Vol. 4 No.

2 | Melbourne The International Journal of Science, Society, and Law

THE SCIENCE IN SOCIETY REVIEW

A PRODUCTION OF THE TRIPLE HELIX

Brain Scans: Valid Legal Evidence

for Criminals?

Air-Conditioned
Earth

Bits, Bytes, and

Property Rights

China’s Economic and

Environmental Footprints in Africa
How 21st century colonialism is marring
the African landscape

ASU • Berkeley • Brown • C a mbrid g e • C M U • C orn e ll • Da rtmou th

G e o r get own • Harvard • JH U • LSE • No rth w e s te rn • NU S • Ox fo rd • P e n n • UC hi c a g o
UCL • UNC Ch ap el H ill • U n iv e rs ity of Me lbou rn e • U C S D • Y a le
EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT
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©2007 The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. The Triple Helix at the
University of Melbourne is an independent chapter of The Triple Helix,
Inc., an educational 501(c)3 non-profit corporation. The Triple Helix
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 TABLE OF CONTENTS
Does Beauty Who Ownes ‘Sustainable’

13 20 35
Really Matter? Those Bones? Agriculture?
What Your Face Says Scientific Practice and Tackling the World
About You Cultural Heritage Food Crisis

Editorial

4 China in Africa: Analyzing the Footprints of the Beijing Olympics Manisha Bhattacharya , Cornell

MELBOURNE
Cover Article
6 China’s Economic and Environmental Footprints in Africa Caroline Lee, Georgetown

University of Melbourne Articles

10 Cancer Immunotherapy: The Price of the Magic Bullet Kenneth Chin, Melbourne

13 The Hottie and the Nottie: Science in Physical Beauty Jade Lao, Melbourne

17 Admitting Ambiguity in the Embryonic Stem Cell Debate Shaun Khoo, Melbourne

20 What Lies Beneath: Museums and the Repatriation of Ancient Mubing Duan, Melbourne
Human Remains

22 Toxic Handlers: Sustaining the Emotional Workplace Sook Jin Ong, Melbourne

25 All We Need Is Just a Little Patents: The Lack of Commerical Aaron Mentha, Melbourne
Protection for the CAM industry in Australia

International Features
32 Deep Brain Stimulation Jennifer Ong, UCSD

35 A Sustainable Way to Keep Hunger at Bay Baird Langenbrunner, Brown

37 The Discrimination, Stigmatization, and Denial of Rural Indian Kartavya Vyas, UCSD
Physicians towards Persons with HIV/AIDS

39 Bits, Bytes, and Property Rights Chris Milroy, Chicago

42 The Autistic Pride Movement Pranai Tandon, Cornell

44 Air-Conditioned Earth Jenny Molloy, Cambridge

46 Brain Scans: Valid Legal Evidence for Criminals? Christie Ciarlo, Brown

48 The Tendency Toward Being: Thermodynamics and the Origin John Szymanski, Brown
of Complexity

Cover design courtesy of Bradley French, Central Production

INSIDE TTH

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2 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 INSIDE TTH

Message from the CEO

Dear Reader,

Through both scholarship and action, The Triple Helix is pioneering new projects and
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© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 3
EDITORIAL

China in Africa: Analyzing the Footprints

of the Beijing Olympics
Manisha Bhattacharya

I
t is impossible to ignore the complex story of China, condonement of human rights violations, and the absence
simultaneously hailed as a rising superpower and labeled of enforceable standards for corporate governance.
as a country that takes controversial approaches to ad- Six months later, China is exceptionally prominent on
dressing common socioeconomic challenges of the develop- the international radar, as the Beijing Olympics draw to
ing world. In March 2008, we published China’s Economic a close and leave the world with a myriad of images and
and Environmental Footprints in Africa, which explored the impressions. The Olympic journey tested the flexibility, re-
growing relationship between sourcefulness, and diplomatic
ever-expanding China and re- ties of China in many ways,
source-rich African countries.
This article emphasizes that in
[Protests highlighted] the several of which brought the
themes of the China in Africa
comparison to Western policies reality that sociopolitical story back into the news. At
towards Africa, Chinese policies
do not carry “obligatory politi-
freedoms are still largely a time when virtually every-
one is contemplating China’s
cal strings”; African countries absent from China’s controlled post-Olympic future, we invite
are able to negotiate business
deals with China and benefit
society. readers to reflect on the paral-
lels and divergences between
from generous aid packages China’s dealings in Africa and

Reproduced from [1] under Creative Commons License.

without the two being tied together. Despite the benefits the ways in which the pressure of meeting international
accrued by all parties, the China-Africa relationship is rife standards for the Olympics has changed China’s domestic
with concerns about lax environmental practices, implicit decision-making.

4 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 EDITORIAL

Looking forward, many may

Reproduced with permission from [2].

ask whether Africa can play a role

in shaping China’s political and eco-
nomic attitudes at this critical junc-
ture. Certainly, given the demand for
natural resources and trade, leaders
genuinely interested in the welfare
of their people and determined
to fight government corruption in
business dealings can turn China’s
advances to their advantage and
spark regional development. Al-
though only one part of China’s
story, Africa’s growing economic
ties with China should be watched
as the international community
waits to see how this enigmatic
nation casts their footprints in the
Some places where China-Africa and China-Olympic
post-Olympic era.
policy intersect are those of infrastructure building, envi-
ronmental stewardship, and sociopolitical protest. When the
International Olympic Committee granted the Olympics to Manisha Bhattacharya is the Chief Executive Officer of The Triple
China, a political prize of sorts for an increasingly powerful Helix Inc. She is a senior at Cornell University, double majoring
country, did it function as a “strings-attached” Western policy in Biological Sciences and Economics.
that led to improved infrastructure throughout China? Of
course, the Olympics created a uniquely intense pressure to
deliver not only world-class infrastructure,
but in China’s case, to improve the noto-
riously polluted Beijing air, the result of
rapid industrialization at the price of the
environment. Similar concerns have been
raised about African firms mining Chinese
oil without regard to conserving natural
habitats. However, many are skeptical that
such pressures will only drive nations to
conceal their failures, which ultimately cir-
cumvents the point of attaching development
and environmental goals to political and
business deals.
The absence of protestors in the des-
ignated protest zones during the Olympics
invoked memories of the impassioned Tibet
protests during the torch relay, threats to
boycott the Olympics to condemn China’s
economic ties to Darfur, and the reality that
sociopolitical freedoms are still largely
absent from China’s controlled society. In
this respect, it is unclear how much the
Olympics facilitated human rights reform
in China, and makes the upcoming Tibet
negotiations and continued unrest over
Darfur even more significant.

Courtesy of Bradley French, Central Production.

References:
[1] http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/files/images/san-francisco-beijing-olympics-protest.jpg
[2] http://www.cdc.gov/nceh/ierh/images/Darfur.jpg

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 5
GEORGETOWN
China’s Economic and Environmental
Footprints in Africa
Caroline Lee
T
he advent of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as
an economic juggernaut is no secret in the twenty-first
century. A large land possessing a massive labor force,
China has maintained rapid economic growth for over a
decade and surpassed the likes of England, France, and
Italy in that span. As of 2006, the PRC trails behind only the
United States, Japan, and Germany in total gross domestic
product, according to the World Bank [1]. This elevated
status has pushed China into the political and economic
limelight, causing its every move to be heavily scrutinized
by the rest of the globe. Thus, it is not surprising that its
increased involvement in Africa has recently raised warning
flags in Western awareness with regards to the PRC’s non-
interference policies, human rights issues, and the environ-
mental impacts of its actions in the region. Already reputed
as environmentally careless at home, many fear that China’s
escalating extraction of oil and other resources within Africa
as well as its involvement in various infrastructure projects
leave foreboding consequences in store for African lands
and in turn, the African people.
Although Chinese involvement in Africa has fluctuated
since the 1950s, the PRC has recently refocused its attentions
towards the developing continent. In the last ten years,
the Asian powerhouse has strengthened its economic and
diplomatic relationships with Africa, mostly under the radar
of the rest of the world. China’s aims in these associations
are straightforward: to help satisfy its immense demand for
natural resources; to expand Chinese manufactured goods
into new markets; and to gain strategic political alliances
6 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
[2]. A so-called “soft target,” Africa emerges as a prime
candidate in pursuing these goals. The vast continent remains
relatively unexploited in comparison to other developing
regions due to the political, economic, and social instability
that has reigned there for centuries [3]. Its relative lack of
suitors has provided China the opportunity to pursue
African oil, timber, various mineral resources and other
[F]oreboding consequences
[are] in store for African
lands and in turn, the
African people.
materials as well as its business and political good graces.
Instability has also perpetuated the widespread corruption
of African governments, and this corruption coupled with
poor management of its governmental development, are
flaws that China has been able to work to its advantage
[2,3]. In turn, China’s non-interference terms and general
disinterest in incorporating obligatory political strings in
its dealings are attractive to its African partners, especially
in comparison to Western proposals. Western agreements
are often coupled with strict demands for Africa that are
meant to help combat poverty and promote development
within the region.
Oil Extraction
Due to a combination of skyrocketing
demands for energy, lack of domestic
resources, and a move away from
their use of inefficient and polluting
coal, China has turned to petroleum
sources abroad. The nation is now
the second largest importer of
African oil after the United States,
accounting for about a quarter of the
oil the PRC imports. This amount
increased more than 71% between
2003 and 2005, supplied by the
Sudan, Angola, Nigeria, Chad, Libya,
Algeria, and Gabon [2,4]. Africa’s
lax governance combined with
China’s lack of pressure on its firms
to exercise good corporate policing
and social responsibility has led to
various corrupt and environmentally
careless practices in the countries
where China obtains oil. In Gabon,
Reproduced from [10].
Chinese state-owned oil company
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 GEORGETOWN

Sinopec was discovered illegally prospecting for oil in Loango however, they can cause more harm than good [8].
National Park in 2006. The park accounts for 11% of the A prime example of a project gone awry is the Merowe
country’s territory and protects extensive coastal habitats and Dam in Sudan, primarily funded by the Chinese. When initiated
wildlife from all extractive and destructive industrial activities. in 2003, surrounding communities were supportive of the
The company had begun dynamiting and clearing forest venture because it would meet the great need for electricity in
without performing an official environmental impact study. It the region. However, with poor implementation and failure
was only after the issue was brought to media attention by a to meet both Chinese and Sudanese environmental standards,
conservation group from the United States that the Gabonese which in themselves are considered sub par, locals were
government ordered Sinopec to forced to relocate to surrounding
halt its activities [3,5]. desert areas [8]. There is a glaring
Corrupt practices aside, lack of legitimate environmental
further problems have arisen in
These [infrastructure] assessments released concerning
the harvesting of African oil. In projects...are meant to benefit the construction of the dam, and
Nigeria, Chinese state-controlled the few that exist fail to address
firms have made considerable
the people and countries: many important issues. One
investments in recent years to however, they can cause more such matter is the possibility of
procure petroleum from the sediment accumulation and its
region, spending billions on
harm than good [8]. impact on downstream farming
controlling stakes in oil fields communities. These farms
and refineries [2,6]. However, depend on the mineral nutrients
oil production in Nigeria is provided by the river during the
generally coupled with the country’s annual floods, raising
flaring of associated gas found the possibility of a potential
in its oil fields, since it is the decline in local agriculture
easiest solution in isolating the with the dam’s construction.
lucrative petroleum product, but In addition, lowered oxygen
these flares can result in a wasted levels in the water are a similar
2.2 billion standard cubic feet of worry for their possible effects
gas per day. The consequences on aquatic ecosystems [9].
of flared gas include significant As a result, issues that have arisen
carbon dioxide emissions as well from such questionable projects
as the release of a harmful mixture have made many wary of similar
of more than 250 toxins into the undertakings in consideration
atmosphere, which is believed to elsewhere within Africa [10].
contribute to acid rain production
and the deterioration of crops, What Can Be Done
livestock, and general human In wooing Africa with the promise
health. Nigeria contributes 16% of economic investment, China
of the world’s flared gas, more is often accused of practicing a
than any other country in the brand of twenty-first century
world, while Africa as a whole colonialism to pursue its own
contributes 34%. While Chinese interests. Some believe this
oil production in Nigeria is still trend mirrors the West’s own
Reproduced from [11].
exceeded by Western companies actions within Africa in the
like Shell, ExxonMobil, and past and even the present. But
ChevronTexaco, its increasing China is often accused of there are important differences:
presence there and throughout the PRC lacks freedom of the
Africa has no doubt exacerbated practicing a brand of twenty- press, and non-governmental
this problem [7]. first century colonialism watchdogs play an insignificant
role in influencing the decisions
Infrastructure Projects and policies of the Chinese
Aid has also been proven to play Administration [3]. Hence, there
a significant role in the agreements between China and is relatively little that Chinese citizens can do to influence
Africa. In 2006, China distributed $5.75 billion throughout a change in policy abroad in Africa.
the continent in the form of loans, debt forgiveness, and However, China has slowly become more conscious of
other forms of financial investment. In addition, funding its global prominence and consequently, more sensitive to
and support of infrastructure are other important offerings foreign criticism. This is evidenced in its very public campaign
in China’s arsenal to foster good relations and trade with to reduce carbon emissions to an acceptable level prior to
Africa. These projects ranging from railway development the Beijing Olympics in 2008. If pressured economically or
to the construction of thermal power plants, oil facilities, politically, crucial changes in its conduct in Africa may be
and dams are meant to benefit the people and countries: possible.

