Appeal No. 1998-1778 Page 10
Application No. 08/521,358
Claims 23 and 26
We agree with the appellants' arguments that the combined
teachings of the applied prior art (i.e., Terve, Olin and
Kenway for claim 23 and Terve, Olin, Kenway, Stroby and Badger
for claim 26) would not have suggested the subject matter of
those claims to one of ordinary skill in the art. Claims 23
and 26 both require an operational unit to contain an
electrically operated device and all electrical components for
controlling supply of operating current to the electrically
operated device to be sealed against humidity and exposed for
operation by a person in the toilet compartment and otherwise
protected against unauthorized human access. However, these
limitations are not suggested by the applied prior art. Once
again, it is our view that the only possible suggestion for
combining the applied prior art in the manner proposed by the
examiner to meet the above-noted limitations stems from
impermissible hindsight knowledge derived from the appellants'
own disclosure. It follows that we cannot sustain the
examiner's rejection of claims 23 and 26.
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