September 2008
Mr. James Hill (a patent attorney with the Chicago law firm Wildman Harrold ) addressed two important questions many inventors ask - Is my invention patentable? Should I invest in a patent? The United States grants patents only for inventions that benefit our society. What is an invention? An invention is a means to a useful end. It is a machine, manufactured article, composition of matter, or method that has 3 aspects ( SOR ): structure, operation (function), and result. Deterministic relationships between those aspects integrate (combine) parts into a whole that is more than the sum of its individual parts. Parts of an invention work together to produce a useful result. A mere aggregate however is just the sum of its parts - an assembly of structures or method steps that do not cooperate to produce a useful result, something a tornado might put together (like a straw through a telephone pole). An aggregate is not patentable because it is not more useful than its independent (old) ...