Appeal No. 1998-1281
Application No. 08/472,376
or mineral lubricating oils. Appellant concludes that
"[t]here is no teaching in Lal that could compensate for the
previously enumerated deficiencies of Jokinen et al. and Small
et al." (page 4 of brief, last full paragraph).
The fatal flaw in appellant's argument is that it fails
to address the basis of the examiner's rejection. Appellant
presents no argument in rebuttal to the examiner's rationale
that it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in
the art to employ a hydrogenated random block copolymer of
styrene and
butadiene of the type disclosed by Small as a viscosity
improver in the composition of Lal, i.e., appellant has not
explained why one of ordinary skill in the art would not have
considered it obvious to modify the composition of Lal in the
manner proposed by the examiner. In essence, we find
appellant's arguments to be non-responsive to the thrust of
the examiner's rejection. We also note that appellant bases
no arguments upon objective evidence of nonobviousness, such
as unexpected results.
One final point remains. In the event of further
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