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 7
GEORGETOWN
A key concern is the need for transparency in the transactions
between the Chinese players and African governments.
Encouragement to sign initiatives and make policies which
mandate and enforce complete transparency with regards to
its environmental practices is imperative. This would help
prevent pollution and the overexploitation of the natural
resources China seeks as well as ensure the quality execution
of projects that are supposed to benefit the African peoples
[5].
Even with transparency among some parties, however, the
rampant corruption that persists within African governments
combined with the debilitating lack of money and development
may allow environmental conditions to continue declining.
Furthermore, China’s no-strings-attached policies in dealing
References:
[1] “GDP 2006,” World Bank World Development Indicators database (2007;
http://siteresources.worldbank.org/DATASTATISTICS/Resources/GDP.pdf).
[2] J. Eisenman, in China and the Developing World, J. Eisenman, E. Heginbotham,
D. Mitchell, Eds. (M.E. Sharpe, Armonk, 2007), pp. 29-59.
[3] H. French, Afr. Affairs 106, 127-132 (2006).
[4] M. Chan-Fishel, in African Perspectives on China in Africa, F. Manji, S. Marks,
Eds. (Fahamu, Cape Town, 2007), pp. 139-152.
[5] E. Economy, K. Monaghan, International Herald Tribune, 1 November
2006.
[6] C. Timberg, Washington Post, 1 May 2006.
[7] Environmental Rights Action, Climate Justice Programme, Gas Flaring In
8 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
Reproduced from [12]
with African nations will continue to entice, especially when
considered against the onerous social obligations that are often
included in Western-African agreements. Counter measures
such as offers of heightened economic aid and investment
by the United States and other nations, and increased global
awareness of the African environmental situation may be
the only options to help quell an intensifying environmental
problem. Thus, unless a fundamental change is made in
the PRC’s policies, the African people could eventually be
stranded with destroyed lands and a continued stagnancy
in their poor quality of life.
Caroline Lee is an Undergraduate at Georgetown University.
Nigeria: A Human Rights, Environmental and Economic Monstrosity (2005;
http://www.climatelaw.org/cases/country/nigeria/cases/case-documents/nigeria/
report/gas.flaring.in.nigeria.html).
[8] L. Ellis, “China Exim Bank in Africa” (China Environment Forum, Woodrow
Wilson Int. Cent. for Scholars, 2007, http://www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?topic_
id=1421&fuseaction=topics.event_summary&event_id=224956).
[9] J. Giles, Nature 440, 393-394 (2006).
[10] http://www.house.gov/salazar/images/oil%20drilling.jpg
[11] http://www.gcmrc.gov/about/
[12] http://muller.lbl.gov/travel_photos/AfricaWildlifeFolder/AfricaWildlifeFolder-
Pages/Image28.html
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 Business and Marketing
Interface with corporate and academic sponsors,
negotiate advertising and cross-promotion deals,
and help The Triple Helix expand its horizons across
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Come join us.
MELBOURNE
Cancer Immunotherapy: The Price of the
Magic Bullet
Kenneth Chin
“All Substances are poisonous, there is none that is not a poison; the right dose differentiates a poison from a remedy” Paracelsus
(Auroleus Phillipus Theostratus Bombastus von Hohenheim), Alchemist and Physician, 1538
C
ancer is a rampant disease in modern society and is usu-
ally treated by combinations of surgery, chemotherapy
and radiotherapy. Despite vast improvements made
over the last few years, however, both chemotherapy and
radiotherapy are known for causing unpleasant side effects,
stemming from the non specificity of such therapies.
Paul Ehrlich, a founding forefather of immunology,
dreamt of the concept of a magic bullet – a molecule that
could selectively deliver toxicity to targets of diseased cells.
Today, antibody based therapies have realised that dream and
emerged as a promising cure against diseases, in particular
cancer. This use of antibody therapeutics in cancer is commonly
referred to as ‘Cancer Immunotherapy’.
Natural defence products of higher organisms, antibodies
are produced within the host to destroy foreign pathogens.
Antibodies are tetramers consisting of two heavy chains
and two light chains, and specificity is conferred by their
variable domains that consist of regions of high variability
in terms of amino acid sequence. These consist of fragment
antigen binding (Fab) regions that bind to specific targets
and a modular fragment crystallisable (Fc) region that host
defenses can recognise in order to illicit other protective
responses. The result of these attributes is a highly specific
killing effect exerted by the antibody [1].
In the battle against cancer, there has been increasing
emphasis placed on the specificity of the anti cancer therapy.
Current available therapies involve a significant level of
collateral damage accompanying tumour cytotoxicity. For
example doxorubicin, an anti-cancer agent, has side effects of
cardiotoxicity which causes dysrhythmia and heart failure.
Another common drug mitomycin, causes pulmonary fibrosis
as well as kidney failure [2].
Radiotherapy is known to cause acute toxicity to normal
tissue which is usually reversible as well as more serious
latent side effects. The advent of antibodies being utilized as
The beauty of the antibody
lies in its modular nature.
By means of antibody
diversity within B cell
genes, antibodies can be
raised with incredible
specificity against virtually
any antigen.
10 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
therapeutics is a great leap forward towards designing a
more specific therapy. The first antibody approved for cancer
therapy was Rituximab (1997), an anti-CD20 monoclonal
antibody and treatment regimens with it have shown significant
increases in overall response rates, complete remission rates,
delay of time to progression as well as overall survival of
the recipient patients. The introduction of Rituximab was
revolutionary in providing an effective means of treating
B-cell malignancies which are a type of leukaemia [3].
While these antibodies are effective, they are extremely
costly. Recently, the antibody Herceptin was accepted to be
subsidized by the Pharmaceuticals Benefit Scheme (PBS)
for medical therapy, despite the huge cost of funding. Thus
the question is raised as to whether the cost is proportional
to benefits yielded by such a novel mode of therapy. This
article will discuss the nature of such a therapy and address
the social implications pertaining to the cost and benefit of
cancer immunotherapy.
Advantages and Modes of Therapy
As mentioned earlier, antibodies are natural products of the
immune system. They are large proteins that are relatively
resistant to degradation and can persist in the system for a long
time [4]. The beauty of the antibody lies in its modular nature.
By means of antibody diversity within B cell genes, antibodies
can be raised with incredible specificity against virtually any
antigen. Fc regions, as well as having the ability to engage
the complement cascade- blood proteins that enhance the
destruction of the target; can be engineered to couple various
payloads [1]. The Fc region of the antibody can engage cells
of the immune system which would target and eliminate the
antigen. The Fc region can also be conjugated with various
payloads such as immunotoxins and radioactive isotopes.
The antibody acts as a vehicle to selectively localize these
cytotoxic compounds to the appropriate targets within the
body minimisng the problem of collateral damage.
The most common form of antibody therapy involves
unconjugated antibodies. These antibodies mainly exert
cytotoxicity to the cancer cells by cell and complement
mediated cytotoxicity, meaning that the antibodies alert the
host immune system as to which cells to kill [5]. The Fc region
of the antibody also engages C1Q of the complement cascade
which results in the activation of the cascade. This results
in the deposition of opsonin C3b which further enhances
phagocytosis, as well as the release of chemotactic factors C3a
and C5a which recruit other immune cells to join the attack.
Unconjugated antibodies are also able to modulate signalling
pathways by blocking or activating certain targeted receptors
and induce apoptosis in certain cancer cell types [6].
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 MELBOURNE

Conjugated antibody therapy further advanced of the molecule itself. Its modularity makes it versatile in
immunotherapy by the simple process of conjugating a adapting different payloads whilst its specificity ensures
payload of choice onto the Fc region of the antibody – using that it seeks out the appropriate cancer targets. From this
the Fab regions of the antibody like a missile seeker and the we can see that such properties make it a formidable tool
Fc region to deliver the deadly payload to the target. The for the treatment of cancer.
two broad categories of conjugated payloads are toxic and
radioactive payloads. The toxic conjugates are usually derived Applications
from bacterial toxins. Common examples undergoing current The efficacy of the antibody as a targeting vehicle has led to the
clinical trials are Pseudomonas aeruginosa exotoxin A and greater innovation of drugs that can be delivered to cancer cells,
diptheria toxin. Both these toxins work similarly by entering as the trend of cancer therapeutics is aimed at increasing the
the cell and disrupting protein synthesis [7]. A unique feature specificity of treatments. A new form of radioimmunotherapy
of toxins is their extreme potency. This means that a small has been developed by a multiple step targeting process
quantity of toxin molecules needs to be targeted per cancer to further enhance and focus cytotoxic radiation [15]. This
cell to effect cell death. Also in this category, anthracycline involves the conjugation of a radioactive DNA binding drug
class chemotherapeutic drugs such as doxorubicin have also to an antibody. The first step of targeting is carried out by
been trialled as immunoconjugates [8]. the antibody which targets the cancer cell. The endocytosis
The next major of the antibody
class of conjugated conjugation and
payloads comprises the cleavage of the
of radioactive drug occur next.
isotopes. The most The second step
common classes of of the targeting
radioisotopes used process happens
are the α- and β- when the drug is
radiation emitting released, entering
radioisotopes the nucleus and
[9]. These vary binding to the
in terms of half DNA. This localizes
life and maximal the radiation and
range and are used maximizes the
dependant on the damage to the
type of cancer [10]. cancer cell’s DNA,
These radioisotopes which is the critical
inflict damage on radiosensitive
the cell either via target within cells
high energy, direct [16].
electron attack An example of
of the phosphate the DNA binding
backbone or the drug used is radio-
generation of IodoHoechst which
reactive oxygen uses a radioactive
species within the Iodine-125. The
vicinity of the target Antibodies surrounding a cancer cell. Reproduced fron [20]. most intrinsic
cancerous cell [11,12]. This mainly results in the catastrophic property of this radioactive drug is its emission of ultra
damage of the cancer cell’s DNA beyond its own repair, short range Auger electrons which only have a range of a
causing death to the cancer cells [13]. few nanometers. This ensures that the radioactive damage is
As we can see from the two examples given, antibodies focused onto the malignant cell’s DNA without harming normal
act to localize cytotoxic and radioactive compounds to cells [17]. This is an excellent example of how future directions
targets so as to focus the damage onto the target cancer in antibody therapeutics remain relevant and promise to
cells as well as reduce collateral damage to other host cells. deliver improved treatment options for cancer.
Moreover, antibodies adjunct with other chemotherapy or
radiotherapy treatments may act synergistically to enhance Social Implications
tumour cytotoxicity. An example would be the synergistic As described, using antibodies as a form of therapy is incredibly
effect observed on cells subjected to radiation and Herceptin effective. Since 1997, five antibodies have been approved
treatment. There is a significant increase in cancer cell killing for cancer therapy with more undergoing trials [18]. Thus it
observed when treated with both radiation and Herceptin is important to consider how these technological advances
[14]. would benefit the healthcare system.
On 1 October 2006, Herceptin was listed on the
Thus it can be concluded that antibodies do hold Pharmaceuticals Benefits Scheme (PBS) in Australia for the
significant advantages attributed to the intrinsic nature treatment of advanced metastatic breast cancer [19]. The

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 11
MELBOURNE

cost of treatment for the average patient is approximately
A$60,000 (US$54,600). Considering all patients treated, this
amounts to an estimated A$470 million (US$428 million) in
government subsidies. It should be noted that women with
early stage breast cancer were not covered by the PBS until late
2007. Oncologists consider Herceptin beneficial for women
with HER2 positive early breast cancer. However, the cost of
treatment meant it was inaccessible for the average patient.
The withholding of treatment on a financial basis resulted
in an outcry in the public with widespread reporting in the
media - bearing in mind that breast cancer is the second
largest killer of women (after lung cancer). Herceptin was
listed on the PBS for the treatment of early HER2 positive
breast cancer in late 2007.
Given this huge expense, it is important to judge if
indeed the benefits of such a form of therapy outweigh the
costs. This is an extremely difficult question and since a
large proportion of pharmaceutical pipeline drugs consist
of therapeutic antibodies, we can expect many heated ethics
related debates into the future. Since cancer immunotherapy
promises to be the next generation of anti-cancer therapy, it
would be highly beneficial for the healthcare system to expand
the budget and plan ahead to allow more subsidies for newer
antibodies emerging from clinical trials. By doing this, it
would ensure a strong competition between pharmaceutical
companies developing anti-neoplastic therapeutic antibodies
which will lead to improvements in the antibodies efficacy
and potentially more cost effective production. Next and most
importantly, by providing subsidy for immunotherapy, it
allows this cutting edge and modern therapy to be available
to a larger population – allowing them access to premium
quality healthcare.
Conclusion
In summary, antibodies are a very promising mode of cancer
therapy. They are highly specific for their cancer targets
and can be customised to deliver a combination of different
cytotoxic payloads. As mentioned earlier, antibodies are
also effective as an adjunct therapy along side conventional
chemo- and radiotherapy treatment of cancer. When the cost
of the magic bullet is brought to question, the promising
results and benefits yielded by investing in such a therapy as
well as its advancement most surely, outweighs its cost. More
funding should be considered in order to better subsidize the
treatment and make it affordable to the general population
in order to improve cancer outcomes.
Kenneth Chin is a Science student at the University of Melbourne.
He is currently completing honours in Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre.

References:
[1] Rabson, A., Roitt, I.M., & Delves, P.J. Really Essential Medical Immunology

Are you interested in

Blackwell, Oxford, ed. 2, 2005
[2] Rang, H.P., Dale, M.M., Ritter, J.M. & Moore P.K., Pharmacology Churchill
Livingstone, Edinburgh, ed. 5, 2003
[3] Bello, C. & Stotomeyer, E.M. Hematology 2007, 233-242 contributing to The Triple
[4] Melero, I., Hervas-Stubbs, S., Glennie, M. Pardoll, D.M. & Chen, L. Nature Reviews
Cancer 2007 7(2), 95-106 Helix? We look forward
[5] Weiner, L.M. Nature Reviews Cancer 2007, 7 (9), 701-706
[6] Glennie, M.J., & Johnson, P.W.M Immunology Today 2000 21 (8), 403-410
to hearing from you at
[7] Pastan, I., Hassan, R., Fitzgerald, D.J. & Kreitman, R.J. Nature Reviews Cancer
2006 6 (7), 559-565
unimelb@thetriplehelix.org
[8] Trail, P.A Wilner, D., Lasch, S.J., Henderson, A.J., Hofstead, S., Casazza, A.M.,
Firestone, R.A., Hellstrom, I. & Hellstrom, A.E. Science 1993 261 (5118), 212 – 215
[9] Sharkey, R.M. & Goldenberg, D.M. Journal of Nuclear Medicine 2005 46:115S–
127S
[10] Goldenberg, D.M. & Sharkey, R.M. Quarterly Journal of Nuclear Medicine and
Molecular Imaging 2006 50 (4), 248-264
[11] Charlton, D.E., Hofer, K.G., Vanloon, N., & Schneiderman, M.H. International
Journal of Radiation Biology 1994 80 (11&12), 921 926
[12] Charlton, D.E. Radiation Research 1986 107 (2), 163-171
[13] Cann, K.L. & Hicks, G.G. Biochemistry and Cell Biology 2007 85 (6), 663-674
[14] Weinberg, R.A. The Biology of Cancer Garland Science, New York, 2006
[15] Karagiannis, T.C. & Chin, K.F.W. Current Radiopharmaceuticals 2008 1 (2), 65-
72
[16] Karagiannis, T.C, Lobachevsky, P.N., & Martin, R.F. Acta Oncologica 2000 39
(6), 681-685
[17] Karagiannis, T.C Hellenic Journal of Nuclear Medicine 2007 10(2), 82-8
[18] Carter, P. Nature Reviews Cancer 2001 1 (2), 118-129
[19] Abbot, T., Media Release, 22nd Aug 2006 ABB120-/66 Minister for Health and
Ageing http://www.health.gov.au/internet/ministers/publishing.nsf/Content/healt
h-mediarel-yr2006-ta-abb120.htm?OpenDocument&yr=2006&mth=8> last accessed
on 7 August 2008
[20] http://www.dreamstime.com/cancer-cell-with-antibodies-image5215453

