Appeal No. 2004-2175
Application 09/086,627
line of reasoning at page 7 of the answer relies upon "design
choice" as a line of reasoning from which the artisan would
conclude that Culbert suggests the feature at the end of claim 14
on appeal. The examiner's line of reasoning at pages 11 and 12
in the answer attempts to persuade us of the suggestibility of
Culbert as to the questioned feature. We find none of these
positions of the examiner to be persuasive.
The examiner's line of reasoning essentially stops short of
meeting or suggesting the requirements of claims 14 and 16 in a
corresponding manner even as admitted in essence by the examiner.
The reasoning appears to be based upon mere speculation and
hindsight. There is no teachings or suggestions relied upon by
the examiner to buttress the actual rationale of the examiner
without additional prior art; even Sumimoto is not relied upon by
the examiner to buttress the examiner's reasoning with respect to
Culbert.
Essentially, we are not able to conclude that it would have
been obvious to the artisan to modify Culbert's system whereas
essentially the examiner merely sets forth a position at the
bottom of page 11 in the answer that Culbert merely suggests "the
possibility of modifying the Culbert system." The categorization
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