Appeal No. 2004-0403
Application 09/100,684
fundamental concepts: matter and energy." We submit that a
fundamental property of "technology" is that it deals with
characteristics of the physical world, matter and energy, which
are transformed and made useful to man in products and processes.
The "useful arts" ("technological arts") are defined by
Congress in the statutory classes of 35 U.S.C. § 101, "process,
machine, manufacture, or composition of matter." Section 101 is
broadly inclusive of subject matter that can be patented. See
S. Rep. No. 1979, 82d Cong., 2d Sess. 5 (1952), reprinted in 1952
U.S. Code Cong. & Admin. News 2394, 2399 ("A person may have
'invented' a machine or manufacture, which may include anything
under the sun made by man, but it is not necessarily patentable
under section 101 unless the conditions of the title are
fulfilled."). However, "every discovery is not embraced within
the statutory terms. Excluded from such patent protection are
laws of nature, physical phenomena and abstract ideas." Diamond
v. Diehr, 450 U.S. 175, 185, 209 USPQ 1, 7 (1981). The statutory
categories of "machine, manufacture, or composition of matter"
broadly cover any "thing" that can be made by man and clearly fit
the definition of "technology."
A "process" is more difficult to analyze. A "process" is
broadly defined in the dictionary as "a series of actions or
operations conducing to an end." Webster's. Any series of
actions or operations is a process within the dictionary
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