12 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Hottie and the Nottie: Science in
Physical Beauty
Jade Lao
“Don’t blame me for the way I look – I was drawn this way”
Jessica Rabbit, Who Framed Rogger Rabbit?
W
e have all heard that people who are judged as
physically appealing are favored in many different
social circumstances. People are friendlier towards
them, they receive more attention, they are more likely to
score the job they want – and the list goes on. Sadly, it has
even been suggested that the same physical discrimination is
applied to children as well. Unfortunately, scientific studies
performed across the social and natural sciences seem to
suggest that, as inequitable as it may sound, beauty does
influence people’s behavior towards one another. Generally
speaking, right now people like you and I are living in a
discriminatory world where each of us is treated differently
according to how aesthetically pleasing we are perceived
to be.
As beauty is a person’s first
piece of information that he
or she sends to the world, it
is invaluable that scientists
study the concept of ‘beauty’
in order to evaluate its impact
on societal interaction.
Historical Attempts to Explain Beauty Mathematically
The concept of beauty and its appealing nature has been
under debate since the ancient times. Documents have been
discovered, written by Greek and Roman philosophers, which
attempt to find a mathematical basis on which beauty can
be universally judged. One very prominent document that
was found contained vast mathematical workings on what is
called the ‘Golden Ratio’. This ratio was discovered by Euclid
around 325 B.C. – 625 B.C. The Golden Ratio, 1:1.6180339887,
is both mystical and functional in nature. Popularized in
Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, this number is believed
to be the proportions upon which nature is built: plant
components, shells, proportions of animals, human body
proportions etc. We need to look no further than our own
hands to see it: the three joints on each of the human fingers
bear a golden relation to one another – each is roughly 1.6
times the length of the next, going from the most proximal
to most distal from the palm [1]. Because this ratio is found
in the proportions of nature itself, it is thought that anything
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
with these proportions should look harmonious, balanced,
and visually pleasing.
Thus, the Golden Ratio has been incorporated into
studies that attempt to determine whether a human face
is beautiful or not. Robert Ricketts, who examined the
faces of ten attractive models, did the most extensive sets
of measurements to prove this theory. He discovered the
ratio in vertical, horizontal and depth measurements of the
models, and in the measurements of their underlying skeletons
seen in x-rays. Cosmetic surgeon W. Earle Matory, Jr., also
found examples of this ratio in the faces of attractive Asian,
African-American, and Middle Eastern men and women [1].
It is thought that Leonardo da Vinci used the Golden Ratio
when painting the Mona Lisa, and that its use in her facial
features explains her intriguing and captivating smile [2].
However, despite the ratio’s popular relation with aesthetics,
not all objects that exemplify the ratio are necessarily beautiful.
The Golden Ratio is a proportion that nature has embodied, but
it is also possible to create objects demonstrating the Golden
Ratio that are not particularly aesthetically pleasing.
The Ideal Beauty
What society percieves as beautiful has changed gradually
through the centuries. Until the late 18th century in Western
society, the ideal figure for a woman was voluptuous and
curvaceous, with a slightly protruding stomach, which
symbolised fertility. We can see evidence of this in paintings
such as ‘The Birth of Venus’ by Sandro Botticelli (1482) in
Figure 1, ‘Milkmaid’ by Johannes Vermeer (1658) and ‘La
Donna Velate’ by Sanzio Raphael (1516). These famous artists
all drew women who were identified as being beautiful at
the time. Today, it is the slender youth, cast in a European
style of beauty, that has become the global standard by which
women of almost all cultures and ages are measured and
found wanting. This ideal, which consists of wide-eyes, long
legs, high cheekbones, and glossy, swishing hair, is often
in opposition to indigenous standards for beauty, such as
fatness, ornamental scars or shaved heads [3, 4].
Youth has been considered attractive for its association
with fertility across all cultures. From an anthropological
point of view, the male gaze is target seeking for a potential
partner [1]. The male is attracted to youth because the females’
chances of reproduction decrease significantly with age
(whilst for males it stays the same). Thus, the male’s primitive
drive is a biological program designed to be attracted to the
youthful, especially those with clear skin and glossy hair
which indicate good general health. These physical signs
provide an indication of a good chance of giving birth to
a healthy child. Evolutionary psychologists suggest that
men are automatically excited by signs of a woman who
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 13
MELBOURNE

is fertile and healthy and that sexual preference is guided behind it. The newborn’s face is the best indicator of whether
by ancient rules that make us most attracted to bodies that he or she would be likely to survive. A healthier-looking
look the most reproductively fit [1]. baby will receive more attention from the mother because
the mother’s primeval instincts know that this newborn
Why Study Beauty? has a high chance of surviving into adulthood, which is the
Many people are quick to point that external beauty is time needed to produce the next generation. The mother
insignificant and it is internal beauty, or the quality of one’s instinctually weighs the newborn’s chances of reproduction
character, that is truly important. However, it is physical against whether it is worth investing the time and effort
appearance that most people base their first impressions into the newborn, and whether to unleash to-die-for love
on, and first impressions matter. Other information, such as [7]. What an auspicious beginning, to have this power of
personality, is more meaningful but much harder to ferret beauty that grabs the attention of those whom newborns
out. People do not have their personality characteristics are entirely dependent upon [6].
tattooed on their foreheads, nor do they display their academic What is equally shocking is a duet of experiments that
qualifications prominently around. Their financial status is explored the chilling notion that parents direct their hostility
a private matter between themselves and their bankers; and towards the least beautiful child in the family. In this study,
scientists would not know how to interpret the structure of researchers arranged for a man and a woman to have either
someone’s genes, even if they could be presented for inspection a ‘delightful’ or a stressful encounter with each other. The
[5]. Thus, as beauty is a person’s first piece of information question was: how would the couple’s encounter affect the
that he or she sends to way the mother treated
the world, it is invaluable the child? And more
that scientists study importantly, would it
the concept of ‘beauty’ matter what the child
in order to evaluate looked like? First, the
its impact on societal women were asked to
interaction. act along with a man
Furthermore, beauty (actually an experiment
is important to study confederate) as parents
because it provides of a ten-year-old child.
insight into the reason The researchers arranged
behind the Darwinist for the ‘couple’ to have
theory of natural selection either a ‘delightful’ or
and reproduction. a stressful encounter
Physical appearance with one another. In
is a key factor in how these experiments,
humans choose their the child’s looks were
Figure 1: The Birth of Venus by Botticelli. Reproduced from [12].
partners because it is systematically varied.
an indicator of general health. In order for the survival of Sometimes the girl or boy was very ‘good-looking’ (the
the human species, primitive people knew that choosing child’s natural appearance). Sometimes, the same child was
partners who look strong, fit and healthy would mean that made to be ‘unappealing’. He or she had dark circles under
future generations would be more likely to possess the same the eyes and stringy hair.
traits. Anthropologically, one’s attractiveness is judged upon The researchers found that even after a ‘delightful’
his or her chances of reproductive success. encounter, women were less gentle with the unappealing
child than with the cute one. They were more likely to punish
Pretty Babies Get Picked up First the unappealing child for errors made in housework. When
Beauty is an important factor starting from as early as being the woman was angry with the man, she also tended to direct
a newborn. With big eyes, silky skin and plump cheeks, her hostility towards the unappealing child. However, in the
many people find babies irresistibly cute. There are no ugly same situation, the women were reasonably restrained with
babies, just as there are no ugly puppies or ugly brides for the more attractive child. Studies such as this suggest that
that matter. But why is beauty important as early as our while beauty protects children from adult anger, ugliness
first entrance into the world? As harsh as it may sound, makes them a moving target [5]. This study shows that
studies have shown that the physical appearance of newborns ‘beautiful’ children too, and not just adults, are given the
affects the way that they are treated. Lacking any speech or advantage of being treated with more kindness, even when
personal characteristics, babies are predominantly judged his or her care-giver is in a bad mood. The reactions of the
by their appearance. Scientific observations have shown women towards the children is eye-opening because they
that in hospitals and day care centers, the cuter babies are provide strong evidence that the acquisition of beauty is
picked up first, are picked up more often, and are held for advantageous from an early age, suggesting that beauty
longer periods of time. Their needs are also attended to ensures a higher likelihood of being safe from harm and
before the other babies [6]. unwarranted hostility from those whom one depends
Mothers too respond differently to their own ‘prettier’ upon.
babies, cooing and smiling, kissing and holding them more
often than do the mothers of plain babies. Although this may First Impressions Count
sound unjustified and cruel, there is an evolutionary reason It is ubiquitous that people in society discriminate against

14 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 MELBOURNE

others based on how they look. Beauty and ugliness are

associated with their culturally constructed stereotypes
and, according to scientific studies, the more aesthetically
pleasing you are perceived to be, the smarter and more
successful people think you are. In a study titled When
Beauty May Fall, women were asked to rank people as
beautiful, average, or homely, and then guess their personality
characteristics. Shown a series of photos, participants judged
the more aesthetically pleasing individuals to be “more
sociable, sexually alluring, successful professionally, and
personally happy” [1].
In another study, elementary teachers were shown the
academic record of an ‘attractive’ or ‘unattractive’ eight-
year-old boy or girl. The records were identical, showing the
students’ attitudes and work habits as well as their grades
in reading, language, arithmetic, social studies, science,
art, music and physical education. They even contained
a tally of their absences during the school year. Despite
identical academic records, teachers were more likely to
recommend the child be placed in a class for the ‘mentally
challenged’ if he or she was unattractive. They also believed
that unattractive children would have poorer psychological
functioning and would experience more academic and social
difficulties [1].
However, society’s judgements of beauty are not always
based on looks. Superior personal abilities can also change
the way one is perceived. For example, children thought to
have superior academic or athletic assets are perceived as
more attractive, at least, by other children. In other words,
although the beautiful are being perceived as being talented,
the reverse is also true – talented people are seen as being
beautiful [5].
Reproduced from [13].
Height, in particular, has a positive linear relationship with
increased salary [9].
Beauty and ugliness are On the other hand, there are instances when beauty
associated with their culturally can be a handicap in getting a job. Marilyn Monroe, for
example, was turned down for the part of Grushenka in
constructed stereotypes and, Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov (1958) because the
according to scientific studies, director thought she was too beautiful to be credible and
thus no one would be able to relate to her [6].
the more aesthetically pleasing
you are perceived to be, the Cheating the Justice System
It sounds outrageous, but beautiful people may even have an
smarter and more successful advantage in the legal system. Although it is standard that
people think you are. ‘all are equal before the law’, the following study exemplifies
that this is not always that case. Criminologists have collected
evidence showing that if defendants are ‘good-looking’,
Don’t Call Us, We’ll Call You they are:
A scientific survey has shown a worrying bias on the part
of personnel managers in choosing whom to hire for vacant 1. Less likely to be suspected of performing illicit
job positions. Personnel managers are willing to admit they activities
discriminate against everyone based on their looks: both 2. If caught, they are less likely to be reported
males and females. The survey revealed that managers 3. And that even if the case does come to court,
consider a ‘good appearance’ to be more important than judges and jurors are more likely to be lenient
a university education, being innovative, or being loyal to with them in terms of sentencing [5]
the firm [8]. While the evidence cannot be said to apply to
all work situations, such studies indicate that managers
do discriminate based on physical appearance. Further The evidence that points to these conclusions is shocking.
studies have shown that men’s physical attractiveness is Psychologists persuaded 440 young men and women to
often associated with power, status, wealth and position. shoplift items from ten large stores in a major city. Clerks

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 15
MELBOURNE
were less likely to stop shoplifters who were well-groomed
and neatly dressed than those with long, stringy hair and
who were sloppily groomed. Presumably, this may be due
to the fact that the clerks were less likely to suspect good-
looking customers and thus were less likely to be watching
their every move [5].
Asked why people desire
physical beauty, Aristotle said,
“No one that is not blind could
ask that question”.
Customers also noticed strange behaviour. The
experiment revealed that customers are more likely to
report the ‘shoplifters’ if the shoplifters have an unappealing
appearance rather than an appealing one [10]. In two different
chain grocery stores and in a discount department store,
an accomplice blatantly shoplifted in the presence of other
customers. The male or female shoplifter was dressed either
in a ‘neat’ style or in a ‘hippie’ style. The ‘neat’ shoplifter
looked like a typical professional out on a shopping break.
The ‘hippie’ shoplifter was described in the following way:
“he wore soiled patched blue jeans, blue workman’s shirt,
and blue denim jacket; well-worn, scuffed shoes with no
socks. He had long unruly hair with a ribbon tied around
his forehead. He was unshaven and had a small beard” [10].
The experiment showed that the ‘hippie’ shoplifters were
not only more likely to be reported but, surprisingly, they
were also reported with more enthusiasm. For example,
one customer said, “that son-of-a-b**** hippie over there
stuffed a banana down his coat”. Apparently, if you are
going to be thief you would do well to be neatly dressed
[10]. It seems that society is equating beauty with affluence,
and that a person’s appearance will influence the extent to
which they are caught in petty criminal acts.
What This Means for the Future
The results of the studies discussed demonstrate that people
in general are inclined to be nicer to the more beautiful
References:
[1] Etcoff, N. Survival of the Prettiest, Abacus, London, 1999
[2] Narrain, D. ‘The Golden Ratio in Art’, The Golden Ratio <http://cuip.uchicago.
edu/~dlnarain/golden/activity3.htm>. Last accessed 1 June 2008.
[3] Hatfield, E., & Sprecher, S. Mirror, Mirror…, State University of New York Press,
New York, 1986
[4] Halprin, S. Look at My Ugly Face, Penguin Group, New York, 1995
[6] Dostoyevsky, F., 1958, cited in Hatfield, E. & Sprecher, S. Mirror, Mirror…, State
University of New York Press, New York, 1986
[7] Friday, N. The Power of Beauty, HarperCollins Publishers, New York, 1996
16 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
individual. It is typical behavior to be more patient with
the more adorable child or to suspect an unkempt person of
perfidy. The typical behaviors and preferences are related
to psychological human nature and thus what we should
be aware of is the fact that beauty is not a depraved or
discriminatory notion, but rather that everyone should be
aware of these prejudiced behaviors and endeavor to treat
everyone equally as a result.
Asked why people desire physical beauty, Aristotle
said, “No one that is not blind could ask that question”
[1]. It is apparent that beauty has a huge impact on our
lives and in society; otherwise the beauty industry would
not survive. More men and women are spending more
money to improve their physical appearance than ever
before. We buy one new ‘look’ after another. Closets are
filled and emptied every season [7]. Beauty has generated
a billion-dollar industry that thrives on consumerism. It is
emphasized not only because it gives us a social advantage,
but also because we are buying into a mass culture that has
been created for us through media and advertising. It is
inextricable that beauty stems from anthropological roots,
but it is also related to culture and this culture projects to
us that ‘rich’ and ‘successful’ comes with the attainment
of beauty [11]. Fashions change rapidly in contemporary
society despite the role of reproductive fitness in influencing
perceptions of beauty and this trend points to the fact that
history and culture have a commensurable part to play in
our perception of aestheticism.
Although beauty does influence people’s behaviors, it
is ancillary to the quality of one’s character and personality.
How do you tell the people who are blinded by vanity
and, in particular, the youth that their few moments in the
spotlight may be just that? I would answer that we must
teach them the role of beauty, pointing out its power but
also showing them the far greater importance of the quality
of one’s character [7]. Personality traits should overshadow
beauty, as kindness, benevolence, compassion and other
social skills are lifelong traits that will be useful in almost all
situations. Physical beauty is a brief and ultimately empty
reign compared with the longevity and significance of one’s
quality of character.
Jade Lao is studying Arts at The University of Melbourne.
[8] Bowman, G., 1964, cited in Hatfield, E. & Sprecher, S. Mirror, Mirror…, State
University of New York Press, New York, 1986
[9] Harter, S., 1993, cited in Friday, N. The Power of Beauty, HarperCollins Publishers,
New York, 1996
[10] Steffensmeier, D.J. & Terry, R.M., 1973, cited in Hatfield, E. & Sprecher, S. Mirror,
Mirror…, State University of New York Press, New York, 1986
[11] Radice, C. The Progressive Grocer 1996 75 (6), 114
[12] www.artchive.com/viewer/z.html
[13] http://www.dreamstime.com/help...-image3205459
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

