I wasn't talking to you and my response was in regard to the OTHER poster's politicaly and philosophically based comment. Oh, don't make unwarranted assumptions about my political views..

Ifyou want to defend a political philosophy that spreads misery and deaths of countless millions I'm sure you can find another thread to do that.

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Founder of BOINC GROUP - Objectivists - Philosophically minded rational data crunchers.

Robert Brooke: You keep referring to politics and it's getting counterproductive.

I have brought up an issue for discussion and feedback between Rosetta's crunchers / advocates (I knew the answer myself, having done my due diligence). In my not-so-limited-anymore experience in attracting people to crunch for humanitarian DC and Rosetta in particular, the issue of public availability of results is among the highest priority issues for MOST people.

It's a FACT that MOST people won't spend $$$ to crunch for free for DC projects, unless they meet certain criteria. It's a fact and one can readily see that people have voted with their feet (CPUs) in several cases of DC projects in the past.

If I didn't like RAH's answers, I wouldn't wholeheartily endorse Rosetta in my dc-howto doc, nor have written the RAH page in Wikipedia, nor have taken numerous other local actions in blogs, newspapers etc

In my own doc, I gave Rosetta as an example of what I'd like the IP statement to look like:

Intellectual property, i.e "ownership" of results. Are they going to become available to the whole scientific community? e.g. extract from R@H FAQ:

Q. Is Rosetta@Home non-profit? / Is someone going to make money out of my donated computer time?
A. The Univerity of Washinton makes available the source code (the actual Rosetta algorithm, which our donated computer power is helping improve) available to academics and other universities for free, and will eventually make the source code available to the public, when the possible cheating problem on BOINC is addressed. Dr David Baker "Everything will be public domain ... No, I do not believe in patenting naturally ocurring genes, proteins, etc."

This paragraph was the 2nd question in the FAQ-draft by hugothehermit
https://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/forum_thread.php?id=615#6187
and I'd like to suggest we should put it back in the current FAQ.

I also suggest R puts on its profile homepage (upper-right) some variation of the

The goal of Rosetta@home is to determine the shape and function of as many proteins as possible, and to make this information available to researchers worldwide at no cost.

http://www.washington.edu/uwnews/homepage/20060412-rosetta/rosetta.html

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Best UFO Resources
Wikipedia R@h
How-To: Join Distributed Computing projects that benefit humanity

I wasn't talking to you and my response was in regard to the OTHER poster's politicaly and philosophically based comment.

That was not very different to the questions I have when I first come to any of the protein projects. Therefore when you ridicule that poster you are also (inadvertently) ridiculing me.

Oh, don't make unwarranted assumptions about my political views..

The assumption I make is that when you liken someone to a Marxist you find there approach similar to that of Marxism. When in fact the questions come from a much less left-wing position than Marx, I conclude that you must be well off the right hand end of my country's politics; as indeed most Americans are, despite our Prime Ministers attempts to Poodle up to you.

Ifyou want to defend a political philosophy that spreads misery and deaths of countless millions I'm sure you can find another thread to do that.

What was it you said about unwarranted assumptions?

I am a critic of neo-monopoly capitalism. That does not make me a Marxist. It does not even make me necessarily a critic of other forms of capitalism. Furthermmore, Marx is not the only critic capitalism has ever had. Even Jesus, who many capitalists claim to serve, was quite critical of the love of money - was He a closet Marxist too?

Please show that you have the ability to allow others to ask questions that come from a different philosophy from yours without you attacking them for asking.

R~~

While I have no intention of taking sides in this discussion, I would point out that the original question for discussion was whether large corporations would be able/allowed to co-opt the work done by Rosetta and the people who are donating resources to the project.

While I understand how some might stretch that topic to the broader issues of political spectrums and Marxist theory, from my point of view those subjects are off topic for this thread and, in fact, this Forum. Particularly when those subjects begin to erode the civility of the original discussion.

As a Moderator I do not and will not censor expression of political opinions on these boards (despite what you may have heard) so long as the discussion is civil. I will move them to the proper venue when necessary. However, it is part of my job to attempt to stop flame wars before they start, and in my opinion this discussion is headed that way.

"Dimitris Hatzopoulos" is the originator/owner of this thread. From my point of view it is his call as to what should happen from here. To that end, I will offer "Dimitris" four Moderator activity options to choose from for resolving this issue. I will not entertain opinions from others on this subject so don't bother posting them. If I do not hear from Dimitris, option "2" is the default action I will take.

