
C、an extension cannot be longer than 32 years
D、few patents of invention can be granted an extension
答案
D
解析
本题为推论题,考查考生能否对文章中没有明确阐述却暗示了的信息作出推论。题目问:根据第二段的内容,我们不能推断出以下哪一项结论?第二段是关于专利到期的阐述。专利权的使用期是有限的,只要期限一到,所有发明的细节都要公之于众。只有在非常情况下,一项专利才可以改变正常的期限,如Georges Valensi彩电接收器的专利期达到了32年;如果一个专利没有回报,就可以得到延长。因此,选项A、B、D都是正确的,只有选项C是无法推知的。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/SmfO777K
0
托福(TOEFL)
相关试题推荐
Completethenotesbelow.WriteNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSorANUMBERforeachanswer.DISSERTATIONINFORMATION
Completethetablebelow.WriteNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSfareachanswer.
Completetheformbelow.WriteNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSforeachanswer.ExpeditionAcrossAttoraMountainsLeader:CharlesOwen
Completetheformbelow.WriteNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSforeachanswer.ExpeditionAcrossAttoraMountainsLeader:CharlesOwen
Completethenotesbelow.WriteNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSAND/ORANUMBERforeachanswer.SCHEDULEOFACTIONRead’Approache
Completethenotesbelowusingwordsfromthebox.ArtGalleryCathedralCastleGardensMarketsTouristattractionsopenallday
Themanwantsinformationoncoursesfor
Themanwantsinformationoncoursesfor
Themanwantsinformationoncoursesfor
Writethecorrectletter,A-F,nexttoquestions21-26.AVideoResourceCentreBReadingRoomCFoodServiceCentreDPeriodic
随机试题
简箭毒碱中毒时,抢救的方法是
体外冲击波碎石后结石复发的原因有
按配置划分,计算机网络可分为()。
_____是教师根据学生已有的知识、经验,借助启发性问题,通过口头问的方式,引导学生通过比较、分析、判断等思维活动获取知识的_____,其基本形式是学生在教师引导下通过独立思考进行学习。
“令黔首自实田”这句话说明中国古代是自给自足的自然经济体制。()
通过大量的婴幼儿日常生活事件的观察,心理学家总结出婴幼儿身心发展的顺序为“三翻六坐八爬十二月会走”的结论说明()。
“凡有井水饮处,即能歌柳词”,其中“柳”指的是:
某国报载:在过去的20年里,州立法机关的黑人成员人数增长超过了100%,而白人成员却略微下降。这充分说明黑人的政治力量将很快与白人基本相等。下列哪一事实有力地削弱了上述观点?()
我国《宪法》规定的公民的社会经济权主要包括
打开工作簿文件Excel.xlsx。将工作表Sheet1的A1:D1单元格合并为一个单元格,内容水平居中;计算“金额”列的内容(金额=数量*单价)和“总计”行的内容,将工作表命名为“设备购置情况表”。
最新回复
(
0
)