Admitting Ambiguity in the Embryonic
Stem Cell Debate
Shaun Khoo
T
he use of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) in scien-
tific research has provoked both warm welcomes and
vigorous condemnation from various interest groups.
Many scientists are interested in using stem cells in regen-
erative medicine. This is because stem cells are able to form
different cell types, while most somatic cells from adults
cannot. However, hESC research has also aroused opposition.
The use of embryos in stem cell research is condemned by,
among others, the Catholic Church and its sympathisers,
who believe that embryos are human individuals [1] and
that it is unethical to destroy such individuals [2]. These
vitalist objections to hESC research rely on the unambigu-
ous classification of an embryo as a human individual, but
advancements in the fields of genetics and synthetic biology
are foregrounding ambiguities in the classification of life
and the limits of scientific definitions of life.
Chemicals with Life-Cycles
There is significant ambiguity in the classification of viruses,
which have some of the characteristics of life, but not others.
If a living organism is cellular and has its own metabolism,
then viruses are not alive since they have neither. However,
viruses do reproduce and evolve. For example, when HIV is
placed under the selective pressure of antiretroviral drugs, it
evolves resistance [3]. It is also possible to synthesise viruses
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
and in 2002, researchers from the State University of New
York reported having synthesised polio without any natural
template [4]. Using enzymes, but no cells, they produced
a molecule that interacted with living tissue and mice in
the same way that naturally occurring infectious polio
does. The researchers, aware of the problems inherent in
classifying viruses as life or non-life, called polio ‘a chemical
[C332,652H492,388N98,245O131,196-P7501S2340] with a life cycle.’[4] The
idea that viruses are chemicals with life cycles destabilises
Reproduced from [18].
vitalism, since it suggests that there is no difference between
life and non-life except in their chemical arrangements.
It may also be possible to synthesise, engineer and create
much more than viruses. The J. Craig Venter Institute claims
that they have successfully performed genome transplantation,
transforming one type of bacteria into another [5]. If an
artificial genome were to be synthesised and then implanted
to produce a cell expressing an engineered phenotype, would
it be more appropriate to call the transformed cell alive, or an
elaborate piece of nanotechnology? The participants of the
Kavli Futures Symposium predict that the distinction between
biology and nanotechnology will eventually blur [6]. If it is
possible, in principle, to make life from scratch [6] then life
is composed of extraordinarily complex machinery and it
becomes more necessary to adopt non-vitalistic motivations
for valuing life.
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 17
MELBOURNE
These implications do not yet apply directly to humans
or other complex animals, but at the same time, humans and
complex animals are not exempt. This is because human
life arose through the same gradual process of evolution as
other lifeforms. Many times during this process, the genetic
sequences of exogenous retroviruses became endogenous.
Bioethical debates
surrounding hESC research
should take into account that
life is an ambiguous category
and that suitable criteria for
defining human individuality
are not clear and simple.
When the sequence of the human genome was published in
2001, endogenous retroviruses and their regulatory sequences
were shown to make up 8% of our genome [7]. This resembles
symbiosis on a genetic level and demonstrates that the human
genome is built using, among other things, chemicals with life
cycles. Other complex animals also experience this process and
it is currently under observation in koalas [8]. The genomes
of complex animals are not only exploited by viruses, but
incorporate living chemicals into their composition. If living
chemicals can be incorporated into and inherited through
the human genome, then there is not an insurmountable
barrier between human life, non-human life and non-life.
These concepts are not discrete and easily separable, but
instead exist on a continuum.
Fertilisation and Individuality
A crucial part of vitalist objections to hESC research is that
embryos are human individuals and it is therefore unethical
to destroy them. However, the criteria by which human
individuals are identified as individuals are not absolute.
The transition between the haploid and diploid stages of
human development is sometimes considered to be the
defining moment of a new human individual, even though
fertilisation is a complex process [9]. The Catholic Church’s
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has declared
that when ‘the ovum is fertilized, a life is begun… the life
of a new human being…’ [10] This is problematic for three
reasons: monozygotic or identical twins, chimerism, and
parthenogenesis. It is commonly known that identical twins
have identical genes, which can be traced back to a single
fertilisation. If fertilisation were used as the absolute and
definitive beginning of the human individual it would leave
room for only one person to be produced per fertilised
egg. It is therefore unrealistic to use fertilisation events
to distinguish between human individuals in the case of
identical twins because it is self-evident that they are not
the same person.
Chimerism also provides a strong challenge to the use
of fertilisation events to distinguish individuals. In 2002, the
New England Journal of Medicine featured a brief report on
18 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
chimerism in which a woman was found to be a tetragametic
chimera [11]. Tetragametic chimerism occurs when two eggs
are fertilised separately and merge early in development
to ultimately produce a single human being. It has been
known for decades that chimerism occurs, [12] and it is
becoming apparent that chimerism also takes place on a
very small scale between a foetus and its mother as cells
are exchanged between the two and persist long after the
pregnancy is over [13]. If human life begins at fertilisation
and each individual has only one genome, then a tetragametic
chimera is two people in one body and many individuals
have others living within them. It is therefore inappropriate
to require genetic ‘purity’ in order to consider a person as
a distinct individual.
Fertilisation events are also unnecessary for initiating
development. Parthenogenesis occurs when offspring are
produced without the need for fertilisation. It has been
observed in many species, including the Komodo dragon
[14], and human eggs may be activated so that they develop
parthenogenetically [15]. A collaborative effort between
scientists from Russia and the USA even managed to
derive hESC lines from parthenogenetically activated
eggs [16]. Although human embryos produced through
parthenogenesis have not yet survived to maturity, this
development allows many objections to hESC research to
be avoided, as fertilisation is not involved.
In principle, it ought to be possible for a
parthenogenetically-derived embryo to survive to maturity
even though actually doing so would raise its own set of ethical
concerns. However, the assumptions essential for vitalist
objections to hESC research would require the adult human
parthenote to not be considered an individual. Mammalian
parthenotes cannot be distinguished from fertilised eggs by
their morphology [17]. They fail to reach maturity because
they require paternal genome expression [18], but if artificial
techniques could overcome the challenges posed by genetic
imprinting, there is no reason why the mature parthenotes
would look or behave any differently to other individuals. Just
as an ant produced by parthenogenesis [19] is an ant and a
Reproduced from [17].
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 MELBOURNE

This suggests that it is not appropriate to use fertilisation

as a signifier for the beginning of a distinct human life and
If it is possible, in principle, superior criteria should be developed.
to make life from scratch Bioethical debates surrounding hESC research should
take into account that life is an ambiguous category and
then life is composed of that suitable criteria for defining human individuality are
extraordinarily complex not clear and simple. The approach of often religiously
motivated vitalists fails to consider that science is unable
machinery and it becomes to define human life with the precision required for their
more necessary to adopt arguments to work. As a Nature editorial on the topic of
synthetic biology remarks, “[T]he formation of a new being
non-vitalistic motivations is gradual, contingent and precarious…” [20] While there
for valuing life. should always be room for society to raise concerns, the field
of hESC research deserves discussion that recognises the
limits of its terms and goes beyond simplistic and reductive
distinct member of the colony, the hypothetical human conceptions of life and its beginnings.
parthenote would also be a distinct human individual. The
use of fertlilisation events as the absolute signifier of the Shaun Khoo is studying Arts/Science at The University of
beginning of human life would deny that the parthenote Melbourne.
was an individual, which is false in the same self-evident
fashion as the idea that identical twins are one individual.

up to
References:
[1] Sherley, J.L. Cell Proliferation 2008 41 (Suppl. 1), 57-64
[2] Address of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI to Participants on the
Symposium on the Theme: Stem Cells: What Future for Therapy? your first choice for

MEDICINE
Scientific Aspects and Bioethical Problems. Cell Proliferation 2008
41 (Suppl. 1), 4-6.

15
[3] Carvajal-Rodriguez, A. Crandall K.A. & Posada, D. Infection

%
Genetics and Evolution 2007 7 (4), 476
[4]Cello, J. Paul A.V. & Wimmer, E. Science 2002 297 (5583), 1016
- 1022
[5]Lartigue, C. et al. Science 2007 317 (5838), 632-638
[6] Austin, R., et al. ‘The Ilulissat Statement’, paper presented at The
Kavli Futures Symposium ‘The merging of bio and nano: towards

LAW
cyborg cells’, Ilulissat, Greenland, 11-15 June 2007.
[7] Lander, E.S. et al. Nature 2001 409 (6822), 860-922 Tarlington,
R.E. Meers, J. & Young, P.R. Nature 2006 442 (7098), 79-81
[8] Familiari, G. Heyn, R. Relucenti, M. Nottola S.A. & Sathananthan,

OFF
A.H. International Review of Cytology 2006 (249), 53-141
[9] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration on
Procured Abortion Rome, 1974

BUSINESS
[10] Yu, N. et al., New England Journal of Medicine 2002 346
(20), 1545-1552
[11] Uchida, I.A. Wang, H.C. & Ray, M. Nature 1964 204 (4954),
191

MOST
[12] Stevens, A.M. Clinical and Applied Immunology Reviews 2005
5 (5), 325-338 Watts, P.C. et al. Nature 2006 444 (7122), 1021-1022
[13] Revazova, E.S. et al., Cloning and Stem Cells (2007) 9 (3), 432-
449 Kiessling, A.A Nature 2005 434 (7030), 145
[14] Kim, K. et al., Science 2007 315 (5811), 482-486
[15] Pearcy, M. et al. Science 2004 306 (5702), 1780-1783

BOOKS
[16] Nature 2007 447 (7148), 1031-1032
[17] www.everystockphoto.com/photo.php?imageId=3100540
[18] http://www.dreamstime.com/sperms-and-human-egg-
image1194205

UNIVERSITY
PROFESSIONAL BOOKSHOP
alan gilbert building
cnr grattan & berkeley / university square
www.uniprofbooks.com.au

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 19
MELBOURNE
What Lies Beneath: Museums and the
Repatriation of Ancient Human Remains
Mubing Duan
I
magine all the different thoughts running through your
mind if you were to unexpectedly unearth a corpse in the
middle of a science expedition. Research ethics would
probably not rank highly as one of them. Yet it is this particu-
lar issue which lies at the centre of an ongoing controversy
surrounding the right of indigenous communities to reclaim
ancient ancestral remains from public museums and research
institutes. Repatriation is ‘the process by which museums
and other institutions transfer possession and control of
indigenous human remains, funerary objects, objects of
cultural patrimony and sacred objects back to their tribes
of origin’ [1]. In the US, it is legislatively enforced under the
‘Native American Graves Protection
and Repatriation Act (1990)’ and
similar policies are being adopted
by other museums and institutes
across the globe [2]. Co-operation,
however, remains sketchy as mem-
bers of the research community
have raised objections against the
unconditional handover of such
valuable and rare anthropological
materials for reburial or cremation.
The question remains this; do our
research ethics compel scientists to
act with integrity by returning all
such specimens in their possession,
or are scientists actually obliged to
continue their research out of a so-
cial responsibility to furthering our
knowledge of human adaptation,
health and disease?
There was a time when
museums were more than just
ancient repositories of dusty and
inanimate specimens. Once upon
a time, science was heralded as a
noble and perilous quest, carried out
by bands of adventurous academics
in search for the Holy Grail of all
archaeological discoveries. By the
mid 1900s, expeditions had uncovered
hominid fossils from South Africa, Aztec artefacts from South
America and ancient human remains from the insides of
Egyptian pyramids to across the vast expanses of Australia.
Public lauding accompanied many of these findings, as
successful archaeologists returned to their home countries
with their discoveries laden in their trunks. By convention,
all archaeological artefacts became property of the funding
national museums and academic institutions, to be proudly
displayed in collections equally for the sake of reputation
as well as serious academic research. Rightful ownership
claims, however, proved to be far from settled and the last few
20 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
decades have been witness to extensive government lobbying,
requests and petitions from many indigenous communities
for the repatriation of their ancestral remains.
In 2007, the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre (TAC)
mounted a legal case against the Natural History Museum
of London (NHM) over a proposal to test DNA and tissue
samples extracted from the ancestral remains of 17 Tasmanian
Aborigines [3-5]. Although an agreement on repatriation had
been made, delays in handover occurred when the NHM
announced its intention to perform scientific tests on the
specimens prior to their return. This promptly sparked an
outcry from the TAC, which views the extraction of DNA and
tissue samples for scientific analysis
as a form of ancestral desecration.
A major dilemma presents itself
in this case and it is the same one
which haunts the whole issue of
repatriation. Should the NHM
surrender their samples and agree
to an unconditional return of all the
primitive remains in question, or
are there greater social benefits to
be gained from the commencement
of these scientific studies?
This is where we return to that
corpse that you have just discovered.
Apart from the “how”, “why”
and “finally, my ascendency to
great scientific renown,” the first
thing you would probably like to
establish would be the exact identity
of this corpse. This may not be a
particularly easy question to answer;
the corpse is highly unlikely to come
attached with a carefully categorised
and cross-referenced history of its
own origins. Historical records are
prone to mix-ups, misplacement
and fabrication in a way which
DNA analysis can easily avoid.
Reproduced from [8]. Moreover, rapid advancements in
DNA amplification technology now
enable us to extract minute DNA samples from the bones of
ancient remains with minimal tissue damage or loss. Indeed,
opponents against unconditional repatriation argue that both
museums and indigenous communities would potentially
benefit from such studies, as the comparative analyses of
the differences in genetic sequence of primitive remains
can firmly establish their evolutionary origins in a way
that paper and historical records cannot. The information
provided by these DNA sequences would also allow scientists
to track human evolutionary changes and the prevalence
of genetic disease susceptibilities in different indigenous
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