Dimitris please advise:

1) Split the thread into two subjects and move the political discussion that began with this post to a new thread in the cafe.
2) I have no opinion do what you as a Moderator think is right
3) Delete the thread and the posts
4) Leave it alone for now, but monitor it, and I will contact you if action is needed in the future.

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ROSETTA@home FAQ
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If it gets moved (split) I'll respond to River's last questions to me there. Otherwise I won't respond to him so the thread can be put back on track.

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Founder of BOINC GROUP - Objectivists - Philosophically minded rational data crunchers.

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Best UFO Resources
Wikipedia R@h
How-To: Join Distributed Computing projects that benefit humanity

I worry first about getting the options available, and then about the price; where if the options are being produced by more than one of the big pharmaceuticals, then we'll have competition to help drive down the costs of the treatment/cure.

Agreed.

I think that the SETI participant referenced in the first post of this thread needs a bit of a wakeup call. While very idealistic, it is completely unreasonable to assume that money will not be made as a result of our efforts. Same with Find-a-drug, which I contributed to.

Lilly, Beckton Dickenson, Squibb Novo, et al are not in the business of being altruistic. Just like Microsoft, or Ford, or Safeway, they are in the business of making money for their stockholders. Never ever forget this.

Getting on my soap-box for a moment, this is why the big pharms are putting very little effort into things like Beta cell, Islet and pancreas transplants, which are by far and away the best "cures" for diabetes. Instead, they work on better pumps, insulin inhalers and the like. Simply because selling insulin and devices to administer it are a multi-billion dollar per annum cash cow for them that they lose the moment we switch to the transplant cures.

That said, a cure for cancer (or aids or malaria) will only become widely available if one of the big pharms can make a profit at it. Love it or hate it, that is the harsh reality of what we are doing.

Do I care?

I really don't give a rats. I've watched two good friends die of cancer. My step mother (who is like a second mother to me) has just undergone a brutal course of combined chemo and radio therapy. Another lady (the wife of one of the aforementioned friends) had to have a double mastectomy because of breast cancer. It's a killer. Anything that helps is good, in my book.

Set your priorities as you see fit. But please take off your rose colored glasses first.

Apologies for letting this turn into a bit of a rant, but as you can tell, it's an area I feel a little strongly about.

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Getting on my soap-box for a moment, this is why the big pharms are putting very little effort into things like Beta cell, Islet and pancreas transplants, which are by far and away the best "cures" for diabetes. Instead, they work on better pumps, insulin inhalers and the like. Simply because selling insulin and devices to administer it are a multi-billion dollar per annum cash cow for them that they lose the moment we switch to the transplant cures.

It's true that they make a LOT more money from people who are dependant on a product for the rest of their lives. However, if you get a transplant, you're still dependant on drugs... Anti-rejection drugs now. Now, one of the side effects of those anti-rejection drugs is...



wait for it...




Diabetes.

That probably has something to do with why there have been so few islet transplants, though there have been a few (here is the Canadian islet transplant programme and here is some recent research on xenotransplants).

The best (ie perfect world) solution would be growing the cells from your own stem cells. Then there's no chance of rejection and no rejection drugs which could re-induce diabetes.

My 2 cents.

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Actually the concern I have is slightly different from what has been posted in this thread so far: Let's assume Rosetta eventually designs an HIV vaccine, or say, some protein that is effective as a cancer treatment (I am not talking about structure predicition here). If this then ends up in the public domain, it will not be patentable, so companies will not be able to make money from it, so they will not be willing to spend their dollars/euros to develop this into a drug by doing human testing and so on, so no one will benefit from this. Well, of course they still could try to produce and sell the drug, but so could their competitors who did not do the human testing. So is this really a serious roadblock or am I being too pessimistic here... any ideas ?

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Team betterhumans.com - discuss and celebrate the future - hoelder1in.org

You just stated in one breath that no company would be able to 'make money from it' then went on to talk about how each competing company would fare against eachother.

Hmmmm.....logic 101.

Don't contradict yourself.

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Founder of BOINC GROUP - Objectivists - Philosophically minded rational data crunchers.

