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 c
Patents and Inventions When an invention is made, the inventor has three possible courses of action open to him: first, he c
admin
2012-01-14
50
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.
Look at the four squares [■] that indicate where the following sentence could be added to the passage. However, even short extensions are normally extremely rare. Where would the sentence best fit?
选项
A、Square A.
B、Square B.
C、Square C.
D、Square D.
答案
D
解析
本题是插话题,考查考生能否将一句话插入顺序相连的四个句子之间的能力。要做好此题,考生必须深刻理解各句子间的词汇、语法和连接的逻辑关系。根据原文的上下文语境,以及所要插入的句子“However,even short extensions are normally extremely rare”中的“even”与上文所说的“Only in the most exceptional circumstances is the life-span of a patent extended…”具有递进关系,而下文“George Valensi was more fortunate than most of other inventors”是对插入句“However,even short extensions are normally extremely rare”的解释,表示George Valensi只是例外,因此该题选D。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/cLyO777K
0
托福(TOEFL)
相关试题推荐
Youshouldspendabout20minutesonQuestions1-13whicharebasedonReadingPassage1below.LEARNINGBYEXAMPLESALearning
Lookatthefollowingnamesofpeopleororganisations(Questions33-36)andthelistofopinionsbelow.Matcheachnamewithth
EducationPhilosophyA.Althoughwelackaccuratestatisticsaboutchildmortalityinthepre-industrialperiod,wedohave
CompanyInnovationA.InashabbyofficeindowntownManhattan,agroupof30AI(artificialintelligence)programmersfrom
Thievesoftentargetstudents’homesbecausestudents______.Theinsurancecompany’sofficeisusuallyopenuntil______.
Studentsoncourseslastingoverayearareusuallygivenuntil______toleavethecountry.
Completethechartbelow.Matchtheadvantagesofjoiningalearningcircle(I-VI)totheperson.NOTE:therearemorea
Completethechartbelow.Matchtheadvantagesofjoiningalearningcircle(I-VI)totheperson.NOTE:therearemorea
ThepassagefocusesoncometsprimarilyintermsoftheirWhichofthefollowingoccurredastheicesfromHalley’sCometevap
随机试题
引起血糖升高的激素有()
简述马斯洛的需要层次理论。
A、0ptochin敏感性试验B、CAMP试验C、盐耐受试验D、杆菌肽敏感试验E、荚膜肿胀试验与A群链球菌有关的是
A.胖大海B.马兜铃C.百部D.礞石E.海浮石
煤矿安全生产中“一通三防”中的“通”是()的简称。
过去的交易或事项是指企业在过去的一个时期里,计划在未来一个时期从银行提取现金、购买股票、计发工资的业务活动。()
按规定,企业以非现金资产和无形资产对外投资时,对资产应进行评估,评估发生的资产增减值,应作如下处理()。
造成“X-低效率”的原因有()。
某机械制造企业生产的某一设备的单价为10000元/台,单位产品变动成本为2000元/台,固定成本分摊为6万元,计算得出的保本销售量为500台,假设预测汁划期的销售量仅有450台。根据上述材料,回答以下问题:()是用来扭亏增盈最重要的措施。
设ξ和η是独立同分布的两个随机变量。已知ξ的分布律为P{ξ=i}=,i=1,2,3,又设X=max{ξ,η},Y=min{ξ,η}。(Ⅰ)写出二维随机变量(X,Y)的分布律;(Ⅱ)求E(X)。
最新回复
(
0
)