communities, which is particularly important as members
of enclosed communities are more likely to inherit common
genetic traits compared to rest of the human population.
The latter claim, however, may be called into question as
population studies are an equally if not more valid method of
identifying genetic predispositions in different communities
and subpopulations. And as history grimly reminds us,
the outcome of such research may, in the wrong hands, be
used to denigrate the very native community under study.
Nevertheless, keeping in mind both the practicalities of
specimen identification and the potential anthropological
contributions arising from such studies, can we still claim
that scientist are completely unjustified in their stance against
unconditional repatriation?
Heavens forbid, but let us now imagine that you were a
scientist interested in the understanding the history of human
variation, adaptation, evolution and disease susceptibility.
The corpse that you have just unearthed turns out to be a rare
specimen which predates Australia’s pre-colonisation era.
It has the exciting potential to reveal clues on how human
populations respond to selective environmental pressures
and change. If this is indeed the case, as is with all the
ancient human remains kept in museum collections across
the globe, then hopefully you would like to see the corpse
preserved in a safe repository where it can be studied with
the care and respect that all rare and precious materials
duly receive. The chances are that you would also be rather
reluctant to see the corpse promptly incinerated or reburied
and left to decompose for another 1000 years or so, before the
next bumbling scientist stumbles along. Under the Anglo-
Australian legal system, entitlement to the disposal of a
deceased person’s corpse is automatically granted to the family
or legal executor. The right to this entitlement, however, is
fundamentally very different to the right of a community
in its claim over the disposal of the ancient remains of one
of its tribal ancestors. Whilst medical coroners are legally
compelled to hand over a corpse to the next of kin or legal
executor for disposal after completion of the post mortem, the
same jurisdiction does not apply to scientists or institutions
in possession of primitive remains belonging to an individual
deceased for hundreds of years and with no direct familial
descendents. Thus, in comparison to the former situation,
the community’s call for repatriation is founded upon a
much weaker jurisdictional principal. However, even this
may not necessarily mean that scientists are ethically less
obliged to respect a community’s request for the repatriation
of its ancient ancestors’ remains.
In the words of the Australian National Health and
Medical Research Council (NHMRC), there is a universally
decreed code stating that all good scientists must seek to
establish and maintain a strong research culture of ‘intellectual
References:
[1] Repatriation Office of the National Museum of Natural History, What is Repatriation?
<http://anthropology.si.edu/repatriation/whatis/>. Last accessed on 11 July 2008
[2] Forde, C & Parker, L O. Indigenous Law Bulletin 2001, 5(6), 9-13 <http://www.
austlii.edu.au/au/journals/ILB/2001/10.html>. Last accessed on 14 April 2008
[3] Denholm, D. and Wilson, P., “Museum Bones Legal Fight ‘A Waste’ of $1m”,
The Australian, February 24 2007 <http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/
story/0,20867,21278185-2702,00.html>. Last accessed 14 April 2008
[4] Amos, J. “Science Argues to Keep Bones”, BBC News, May 16 2003, <http://news.
bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/sci/tech/3032657.stm>. Last accessed 14 April 2008
[5] Cordingley, G., “Activist ‘Not Going Home without Bones’, Sunday Tasmanian,
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
honesty and integrity, and scholarly and scientific rigour’[6].
Under current NHMRC guidelines, scientists are expected to
manage conflicts of interest so that ‘ambition and personal
advantage do not compromise [any] ethical and scholarly
considerations’ [6]. Furthermore, the NHMRC policy regarding
‘Ethical Conduct in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
Health Research’ prioritises the importance of respecting
the ‘values, expectations and cultures’ of indigenous
communities, even at the cost of scientific research itself
[7]. This is understandable. The perpetuation of cultural
richness is a praise-worthy reflection of human existence,
and the values of all ethnic communities deserve the equal
right of our respect. The significance of cultural traditions
should never be lightly dismissed for the greater scientific
good, especially not when the community holds even the
slightest legitimate claim over the proceedings in question.
In fact, the ethics of reparation are less based on the law of
property but rather on the need for scientists to recognise and
respect the cultural traditions of all people. The withholding
of indigenous ancestral remains holds enormous emotive
appeal, and museums and other institutions risk appearing
cold and callous to the eyes of the general public if they adopt
anything less than a completely co-operative approach. As
the hypothetical scientist, would you still choose to keep the
corpse if it meant losing the respect and support of the very
people you were trying to help in the first place? Hopefully
this has just sounded like a rhetorical question.
The boundaries of scientific responsibility and ethical
conduct are not always as distinct as we would like them
to be, and neither are the dilemmas that arise confined to
the issue of repatriation alone. In this particular situation,
we can theoretically present the scientist as an individual
torn between a desire to respect community values and
a utilitarian obligation to continue conducting scientific
studies which carry many potential benefits for mankind.
I use the word theoretically here, because in reality, scientists
do not really have the luxury of making this choice. Science
loses its standing if it loses the support of the people it
aims to benefit; the very same people, incidentally, whose
taxes fund the majority of all scientific grants in the first
place. For scientists, laboratory life is often a juggling act
of academic rigour, scholarly integrity, social responsibility
and an ongoing obligation to preserve the public image of
science itself. Accidentally unearthing corpses, at times, can
be the least of their problems.
Mubing (Erika) Duan is studying Science at the University of
Melbourne. She is currently completing honours through the
Department of Medicine with the Royal Melbourne Hospital and
the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research.
February 22 2007 <http://www.news.com.au/mercury/story/0,22884,21244168-5007221,00.
html>. Last accessed 14 April 2008
[6] National Health and Medical Research Council, Australian Code for Responsible
Conduct of Research, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, 2007 <http://www.nhmrc.
gov.au/publications/synopses/e52syn.htm>. Last Accessed 14 April 2008
[7] National Health and Medical Research Council Values and Ethics: Guidelines for
Ethical Conduct in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research, Commonwealth
of Australia, Canberra, 2003 <http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/publications/synopses/e52syn.
htm>. Last accessed 14 April 2008
[8] http://www.dreamstime.com/ancient-grave-image3867552
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 21
MELBOURNE

Toxic Handlers: Sustaining the

Emotional Workplace
Sook Jin Ong

T
he workplace is an increasingly volatile environment
to be in. As firms compete to remain in the market,
drastic measures are often taken to ensure their sur-
vival, some of these at the expense of their own employ-
ees. Changes are rife, downsizing takes place in the name
of cutting costs, and job security is no longer something
employers can offer to their people [1]. In order to stay on
board, employees are pushed to their limits – extraordinary
performances are expected, and that too is often not enough
to ensure continuous employment in the organisation. This in
turn breeds uncertainty, and negative emotions such as fear,
hurt and anger [2]. In a more ‘everyday’ situation that does
not involve such extreme activities, negative emotions are
capable of manifesting too. Think of times when a dedicated
employee has their expectations and confidence taken away
by mismanagement, discriminating policies, and even col-
leagues and/or clients that create problems for the employee
[3]. In short, emotions make up part of the organisational life
and, in light of recent trends, the management of emotions
in the workplace could possibly spell the success or death
of organisations.
Corporations are often depicted as heartless organisms
made out of steel and concrete, equipped with a brain to
rationalise the best way to maximise profit and nothing
more. While this common adage puts aside the influence
emotions play in an organisation, the reality is, an organisation
consists of people within it, coming together for a common
goal [4] – and all these people have feelings! The notion
that organizations are emotionless came about from the
Scientific Management movement, in which organisations
are encouraged to view employees as nothing more than cogs
in a wheel, and all tasks should be streamlined and made
simple, in order to reduce costs and increase productivity – all
in the name of maximising profits. This view is less relevant
in the new knowledge economy, whereby the people within
an organisation make a difference to the type of competitive
advantage an organisation is able to lever to compete in its
environment.
In the light of current trends, such as mergers and
acquisitions, downsizing and reengineering, one would expect
negative emotions, particularly that of hurt, anger and fear,
to be commonplace in organisations. In recent literature,
for example, pain is accepted as part of organisational life.
Pain in itself is not so much the problem – the way pain
and all other negative emotions are dealt with may form
the root to future complications within the organization [5].
The effects of mishandling these emotions will manifest in
the long run.
How do we manage the assortment of emotions that
exist in an organisation at a given time, and who should be
doing this? What should be done to support these people?
And given that negative emotions can take place in any
organisation – be it a Fortune 500 company on the verge of
a new takeover, or a research institute struggling to secure
funding, or a religious denomination in their daily routine,
or even a small student-run science society in the university
– awareness of this phenomenon and its healers should
come to light.
The Toxic Handler
The handling of negative emotions is often dealt with by a
group of people called the ‘toxic handlers’. Peter J. Frost aptly
coined the term ‘toxic handlers’ to depict the work of those
left to deal with the emotional pain caused by organisational
decisions and actions [5]. The metaphor captures the concept
of emotional pain as something hazardous that needs careful
handling to dispose of, and this is done by certain people, not
merely anyone. Just like real toxic handlers, these metaphorical
‘toxic handlers’ are people who help others come to terms
with their hurt and allow them to get on with their work.
In the era where change has become a permanent feature
of the corporate world, having these individuals who are
Reproduced from [16].
equipped with toxin-handling competencies will bring an
added advantage in ensuring the longevity of an organization
[6]. These people are motivated by the desire to listen, hold a
space for the pained one to heal, buffer the pain, extricate the
pained one from the painful situation itself, and ultimately
transform the pain in order to allow the pained one to move
on [5]. Their toxic-handling activities are often marked by high
levels of emotional intelligence – this refers to one’s socio-
emotional competence. In particular, it refers to the ‘ability
to monitor one’s own and others’ feelings and emotions, to
discriminate among them, and to use this information to
guide one’s thinking and action’ [7].

22 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

Imagine a situation whereby an airline company is
undergoing a major overhaul in terms of its human resource,
with significant downsizing taking place. A leader with toxic
handling skills will try to minimise the negative elements from
this activity – he would begin by honestly communicating
this change to the employees. Information and updates on the
change process will be communicated clearly and frequently
to avoid apprehension, and to stop rumours from spreading.
Those who are about to be laid off will be given adequate
compensation, and there will be help to assist them in job
search. The remaining employees – the survivors, of which
most are often jaded by the change, will be given reassurance
that there will not be changes in the meantime, in order to
reduce their fear of being unemployed. As shown in this
example, negative emotions are unavoidable, but there are
steps that can be taken to reduce their impact.
Unfortunately, as crucial as it seems, the handling of
toxic emotions in an organisation is mostly unnoticed or
unrewarded. It is due to the intangible, unseen nature of this
task, whereby being there for someone is unquantifiable and
not part of the official description of a job [5]. In positions
such as a manager’s, dealing with a colleague’s well-being
is often taken for granted as part of what being a manager
entails to. In a world where performance is evaluated based
on their dollar value or tangible outcomes, the handling of
emotions is easily ignored. This is compounded with the
common notion that emotions are seen as out-of-place in
the work environment [8]; rationale, reasoning and logic
are the order of the day.
Toxic handlers can come from any level of hierarchy in
the organisation – they exist from front-line employees to
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
Reproduced from [17].
top-tier managers. Anyone who has the capacity to deal with
emotional pain and steps up to do so is, technically, a toxic
handler. Think of a fellow truck driver in a transportation
company who has heard about the overloading of deliveries
in a route that you have been assigned to by the boss, and
opts to help you out by taking on some of the deliveries
himself. Also, consider a fellow colleague in the office who
self-organised a fund-raising event to assist a workmate
who has lost his home in a fire. Or, a manager of a small
division in the company who upon finding out about the
discontentment of her team on not receiving adequate support
for their project, placates her team and proceeds to try and
gain much needed resources from the top management.
Given the nature in which toxic handlers can originate from
any level in the organisation, it is harder for the organisation
to identify and reward a toxic handler.
Poisonous Consequences
The toxic handlers themselves are not immune to these
emotions that they handle. As the metaphor would suggest,
in dealing with real toxins, one would imagine the use of
protective gear to reduce the chance of coming in direct
contact with the hazardous materials. It also gives us the
imagery of an expert being the one dealing with these noxious
materials. Unfortunately, the toxic handler that deals with
emotions is untrained and in doing so, exposes him/herself
to the possibilities of harm. They are also caught up with
their own work of helping others, that sometimes they do
not realise nor acknowledge the presence of such negativity
within themselves [5]. Emotions are most often contagious –
how someone is feeling can rub off on another [9]. In trying to
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 23
MELBOURNE
help, the toxic handler might be exposed to psychological
and physiological harm from absorbing the negativity exuded
by the one they are trying to help [10].
It is unfortunate, as even experienced and trained
emotion handlers, such as social workers and therapists,
are often burned out by these experiences [11]. While there
are psychological benefits from being empathic to one’s own
colleague, the feeling of accomplishment is not always enough
to counter the wear and tear from handling someone else’s
negative emotions.
The health impact upon these people should not to
be taken lightly. Stiff necks, nausea, and headaches are
among the many symptoms of excessive stress that one
may suffer from. Research done by Dr Hans Seyle in the
50s pioneered the notion that overwhelming stress brings
about a breakdown of the protective mechanisms in one’s
body, hence the weakening of one’s immune system [12]. For
example, a 1993 study spanning two decades has shown the
link between stress and the speed of cancer spreading [13].
The study also shows weakened resistance to viral infections,
increased chances of a heart attack occurring, and increasing
blood pressure. Interestingly, this research notes that stress
puts pressure on one’s biological weak points – it differs for
each individual, and the individual suffers in accordance
to their own weakened biological areas.
Subsequent studies done over time by other scientists
measuring the levels of IgA –secretory immunoglobulin A,
a key immune system antibody that aids in the resistance of
viruses and bacteria – have found that a person’s emotions
affect the levels of IgA in their body [14]. Negative emotions
suppress the presence of IgA, and toxic handlers who are
often exposed to negativity are more likely to have weakened
abilities to fight against infections.
Future Directions
Given the extensiveness of this societal phenomenon,
something must be done to support the role of toxic handlers.
Organisational acknowledgment is the first step to giving
legitimacy and needed resources to support the handlers [5].
By raising such consciousness, the workplace can be more
conducive to the efforts played by the handlers. Their work
needs to be backed up by organisational reward systems,
general policies and other forms of informal reinforcement, such
as changes in organisational culture, to ensure organisational
and individual well-being.
References:
[1] Hartley, J. Jacobson, D. Klandermans, P.G. & van Vuuren, C.V. Job Insecurity:
Coping with Jobs at Risk Sage Publications, London, 1991
[2] Jordan, P.J. Ashkanasy, N.M. & Härtel, C.E.J. Academy of Management Review
2002 27 (3), 361-372
[3] Fraser, J.A. White Collar Sweatshops: The Deterioration of Work and Its Rewards
in Corporate America W. W. Norton, New York, 2001
[4] Jones, G.R. Organizational Theory, Design, and Change Pearson Education, Inc.,
Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2007
[5] Frost, P.J. Toxic Emotions at Work: And What You Can Do About Them Harvard
Business School Press, Boston, Massachusetts, 2007
[6] Kahn, W.A. Administrative Science Quarterly 1993 38 (4), 539-563
[7] Mayer, J. & Salovey, P. Applied and Preventive Psychology 1995 4, 197-208
[8] Fletcher, J. K. Disappearing Acts: Gender, Power and Relational Practice at Work
MIT Press, Cambridge, 2001
24 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
There also need to be increased awareness amongst
these people themselves that the work they are doing can
be potentially dangerous if not handled well. Self awareness
of being a toxic handler, and the realisation that there are
steps that can be taken to ‘heal the handler’ will make a
difference. Exercising, taking things lightly, going for a walk,
vacation time and learning how to be impartial will aid to
the wellbeing of a toxic handler. The importance of having
a rest and breaking away from a stressful situation has been
scientifically shown. In a research done by Jim Loehr and
Unfortunately, as crucial as
it seems, the handling of
toxic emotions
in an organisation is mostly
unnoticed or unrewarded.
Tony Schwartz, the biological changes that take place in a
person taking part in prolonged challenging activities have
been recorded. A person’s hormone, glucose and blood
pressure drops every 90minutes or so, and if one fails to
seek recovery and thereby denies the body from following
its natural stress-rest cycles, the overall capacity to perform
is compromised [15].
All in all, as the workplace takes on a more capricious
nature, people need to be aware of the serious effects negative
emotions can have on fellow colleagues and organisational
performance, and take precautionary steps to reduce
these consequences. It starts with something as simple as
acknowledging the emotions involved in workplaces, the
importance of the work done by toxic handlers, and making
positive steps to ensure these toxic handlers are supported.
More importantly, a work environment where emotions are an
accepted and integral part of the makeup of the organization
should be fostered, rather than an ignored, and potentially
hazardous, reality.
Sook Jin Ong is studying Commerce at The University of
Melbourne.
[9] Goleman, D. Emotional Intelligence Bantam Books, New York, 1995
[10] Dossey, L. Be Careful What You Pray for... You Just Might Get It: What We Can Do
about the Unintentional Effects of Our Thoughts, Prayers and Wishes HarperCollins,
San Francisco, 1997
[11] Grosch, W.N. Olsen, D.C. When Helping Starts to Hurt: A New Look at Burnout
Among Psychotherapists W. W. Norton, New York, 1994
[12] Seyle, H. Stress in Health and Disease Butterworth-Heinemann, London, 1976
[13] McEwen, B.S. & Stellar, E. Archives of Internal Medicine 1993 153 (18), 2093-
2101
[14] Rein, G. McCraty, R. & Atkkinson, M. Journal of Advancement in Medicine
1995 8 (2)
[15] Loehr, J. & Schwarz, T. Harvard Business Review 2001 79 (1), 120-128
[16] www. dreamstimefree_1201219
[17] http://www.dreamstime.com/4535816workstress
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