Hoelder1in wrote:

Actually the concern I have is slightly different from what has been posted in this thread so far: Let's assume Rosetta eventually designs an HIV vaccine, or say, some protein that is effective as a cancer treatment (I am not talking about structure predicition here). If this then ends up in the public domain, it will not be patentable, so companies will not be able to make money from it, so they will not be willing to spend their dollars/euros to develop this into a drug by doing human testing and so on, so no one will benefit from this. Well, of course they still could try to produce and sell the drug, but so could their competitors who did not do the human testing. So is this really a serious roadblock or am I being too pessimistic here... any ideas ?

That's an interesting point.

The method of making a specific protein will still be patentable but it may be that governments will have to give companies a patent for a few years just so they can recoup the money they spend on the animal and human trials.

I'm sure that you would agree that the probable solution published, is a good thing.

I'm not sure how it would all work, but I am sure it will work itself out in the end. There are to many people that know how to turn nothing into $ for it not to.

That's my two bob anywho.

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Hmmmm.....logic 101.

Don't contradict yourself.

I didn't ! Please try to read carefully what I wrote. I said: "...they could TRY to sell the drug ... but so could their competitors who did not do human testing". If you try to sell something, it may happen that no one will buy your product at the price you need to charge to recoup your upfront costs (you could still sell the product at a lower price but would end up with a loss), the reason being that your competitors didn't have those upfront expenses in the first place (no human testing) and so will make a profit even at the lower price.

Capitalism 101... ;-)

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Team betterhumans.com - discuss and celebrate the future - hoelder1in.org

Hmmmm.....logic 101.

Don't contradict yourself.

I didn't ! Please try to read carefully what I wrote. I said: "...they could TRY to sell the drug ... but so could their competitors who did not do human testing". If you try to sell something, it may happen that no one will buy your product at the price you need to charge to recoup your upfront costs (you could still sell the product at a lower price but would end up with a loss), the reason being that your competitors didn't have those upfront expenses in the first place (no human testing) and so will make a profit even at the lower price.

Capitalism 101... ;-)

The government would set up and pay for, using public money, these trials via Universities or something similar to the NHS over here.
Maybe even a World health organisation or charities would setup to make these work. It may not be as quick we would get there eventually


Commies 101 ? (I dunno, I don't do politics other than have a laff at how bady ALL of them manage to run a country ;)

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Team mauisun.org

Drug companies can patent more than just the active element in a product. The inerts and other things in the product make for a unique formulation that is what gets patented. So just because the active element is public, does not mean that they would not be able to make, patent, and profit from a particular product. Aspirin is a perfect example. The stuff can be found in the bark of willow trees, but companies seem to make a wide variety of aspirin based products, and do so at a profit.

Regards
Phil

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We Must look for intelligent life on other planets as,
it is becoming increasingly apparent we will not find any on our own.

Getting on my soap-box for a moment, this is why the big pharms are putting very little effort into things like Beta cell, Islet and pancreas transplants, which are by far and away the best "cures" for diabetes. Instead, they work on better pumps, insulin inhalers and the like. Simply because selling insulin and devices to administer it are a multi-billion dollar per annum cash cow for them that they lose the moment we switch to the transplant cures.

It's true that they make a LOT more money from people who are dependant on a product for the rest of their lives. However, if you get a transplant, you're still dependant on drugs... Anti-rejection drugs now. Now, one of the side effects of those anti-rejection drugs is...

That may not be the case any more. Admittedly, a pancreas transplant will require anti rejection drugs. However there was a team at either U Miami or UC Davis that was working on beta cell transplants that did not require a permanent program of anti-rejection drugs. Of course, now that I want it, I can't find any references to it. If it was the UC Davis team I fear for the worst: last I heard that project was being closed down.

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Hmmmm.....logic 101.

Don't contradict yourself.

I didn't ! Please try to read carefully what I wrote. I said: "...they could TRY to sell the drug ... but so could their competitors who did not do human testing". If you try to sell something, it may happen that no one will buy your product at the price you need to charge to recoup your upfront costs (you could still sell the product at a lower price but would end up with a loss), the reason being that your competitors didn't have those upfront expenses in the first place (no human testing) and so will make a profit even at the lower price.

Capitalism 101... ;-)

Oh ok. I understand better what you meant now. Thanks for the clarification.

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Founder of BOINC GROUP - Objectivists - Philosophically minded rational data crunchers.