All We Need Is Just a Little Patents: The Lack of
Commerical Protection for the CAM industry
in Australia
Aaron Mentha
“The complementary medicine industry is under threat and the need for evidence has never been greater” [1].
T
he complementary and alternative medicine (CAM)
industry in Australia is controversial, to say the least.
Despite growing CAM use among consumers, questions
concerning the efficacy and safety of many complementary
medicines continue to arise. Many of these concerns are not
unfounded: relative to the pharmaceutical industry, CAM
companies overall spend significantly less time, effort and
money researching and trialing their products before they
are given the green light by the Therapeutic Goods Ad-
ministration of Australia to enter the marketplace. Yet the
pharmaceutical industry enjoys a means of recouping the
money it spends on product research and development, the
CAM industry does not - patent protection.
This article will explore the extent to which the inability
of CAM companies to regain their expenditure on product
research and development through patent and intellectual
property protection provides a disincentive for CAM companies
to properly research and assess their products. It will then
be argued that the fact that CAM companies are able – and,
indirectly, encouraged by current restrictions to patenting – to
pump out a high volume of products at minimal cost with
limited regard to efficacy and safety is largely responsible
for their enduring dubious reputation in Australia relative
to the pharmaceutical industry. Measures of change will also
be suggested and evaluated for their potential to address
this imbalance, in light of the system of patent protection
scheme in place for traditional medicines in the People’s
Republic of China.
The lack of commercial
protection available to CAM
companies in Australia
provides a disincentive
for their expenditure and
development of
evidence-based complementary
medicines, which, in turn,
exacerbates the
industry’s negative
reputation.
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
Medicines in Australia
Medicines are therapeutic goods that are represented to
achieve their ‘principle intended action by pharmacological,
chemical, immunological or metabolic means [2].’ In Australia,
the primary regulatory body for medicines is the Therapeutic
Goods Administration (TGA), which broadly groups
medications into two groups: high risk and low risk.
Medicines regarded as presenting a higher level of risk,
such as prescription pharmaceutical medicines, are required
to be assessed individually for efficacy, safety and quality
before being registered on the Australian Register of
Therapeutic Goods (ARTG) under s9A of the Therapeutic
Goods Administration Act 1989 (Cth). Lower risk medicines,
such as complementary medicines, are not required to be
individually assessed for efficacy. Manufacturers are simply
required to assure the TGA that all indications and claims
made in relation to their products are supported by evidence,
which may be audited at a later date. These medicines must
then be listed on the ARTG.
Complementary Medicines
Section 52F of the Act defines “complementary medicines”
as ‘therapeutic goods consisting wholly or principally of one
or more designated ingredients, each of which has a clearly
established identity and a traditional use.’ “Designated active
ingredients” are defined by s52F of the Act as those listed
in Schedule 14 of the Therapeutic Goods Administration
Regulations 1990 (Cth), while the TGA publishes the index,
Substances that may be used in listed medicines in Australia
[3], in order to further clarify which ingredients may and
may not be used in CAM preparations. “Traditional use”
of such an ingredient refers to use that is well documented
or established ‘according to the accumulated experience of
many traditional healthcare practitioners over an extended
period; and accords with well-established procedures of
preparation, application and dosage’ [2].
Complementary medicines do not generally require a
prescription, and may be found on supermarket, pharmacy and
health food store shelves in the form of health supplements,
traditional Chinese medicines, vitamin and mineral preparations
and herbal, aromatherapy or homeopathic substances. CAM
products such as those claiming to support prostate function
or help to manage the symptoms of menopause will often
include a unique formulation of one or more designated active
ingredients, often plant or herbal derivatives, created on the
basis of both scientific data and traditional knowledge.
While some complementary medicines may be registered
on the ARTG, the overwhelming majority of CAM products
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 25
MELBOURNE
are listed. Accordingly, the term “complementary medicines”
in this essay is used to refer to listed CAM products.
Pharmaceuticals
For the purposes of this article, “pharmaceuticals” may be
defined as goods required to be registered on the ARTG,
which focus upon the use of isolated drug compounds in
order to achieve their intended action.
The Australian Patent System
A patent is a legally enforceable right granted for any
suitable invention which gives its owner the exclusive right
to commercially exploit the invention for the duration of the
patent. In exchange for exclusive commercial rights over their
invention, patentees are required to submit documents detailing
the specifications of their inventions to the patents office.
These documents are open to public inspection [2], thereby
increasing publicly available technological information in a
bid to stimulate further industrial innovation and encourage
economic growth.
Adapted from [28].
There are two types of patent available in Australia:
standard patents and innovation patents. In order for either
to be granted, an invention must meet the threshold tests
outlined in s18 of the Patents Act 1990 (Cth).
Standard Patents
Standard patents may be granted for inventions qualifying
as a ‘manner of manufacture’ [4] that can be considered
novel, inventive and useful [4]. The current test for what
qualifies as a manner of new manufacture stems from the
High Court’s decision in National Research and Development
Corporation v Commissioner of Patents [5]. Essentially, the
26 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
invention must qualify as ‘a mode or manner achieving an
end result which is an artificially created state of affairs of
utility in the field of economic endeavour.’ [6]
The term for a standard patent is 20 years, during
which time the patentee enjoys the exclusive right to exploit
the invention or authorise another person to do so [4]. For
pharmaceuticals, a further five years’ patent protection may
be obtained upon application [4]. In large part, this measure
is in place to compensate pharmaceutical companies for
the expensive and lengthy research and development steps
they must undertake to produce marketable medicines,
which may leave only limited patent life in which to
recoup initial investment by the time the product reaches
the marketplace.
Innovation Patents
Innovation patents are similarly granted for manners
of manufacture considered to be ‘novel’ and ‘useful’ [4].
However, these patents need only meet the less onerous
criteria of involving ‘an innovative step’, rather than being
‘inventive’ [4]. Accordingly, these patents endure for eight
years only [4].
Yet, while the innovation patent principle threshold
test is deliberately easier to satisfy than that of the standard
patent, innovation patents are encumbered by the additional
restriction of s18(3) of the Patents Act: ‘plants and animals,
and the biological processes for the generation of plants and
animals, are not patentable inventions.’ For the CAM industry,
the implications of this restriction are far-reaching.
Commercial Protection: Pharmaceutical vs CAM
Among the many differences that exist between pharmaceutical
and CAM products, the following is key: pharmaceutical
medications utilise isolated drug compounds, while CAM
medications utilise entire plant and natural products.
Therefore, while the pharmaceutical preparation of an
analgesic drug such as morphine may contain an isolated
chemical compound extracted from a poppy flower as its
active ingredient, the complementary medicine alternative
may contain the flower itself.
Pharmaceutical companies are able to patent both he
novel, useful and inventive or innovative processes by which
they isolate chemical compounds or other active ingredients,
as well as the compounds themselves. Both methods effectively
enable patentees to gain exclusive commercial rights over
any products incorporating their patented ingredients. Yet
both forms of protection remain largely unavailable for
companies manufacturing alternative medicines.
Because complementary medicines typically incorporate
whole plant and herbal products such as roots and leaves
– not just their active pharmacological components – there
are no extraction processes that may be patented in order
to afford CAM companies exclusive commercial rights over
their products. Therefore if patenting is desired an argument
needs to be made that the new use of existing product is
in itself a manner of new manufacture as defined in the
NRDC case. Further, the substances available for use in
complementary medicines in Australia cannot be patented
because their use is neither novel, inventive nor innovative;
they are required to be drawn from a pre-existing list: the TGA’s
Substances that may be used in listed medicines in Australia.
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 MELBOURNE

Any health claims or indications made on the basis of the With nothing to preclude Australian courts from
inclusion any of these substances within a complementary recognising patents to treat the human body, it is possible
medicine must then be supported by (usually pre-existing, to consider the likelihood of patents being used to protect
and therefore not novel) traditional or scientific data. The the methods of administration of a particular CAM. In
ability to demonstrate that the medicine is ‘useful’, in the the case of Bristol-Myers Squibb Co v FH Faulding & Co
sense of working as it is claimed to, is another requirement Ltd [11], it was concluded that the only factor preventing
of patenting – and one that provides at least some guarantee a method of administering the cancer drug Taxol over a
of efficacy. All these problems aside, s18(3) of the Patents Act shorter time period from being patentable as a method of
precludes plants, which account for the large portion of the medical treatment was the invention’s failure to satisfy the
substances the TGA allows to be novelty requirement. The court
used in listed medicines – from reasoned that if a prior publication
being patented. is to destroy novelty, it must give
a direction or recommendation
‘which will result, if the skilled
Intellectual Property Protection reader follows it, in the claimed
Available for CAM invention’ [11]. In that instance, a
published clinical trial outlining
Patenting the Medical Treatment the method of treatment with Taxol
Process was considered sufficient.
The ability to patent methods Because of the TGA’s
of treating the human body has requirement that the health
evolved significantly through claims and indications for all
Australian case law in the past listed medicines be supported
several decades. In National by evidence, which most often
Research Development Corp v takes the form of published
Commissioner of Patents [5], the clinical trials, CAM companies
High Court assumed that methods are essentially unable to claim any
for treating the human body were method of use for their products
not patentable because they lay without reference to previous
outside the concept of invention publications. Consequently, the use
by virtue of being essentially of patents to protect the methods
non-economic [7]. Barwick CJ of medical treatment involving
agreed in his reasoning in Joos complementary medicines is
v Commissioner of Patents [8] that almost certain to fall short of the
medical treatment ‘is not a proper novelty requirement for the same
subject of letters patent’ [8]. Yet, he reasons as those given in Bristol-
expressed the view that a narrow Myers Squibb Co v FH Faulding
definition of the term “medical & Co Ltd [11].
treatment” should be taken, such
that chemical preparations applied Swiss Style Patent Claims
to the skin to prevent sunburn and In Bristol-Myers Squibb Co v
other such products would not Baker Norton Pharmaceuticals Inc
fall into this category. Rather, the [12], Jacob J noted that by taking
term should be considered to refer the generalised form: ‘the use of
strictly to processes of treating the compound X in the manufacture
human body to cure, prevent or of a medicament for a specified
ameliorate disease. Accordingly, (and new) therapeutic use’ [12],
the Patent Office adopted the the Swiss style of claim may be
view that applications to patent said to confer novelty despite the
Reproduced from [29].
methods of treating the human fact that compound X itself may
body would not be rejected solely on the basis that the human be old. The 2006 case of Prosidion Limited v Novo Nordisk
body was involved [9]. [13] clarified the use of Swiss claims further, holding that
However, in the more recent full Federal Court case of while they may be used to cover the the manufacture of
Anaesthetic Supplies Pty Ltd v Rescare Ltd [10], Lockhart and a medicament in which the medicament is intended for a
Wilcox JJ considered the above reasoning as obiter dictum, specified medical treatment, claims do not extend to the
and therefore not binding on the court. This conclusion was intended medical treatment itself. This is not necessarily
supported in 2000 in Bristol-Myers Squibb Co v FH Faulding problematic with respect to the manufacture of complementary
& Co Ltd [11], in which Black CJ, Lehane and Finkelstein JJ medicines. Rather, these types of claims are unlikely to afford
held that a method of medical treatment of the body was adequate protection to CAM companies on the fundamental
indeed patentable [11]. basis that it is not the use of a particular compound in the

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 27
MELBOURNE

manufacture of a medicament for a specified therapeutic Copyright gives to the owner the exclusive right to prevent
use, but the combination of compounds or ingredients that others from making unlawful copies, or certain unlawful
CAM companies would seek to protect. commercial dealings in copies, of a work or other subject
Yet, in the event that the “compound X” of a Swiss patent matter of copyright [15]. Unlike patent grants, a copyright
claim may be considered a permissible substance for use does not confer rights of exclusivity or monopoly upon its
in the preparation of a listable complementary medicine as owner in the copyright subject matter. Essentially, unless there
specified by the TGA’s publication, Substances that may be used is a causal connection between two works, the independent
in listed medicines in Australia creation of a similar or identical
[3], there may be some remote subject matter by another does
hope for CAM companies. By not represent an infringement
virtue of their inclusion in the
There are relatively few checks of that copyright [16]. In terms
above publication, each of the in place to prevent the CAM of complementary medicines, if
substances that may be used in a particular formulation was to
listed medicines in Australia has
industry in Australia from be protected by copyright, this
been investigated for their health living up to its questionable would do nothing to prevent
risks and indications to some another CAM company from
degree. However, if new evidence
reputation...the reality is that serendipitously inventing a
arose that the use of any such CAM companies may draw upon formula containing the same
substance may be beneficial in a
novel medical treatment, it may
sketchy, unvalidated or erroneous ingredients. Furthermore, it is a well-
be possible to circumvent the scientific and traditional evidence established principle that
novelty impediment encountered
to gaining a standard patent in
to make spurious health claims there may be no copyright in
ideas, but rather only in the
the case of Bristol-Myers Squibb about their products. particular forms of expression
Co v FH Faulding & Co Ltd [11] in which they are conveyed.
by using a Swiss style patent The detriment of this premise
claim. in relation to CAM protection
It remains unclear whether the inventive threshold may be properly appreciated when one considers a written
would be met in an instance. Even if it were so, this tenuous formula for a particular complementary medicine with an
form of patent protection falls far short of a general form accompanying rationale for the use of each ingredient, as
of protection over any unique evidence-based medication may be commonly found at any number of CAM company
formulas that CAM companies may devise. Further, if this websites [17]. The description of the medication on a website
method of patenting were recognised for CAM companies, it or any publication that is that subject matter of a copyright
would be doubly unlikely to be compatible with the innovation does not necessarily confer any exclusive rights over that
patent scheme. As previously mentioned, the majority of medication’s formula upon the CAM company possessing
ingredients that may be used in listed complementary the copyright [18]. If the appropriation of the ideas for the
medicines are plant materials. If the “compound X” of a medication expressed within the publication was in fact to
Swiss patent claim may be regarded as a plant substance constitute any copyright infringement, this would only be
used in the preparation of a listed complementary medicine, so to the extent which the appropriation was considered an
it is doubtful whether the use of this substance could form appropriation of the publication itself – not because any part
the subject of an innovation patent claim by virtue of the of the actual formula was copied [18]. This would essentially
restriction of s18(3) of the Patents Act 1990 (Cth), which leave others free to use any written formula or ingredient
precludes plants from being patented. listing for a complementary medicine as a recipe for the
Therefore, there may only be extremely limited, if any, creation of their own product.
patent protection likely to be afforded to CAM companies
through this scheme. Designs
The designs registration system similarly fails to offer CAM
Copyright companies any legal protection in terms of the medicine
Australian copyright law does not afford any protection to formulations they produce. For the purposes of the Designs
CAM companies for the medications they create. Under the Act 2003 (Cth), the governing piece of legislation for this
Copyright Act 1968 (Cth), protection is extended to original area of law in Australia, the term “design” in relation to a
(published or unpublished) versions of works – literary, product refers simply to ‘the overall appearance of the product
dramatic, musical or artistic works [14] – or sound recordings, resulting from one or more visual features of the product’ [19].
cinematograph films, television and sound broadcasts or These features may include ‘shape, configuration, pattern
published editions of works [14]. While the creation of a and ornamentation’ [19]. However, the Act expressly states
unique formula for a complementary medicine does not fall that the materials used in the product do not come within
easily into any of these categories, even if this were not the this definition [19]. The recipe of ingredients used to create
case, the type of protection granted by the copyright system a particular medicine are therefore beyond the purview of
would most likely be inadequate for the purposes of protecting the designs registration system.
CAM companies from commercial exploitation.

28 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

Confidential Information
The protection of confidential information under Australian
law is not unified, but derived from both equity and contract.
Rather than opting to apply for a patent and disclose the
technology behind their inventions in exchange for exclusive
commercial rights over the product for a finite period of time,
some companies prefer to maintain their production processes
as trade secrets, protecting their commercial exclusivity
indefinitely, or for as long as confidentiality can be maintained.
Unlike patent law, however, the maintenance of trade secrecy
does not protect against the reverse engineering of a product
to ascertain the technology upon which it relies.
Coca-cola’s ongoing refusal to release the formula for
their drink is a classic example of this practice. By keeping the
exact quantities of the ingredients they use in their product
a secret, Coca-cola has been able to ensure commercial
exclusivity over their product for over a century. Yet while
the recipe for a cola beverage may be regarded as sharing
many similarities with the formulation of a complementary
medicine (after all, both are recipes in essence), the nature
of the latter as a medicine prevents CAM companies from
being able to keep trade secrets over their products in order
to enjoy the same commercial exclusivity.
In order for any medication to gain listing or registration
on the ARTG and enter the Australian marketplace, the TGA
labeling requirements must be adhered to. Under s10(4) of
the Therapeutic Goods Act 1989 (Cth) [20], the labels of all
medicines in Australia are required to display the names, as
well as the quantity or proportion of all the active ingredients
they contain, and the name of the dosage form [20]. Clearly, the
requirement that the very formulation which CAM companies
would seek to keep as a trade secret must be included on
the product label in order to gain entry to the Australian
market precludes this information from being protected as
confidential. But what of “proprietary ingredients?”
Proprietary Ingredients
The TGA defines a proprietary ingredient as a ‘confidential
formulation usually containing two or more ingredients
and about which information is not in the public domain’
[21]. While the TGA allows proprietary ingredients to
be included in ARTG medications, it requires that the
formulation details of all proprietary ingredients present
in the medication be submitted before medications can be
added to the Register.
Proprietary ingredient information supplied to the
TGA is treated as “commercial-in-confidence.” The TGA
undertakes not to release this information, other than in
accordance with the Therapeutic Goods Administration
Act 1989 (Cth) or as otherwise required by the law [21].
Under Chinese patent law,
both pharmaceutical and
traditional Chinese medicines,
methods and usages may all be
patented [25].
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
However, this potential form of commercial protection and
formulation secrecy for CAM companies is precluded by
the legal requirement that the quantity or proportion of
all the active ingredients be displayed on the labels of all
medications [20]. Even if a formulation is considered to
be proprietary ingredient, the active ingredients – those
key substances upon which the efficacy and quality of the
medicine relies – must be exposed.
Lack of Commercial Protection
Hence, the fact that a complementary medicine may take
the form of a seemingly novel, inventive or innovative, and
Reproduced from [30].
useful formulation of listed substances to treat the symptoms
of a particular condition is apparently extraneous. Certainly,
complementary medicines are required to meet with minimal
efficacy and safety standards under the federal Trade Practices
Act 1974 (Cth) [22] and corresponding state fair trading
legislation [23], as well as those obligations that may be
required as a matter of contract with consumers. However,
with virtually no commercial protection available for their
products, CAM companies are nonetheless faced with an
undesirable choice: produce a high volume of listed medicines
and make wide-ranging and grandiose health claims for
their products that need only be supported by relatively
limited amounts of potentially unvalidated or questionable
scientific or traditional evidence that may or may not be
audited by the TGA; or, spend vast amounts of money on
conducting targeted, exhaustive and qualitative scientific
and literature research in order to produce high quality,
truly evidence-based medicines.
All the while, pharmaceutical companies may seek
extensions of up to five years on original standard patents
to further recoup research and development losses [4],
as well as lodge ancillary patents on existing inventions
covering new forms, tablets, uses and processes to effectively
‘evergreen’ their commercial exclusivity over their products
[24]. The profit protection afforded by patenting enables
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 29
MELBOURNE
pharmaceutical companies to invest further in research
and development and the production of evidence-based,
efficacious medicines.
Given this disparity, it is little wonder the Australian
CAM industry currently suffers from image problems in
the media.
Other Systems: China
In light of the apparent absence of any significant commercial
protection in Australia for unique CAM formulas, the following
section outlines the system available for the protection of
traditional Chinese medicines under the legal regime of the
People’s Republic of China. The transferability of the key
tenets of this system to our own is then considered.
Chinese Patent Law and Traditional Medicine
The Patent Law of the People’s Republic of China became
effective in 1985, since which time over 12,000 patent
applications relating to traditional Chinese medicine have
been received [25]. In 2001 alone, 3300 patents were granted in
China for innovations within the field of traditional Chinese
medicine [26].
Under Chinese patent law, both pharmaceutical and
traditional Chinese medicines, methods and usages may all be
patented [25]. Most notably, traditional medical compositions
and herbal preparations – unique CAM formulations – are
eligible for patenting [25].
Article 22 of the Patent Law of the People’s Republic of
China requires that, in order for any invention to be patented, it
must possess novelty, inventiveness and practical applicability
[27]. In order for a patent application for a medical formula
to satisfy the first of these criteria, there must have been no
identical compositions of substances published before the
Because complementary
medicines typically incorporate
whole plant and herbal products
such as roots and leaves – not
just their active pharmacological
components – there are no
extraction processes that may be
patented in order to afford CAM
companies exclusive commercial
rights over their products.
patent application is filed [25]. With respect to the practical
applicability requirement, the invention must simply be
able to used to achieve effective results [25].
The inventiveness criteria for patent applications under
Chinese law is met for medicines composed of several
different substances provided that the composition is new
and represents notable progress from previously existing
technology. This progress may take the form of new health
indications for the formulation, which must be supported
by relevant clinical or traditional data [25].
30 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
The grant of a Chinese invention patent provides
exclusive commercial rights over an invention for a term
of 20 years [27].
Application to Australia
Prima facie, the Patent Law of the People’s Republic of China
shares many fundamental similarities with Australian law.
Both systems demand both novelty and inventiveness from
their patent applications, and both afford exclusive right
to commercially exploit that which is the subject of the
patent application for up to 20 years. The key difference
between the two systems with respect to their regulation
of complementary medicines is relatively straightforward:
traditional medical compositions and herbal preparations
may be considered novel and inventive in China, allowing
unique CAM formulas to gain patent protection. In Australia,
they cannot.
As previously outlined, CAM formulas are unable to be
deemed novel or inventive in Australia essentially because of
the TGA’s requirement that all eligible substances for use in
listed medicines must be drawn from the list Substances that
may be used in listed medicines in Australia [3], and because
all health claims made on the basis of the inclusion of these
substances must be supported by traditional or scientific
(and usually pre-existing) evidence. Medically speaking, the
rationale behind these requirements is wise. Defining what
substances may be used in this class of therapeutic good
helps to ensure that no particularly dangerous preparations
enter the market. Requiring that health claims be supported
by evidence endeavours to control against CAM companies
making far-reaching or bogus claims about the applications
of their products.
Yet, in spite of these control measures, there are relatively
few checks in place to prevent the CAM industry in Australia
from living up to its questionable reputation. While nominating
what substances may be used in listed medications may
be effective, the reality is that CAM companies may draw
upon sketchy, unvalidated or erroneous scientific and
traditional evidence to make spurious health claims about
their products. Because listed medicines are not individually
assessed for efficacy, these claims are rarely disproved. It is
therefore conceivable that Australian consumers are spending
significant amounts of money at present on a wide variety
of complementary medicines which simply do not work at
all. This gives rise to a convincing public policy argument
for the creation of an exception to Australian patent law:
the recognition of unique, evidence-based formulation of
complementary medicines as novel and inventive in order to
provide a commercial incentive for CAM companies to invest
in more diligent and rigorous research and development
processes.
Conclusion
Australian intellectual property law fails to afford any
significant rights to CAM companies to protect their
products, while pharmaceutical companies are afforded
exclusive commercial rights to the medicines they produce
by virtue of their ability to gain patent protection. The lack
of commercial protection available to CAM companies in
Australia provides a disincentive for their expenditure on the
research and development of evidence-based complementary
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

By keeping the exact
quantities of the ingredients
they use in their product a
secret, Coca-cola has been
able to ensure commercial
exclusivity over their
product for over a century.
References:
[1] Speech by AMA Federal President, Dr Kerryn Phelps to the International Holistic
Health Conference – Australian Integrative Medicine Association (AIMA), Noosa.
Doctors, healing, and the role of complementary medicine, 23 May 2003. <http://www.
ama.com.au/web.nsf/doc/WEEN-5MT8UY>. Last accessed on 9 March 2008.
[2] Therapeutic Goods Administration Act 1989 (Cth).
[3] Substances that may be used in listed medicines in Australia Therapeutic Goods
Administration, Department of Health, Australian Government, 2007.
[4] Patents Act 1990 (Cth).
[5] National Research and Development Corporation v Commissioner of Patents
(1959) 102 CLR 252
[6] CCOM v Jiejing, 28 IPR 481 (1994) AIPC 91-079
[7] Maeder v Busch (1938) 59 CLR 684
[8] Joos v Commissioner of Patents (1972) 126 CLR 611
[9] Manual of Practice and Procedure, Australian Patent Office. Vol 2 – National,
8.2.13.3
[10] Anaesthetic Supplies Pty Ltd v Rescare Ltd (1994) 28 IPR 383
[11] Bristol-Myers Squibb Co v FH Faulding & Co Ltd (2000) 170 ALR 439
[12] Bristol-Myers Squibb Co v Baker Norton Pharmaceuticals Inc (1999) RPC 253
[13] Prosidion Limited v Novo Nordisk (2006) APO 6
[14] Copyright Act 1968 (Cth).
[15] Lexis Nexis Copyright distinguished from rights in designs, patents and trade
marks Copyright and Designs, Intellectual Property Law. 2008 <http://www.lexisnexis.
com.ezproxy.lib.unimelb.edu.au/au/legal/results/pubTreeViewDoc.do?nodeId=TAA
BAABAAD&pubTreeWidth=23%25> Last accessed on 9 March 2008.
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
MELBOURNE
medicines, which, in turn, exacerbates the industry’s negative
reputation. Research into most CAM production remains
limited when compared to the pharmaceutical industry, while
the grandiose claims made by CAM companies about their
products continue. Reforms to Australian patent law such
as allowing for unique CAM formulations to be recognised
as novel and inventive are required in order to encourage
greater expenditure by CAM companies on the research and
development of their products and help rectify the industry’s
tarnished image.
Aaron Mentha has a degree in Biomedical Science and is currently
studying Law at The University of Melbourne.
[16] Francis Day & Hunter Ltd v Bron (1963) 2 All ER 16.
[17] Blackmore’s products. <http://www.blackmores.com.au/Products/>.
[18] Hollinrake v Truswell [1894] 3 Ch 420; Baker v Selden (1879) 101 US 99 SC (USA);
Lexis Nexis No Copyright in Ideas Copyright and Designs, Intellectual Property
Law. 2008 <http://www.lexisnexis.com.ezproxy.lib.unimelb.edu.au/au/legal/results/
pubTreeViewDoc.do?nodeId=TAABAABAAD&pubTreeWidth=23%25> Last accessed
9 March 2008.
[19] Designs Act 2003 (Cth)
[20] Therapeutic Goods Order No. 69 2004 (Cth).
[21] Guide to the Completion of the ‘Notification of a New Proprietary Ingredient’ form
Therapeutic Goods Administration, Department of Health and Ageing, Australian
Government, 2007.
[22] Trade Practices Act 1974 (Cth).
[23] Fair Trading Act 1999 (Vic).
[24] Chalmers, R. Evergreen or deciduous? Australian trends in relation to the
‘evergreening’ of patents 2006 30 M.U.L.R. 29.
[25] Zheng Yongfeng China’s Patent Protection of Traditional Medicine 2003 South
Bulletin 39.
[26] Intellectual Property and Traditional Knowledge World Intellectual Property
Organisation, 2004.
[27] Patent Law of the People’s Republic of China (1985).
[28] http://www.imageafter.com/image.php?image=b12objects004.jpg
[29] http://www.dreamstime.com/experiment-image5370644
[30] http://www.dreamstime.com/pills-falling-into-and-around-medicine-bottle-
version-3-imagefree664889
Are you interested in
contributing to The Triple
Helix? We look forward
to hearing from you at
unimelb@thetriplehelix.org
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 31
UCSD
Deep Brain Stimulation
Jennifer Ong
I
n his private practice located in the Upper East Side
office of Manhattan, Dr. Lawrence Steele offers patients
memory enhancement on a cash-only basis. His clien-
tele, the wealthy elite looking for a “cognitive tune-up,” are
presented with three options varying in levels of intensity
and invasiveness: a memory training program that may take
as long as weeks or months depending on how much time
the patient is able to put in; transcranial magnetic stimula-
tion (TMS) treatments which can take up to half an hour
for three times a week—time which is not wasted as the
[I]magine if you could
enhance your brain...
patient can obtain a manicure, pedicure, or massage while
undergoing the treatment; and the more invasive form of
electrical brain stimulation where the doctor will make “a
small incision — half an inch — in the scalp overlying each
major node in the memory network, create a small hole in
the skull, and insert a neat little metal plug, similar to a
watch battery, that contains both stimulator-electrode and
battery” [1]. The electrical stimulation is constant and low
grade, and the batteries are recharged as needed, usually
only every two to three years. And to tempt the client even
further, the procedure is usually done on a Friday so that
they can return back to work the following Monday.
It is this “brainlift” trend which triggers much of the
ethical debate arising in academic world surrounding the
use of cognitive science technologies for lifestyle memory
enhancement. Yet, Dr. Lawrence Steele remains confident in his
belief that these techniques would become a more prevalent
practice within society. “Plastic surgery triggered similar
debates years ago, but the debates didn’t last. Brainlifts will go
through the same cycle: they’ll gain broader acceptance, the
debates will eventually die down, [and] the procedures will
become more commonplace [...] After all, we’re talking about
a more finely tuned mind, not just a tighter face” [1].
So imagine if you could enhance your brain; performing
cognition faster than you have before and remembering more
facts than you ever thought possible. Think about all the
possibilities you could achieve by being smarter. For example,
you could obtain the highest score on an entrance exam to
gain acceptance to a dream university, and later, land the
perfect job. If such possibilities entice you, to what lengths
would you be willing to go to obtain the next superbrain?
Although science has yet to develop the technologies for
creating superbrains, many people consider this concept
no longer a science-fiction fantasy. In fact, some researchers
speculate that we will soon be able to manufacture such
high-powered, low-maintenance, memory enhanced minds,
32 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
all through the use of cognitive science technologies such
as deep brain stimulation.
Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is not a novel idea or
method. Electrical stimulation of the nervous system has been
used for medical cases since the 18th century, ranging from
attempts to reverse blindness to reviving drowned patients
with electrical shocks [2]. A modern use of DBS has been for
the treatment of Parkinson’s disease, a degenerative disorder of
the central nervous system which gradually impairs all motor
skills and speech. When a patient develops side effects from
the traditional L-Dopa medication, DBS entails implanting
electrodes in the thalamus, which produce a high-frequency,
low-voltage current that block the tremors symptomatic of
Parkinson’s disease. It is a last-resort method which shows
significant improvement in 70-80% of the cases used [3].
More recently, some researchers have thought that DBS
and similar methods of brain stimulation could be used to
enhance people’s memories. For example, in January 2008
Canadian neurosurgeon, Dr. Andres Lozano, and his team
at Toronto Western Hospital began investigating the effects
of deep brain stimulation on a fifty year-old male with a
history of obesity. They hoped that the electrodes implanted
in the hypothalamus of the brain, a region recognized to
control appetite urges, could repress the desire to eat and
subsequently reduce the man’s weight. However, what they
discovered was a surprisingly different side effect—the patient
recounted profound feelings of déjà vu; more specifically, he
remembered a scene at the park with friends which occurred
around thirty years ago. As the intensity of the electrical
stimulation increased, the more details he could remember.
Lozano proclaims, “This was for us a eureka moment in that
we were not expecting it at all” [4].  
...performing cognition
faster than you have before
and remembering more
facts than you ever thought
possible.
This unexpected finding has led Dr. Lozano to believe
that DBS may benefit patients suffering from Alzheimer’s
disease. In March of 2008, Dr. Lozano began a pilot study
with six Alzheimer patients to research whether deep brain
stimulation could delay the symptoms of the memory-
degenerative disease that affects as many as 5.2 million
people in the United States alone. Even if DBS would not
be able to cure Alzheimer’s, it is hypothesized to provide
patients with a longer span of time in which they can function
independently and normally—as long as they remain on
the electrode system.
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 UCSD

the lifestyle benefits of these new methodologies. Since DBS

will be most likely limited through other factors such as cost
But are these procedures barriers and availability, what would happen if DBS were to
really worth the extra become accessible to the public as a memory enhancement
technique, and how could that affect the already significant
memory? vast divide between those who are privileged, whether by
social or economic status, and those who are not?
While the medical uses of DBS may be promising, if To learn more about the possible outcomes of DBS
this technology was made available to the general public, being made available to the public, we can draw from
the ethical, medical, social, and cultural implications of mind parallel issues concerning pharmacological treatments for
manipulation would be astounding. Advocates of deep brain improved cognition, which has already long been a focus for
stimulation emphasize the excellent targeting abilities and military research. The U.S. Air Force’s use of amphetamines
independent control qualities of the electrode system, since as “go pills” to treat fatigue of military personnel has been
the electrodes could hypothetically be shut down and the permitted as early as World War II [8]. Simultaneously, the
effects nullified. Yet, as appealing as simply “turning off use of prescription stimulants as cognitive enhancers have
the electrode system” sounds, deep brain stimulation is also been popular methods for people looking to sleep less,
not a completely reversible process. DBS would affect the stay up longer, work harder, and play more [8]. In his book
patients’ individuality as they might become dependent on Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology
the electrode system for the rest of their lives. The procedure Revolution, Francis Fukuyama vocalizes his standpoint in
itself involves stereotactic surgery which entails structural the brain enhancement debate stating, “The original purpose
modifications to the brain, running risks of intracranial of medicine is to heal the sick, not turn healthy people into
hemorrhages, stroke, behavioral changes, and other factors gods” [8]. He asserts that the use of neuropharmaceutical
associated with neurosurgery. And the chance of an electrode drugs such as Adderall, which is prescribed to treat attention
failure remains a significant risk. The perils to the brain deficit disorder, and Provigil, which promotes wakefulness
are undeniable, and a person’s motor performance, general for narcolepsy patients, already “raise the standard of what is
mood, physical situation and overall quality of life would considered ‘normal’ performance and widen the gap between
depend to a high degree on how well the technical device those who have access to the medications and those who do
functions [5]. not” [9]. Furthermore, brain enhancement could interfere
Thus, to address the growing awareness of cognitive with a person’s subjective experiences, cognitive abilities,
science techniques such as DBS, an emerging discipline and personality traits in unexpected ways. As Thomas Fuch
termed neuroethics has risen. First coined in the 1970’s mentions in his article Ethical Issues in Neuroscience, the use
but not prominent until the early 21st century, neuroethics of cognitive science techniques threatens to devalue human
currently encompasses “professional
ethics or procedural ethics regarding
the conduct of neuroscience research;
neurobiological basis of value systems,
including moral and religious
thought; and social implications
of the outcomes of neuroscience
research” [6]. As DBS becomes
synonymous with brain enhancement,
its advancement raises ethical issues
for the neuroscience community—
namely, where do we draw limits for
its use? Axel Cleeremans, director of
the cognitive science research unit
at the Free University of Brussels,
affirms “We are already performing
the equivalent of plastic surgery on
the brain [. . .] [but] do we really want
cognitive enhancement via surgery
or medication, and if so how do we
regulate it? [...] How will we deal
with issues such as privacy and
responsibility?” [7]. As the field of
neurocognitive enhancement becomes
more popular among scientists,
physicians, and marketable consumers
alike, legislatures and the public will
have to determine whether new
regulations must be placed to control Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation. Reproduced from [13].

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 33
UCSD
life of its imperfections and interferes with the personal
development that results from learning from failures and
dealing with adversities [10]. After all, to what extent could
Reproduced from [14]
people retain their individuality if their actions and thoughts
were the result of deep brain stimulation? These techniques
would further complicate the issues of identity and free-will,
an already controversial topic that is still debated among
various religious, philosophical, academic, political, and
medical spheres.
Yet despite these concerns, experts have to admit that
deep brain stimulation used for brain enhancement has its
appeal. “It’s an interesting example of the sort of unexpected
finding we may start to see as different brain areas are
tested with DBS,” says Helen Mayberg, a neurologist at
Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia.
“It suggests that enhanced brain functioning—and not just
reversal of abnormal behavior—is possible with DBS, and
that’s going to prompt a lot of discussion among scientists
and ethicists” [11].
But are these procedures really worth the extra memory?
Neurosurgeon Katrina Firlik vocalizes her opinion for the
future of neurosurgery. Since surgical enhancement of the
brain seems to be a viable option for the public in the near
future, she speculates that the certain individuals looking for
the “cognitive tune-up” would instead develop a savant-like
mind. These elite savants will certainly “expand the potential
for human achievement and productivity beyond what is
currently constrained by average human brainpower” [1].
References:
[1] K. Firlik, Another Day in the Frontal Lobe. Random House, Inc. 2006.
[2] H. Lüders, Deep Brain Stimulation and Epilepsy (Taylor and Francis Group,
London, UK, 2004).
[3] A. Keyes, Essential Neurosurgery. (Blackwell Publishing Inc, Malden, MA,
2005).
[4] A. Favaro, Deep Brain Stimulation May Improve Learning. 2008. (available at
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080129/deep_brain_080
129/20080130?hub=CTVNewsAt11).
[5] E. Hidt, Electrodes in the Brain: Some anthropological and ethical aspects of deep
brain stimulation. 2006. (available at http://www.i-r-i-e.net/inhalt/005/Hildt.pdf).
[6] T. Fukushi, Exploring the Origin of Neuroethics: From the Viewpoints of Expression
and Concepts. The American Journal of Bioethics. 56-57 (2008).
[7] H. Phillips, Who is messing with your head? New Scientist. 11 (2006).
34 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
Yet, the downside remains that the individual may have this
newfound ability to “multiply 1,456 by 6,321 off the top of his
head, or may be able to recite pi out to hundreds of digits”
but would not be able to communicate and hold meaningful
conversations with another human being [11]. Thus, one has
to doubt the human desire to obtain an unlimited memory.
Joshua Foer, in his article “Memory” for National Geographic,
discussed the rare case of a person with extreme memory
function: a 41-year-old woman named AJ who remembers
every single day of her life since she was 11, an ability is so
unprecedented that neuroscientists at University of California,
Irvine, had to coin a new term to describe her condition:
hyperthymestic syndrome [12]. However, AJ’s quality of
life is actually impaired by her superior memory. Although
she can flip through each day of her life like a Rolodex and
remember every moment as if it was yesterday, she remains
eternally obsessed about the past:
I remember good, which is very comforting. But I
also remember bad — and every bad choice [...] I
really don’t give myself a break. There are all these
forks in the road, moments you have to make a
choice, and then it’s ten years later, and I’m still
beating myself up over them. I don’t forgive myself
for a lot of things. Your memory is the way it is to
protect you. I feel like it just hasn’t protected me.
I would love just for five minutes to be a simple
person and not have all this stuff in my head.
Most people have called what I have a gift, but I
call it a burden [12].
Indeed, AJ may have a point. There are evolutionary
explanations as to why we forget things; after all, if we could
remember every single facet—everything we saw, smelled,
tasted, felt, heard, or thought—we would be overwhelmed by
a vast amount of irrelevant information not directly related
to our current situation in life. So as DBS ventures into the
realms of treatment for Alzheimer patients, I applaud that
move and hope for the best. But if given the option of a
superbrain? I may have to pass. I don’t need to remember
what I wore a year ago, or how I just disastrously failed
yesterday’s midterm. Those are memories I’d rather not
keep, thanks.
Jennifer Ong is an Undergraduate at the University of California,
San Diego.
[8] S. S. Hall, Sci. Am. 54-65 (September 2003).
[9] B. Carey, Brain Enhancement is Wrong, Right? 2008. (available at http://www.nytimes.
com/2008/03/09/weekinreview/09carey.html?_r=1&ex=1362718800&en=753abf3a269f
71c3&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin).
[10] T. Fuchs, Ethical Issues in Neuroscience. Current Opinion in Psychiatry. Lippincott
Williams & Wilkins Inc. 2006, 19, 600-607.
[11] A. Abbot, Brain Electrodes Can Improve Learning, 2008. (available at http://
www.nature.com/news/2008/080129/full/news.2008.538.html)
[12] J. Foer, Memory, 2007 (http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2007/11/memory/
foer-text)
[13] http://intra.ninds.nih.gov/images/Research_Images/wassermanne@ninds.nih.
gov.jpg
[14] http://www.nih.gov/news/research_matters/november2007/images/brain_l.gif
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

A Sustainable Way to Keep Hunger at Bay
Baird Langenbrunner
C
o-ops, community gardens, and farmers markets are
sprouting up everywhere, and the grocery store con-
tinues to boast its “local” and “sustainable” produce.
But what is “sustainable agriculture,” anyway, and is such
a concept as powerful as its supporters claim? This is an
ongoing debate, and a great deal of research suggests that
a local, sustainable approach to agricultural development
in poverty-stricken countries could play an integral role in
meeting the increasing world demand for food.
The sustainable agriculture movement itself has evolved
from two major perspectives: as a method of achieving food
self-reliance and environmental stewardship, and as a means of
sustaining rural communities [1]. The Sustainable Agriculture
Research and Education Program at UC Davis defines the
movement as having three primary goals: “environmental
health, economic profitability, and social and economic equity.”
Furthermore, this sustainability “rests on the principle that
we must meet the needs of the present without compromising
the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”
[2].
An integral goal of the sustainable food movement
is to reduce a food’s environmental impact. Other parts
are numerous and varied, including its impact on the local
economy, the benefits it has on farmers’ soils, or the amount of
food it makes available to the nearby population. Researchers
have even begun to establish indicators that monitor progress
toward sustainability on farms, identifying and ranking key
“sustainable” aspects.
Can We Quantify Sustainability?
In an attempt to quantify sustainability, one study was
conducted on 237 horticultural producers—80 organic and 157
conventional—in the UK [3]. The study did not directly take
into account social and economic dimensions of agriculture.
Instead, it based its sustainability index solely on the impact
of certain farming methodologies, scoring them according
to different criteria and then summing the total; a higher
score signifies a higher degree of sustainability.
Mean values were calculated across all aspects for the
237 producers. The organic group received a 0.72, while the
conventional came in at 0.23. The study warns, however,
that it would be “an oversimplification to equate organic
production with farm-level sustainability,” due to significant
spread in the calculated values [3].
Beyond measures like these, no specific set of practices
constitutes farming as sustainable, but certain methods have
been shown to improve soil life. For example, managing
nutrients through crop rotation—rotating dissimilar crops
in sequential cycles—reduces soil pathogens, lessens the
need for fertilizers, and eliminates the threat of pests; this in
turn provides pest control strategies that don’t harm natural
systems [4,5].
Conventional farming, by contrast, rarely employs
methods that minimize farm impact. Instead, it relies
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
BROWN
heavily on external inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides,
and fossil fuels. These practices are shown to have negative
environmental effects, and this conventional farming system
has been proven to wreak havoc on soil quality, to cause
stream and groundwater contamination, and to increase
greenhouse gas emissions [6,7,8,9].
The Hegemony of Conventional Farming
These methods of conventional farming are often attributed
to the Green Revolution, a transformation during the mid-
twentieth century in which scientific research in agriculture
led to dramatic advances in crop yield and efficiency. In
1945, test plots in Mexico harnessed the development of
high-yield, disease-resistant varieties of wheat, a research
project led by American plant pathologist Norman Borlaug.
This sparked the growth of the conventional agriculture
system in place today, and it quickly brought food security
to many parts of the world [4].
Yet even now, developing nations continue to face the
threat of starvation. A 2006 UN report stated that as of
2003, nearly 845 million people in the world were hungry,
defined as “undernourished” [10]. This was despite the
fact that more than enough food was produced daily to
feed the entire world population. Such a paradox is a direct
result of poverty—although food may be available, many
do not have the money to buy it. At least 97% of these
undernourished populations lived in developing countries,
with 87% in Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa alone [10,11,12].
The hungriest populations coincided with some of the world’s
most entrenched conditions of poverty, most prevalent in
poor rural areas in developing countries.
Sustainable Agriculture’s Role in Ameliorating World
Hunger
Local, sustainable agriculture has potential in community
development and poverty reduction, and it is considered
a fundamental instrument in establishing self-reliance in
rural communities [13]. When production and consumption
become local, the community benefits directly—not only by
giving the farmer independence, but also by stimulating the
local economy and providing consumers with fresh, cheap
food, free of transport and packaging costs.
A 2003 study conducted on small farms in 52 developing
countries documented various ways in which the livelihood
of the population was improved through the development of
these small-scale agricultural systems, including a significant
increase in food production and consumption [11]. It found
that farm productivity increased over time if the necessary
things were obtained: water, land, and labor. Furthermore,
the study points out that when sustainable practices were
employed, relative crop yield increased as farm size decreased.
The small farms that benefit from this are characteristically
found in developing rural areas.
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 35
BROWN
Some believe that food production should be further
modernized in order to feed the mouths of the future. But
with short-term food availability one must also consider
long-term food security. While it is possible to squeeze a
little more out of a conventional system, its capacity and
longevity have been disputed. Industrial farming as it is
now is not sustainable [3]. And although industrial methods
are often seen as the only way to feed the world population
in the future, several studies have found otherwise.
Is a Sustainable World Food Supply an Oxymoron?
In 2007, researchers at the University of Michigan asked a
crucial question: could a world system based entirely on
alternative, sustainable agriculture feed the world? The
results were impressive. Researchers estimated that this
system would provide enough kilocalories daily to support
the current human population, without increasing the current
agricultural land base [14]. Using corn as a representative
example, they calculated the yield of corn for both the
developed and developing world to be 2,523 and 4,358 kcal
per person per day, respectively. Both calculations exceed the
recommended daily energy requirements of 2,100 kcal per
person laid out by the Food and Agricultural Organization
of the UN.
Furthermore, in 2005, a study modeled the conversion
from conventional to organic agriculture and found that such
a change would not severely diminish food security or global
food supply in developing regions [15]. From a quantitative
standpoint alone, then, changing from a conventional world
system to one that operates sustainably would supply ample
food to the current world population, and an even larger
population in the future [13].
But Isn’t Conventional Farming More Profitable?
Even if the world could survive off of a sustainable
food system—assuming that farms began operating
locally and sustainable crop and livestock practices were
implemented—how practical would such a conversion be?
And what benefits—if any—do sustainable practices offer
to farmers?
The benefits are plentiful, according to Sustainable
Agriculture Research and Education. SARE monitored the
conversion of several farms from conventional to organic,
finding that after a three-to-five-year transition period, 90
to 95% of conventional yields were recovered. In addition,
References:
[1] G. K. Douglass, “The Means of Agricultural Sustainability in a Changing World
Order,” G. K. Douglass, Ed. (Westview Press, Boulder, CO, 1984), pp. 3-30.
[2] G. Feenstra, C. Ingels, D. Campbell, “What is Sustainable Agriculture?” (UC Sustainable
Agriculture Research and Education Program instructional website, University of
California, Davis, 1997; http://www.sarep.ucdavis.edu/concept.htm).
[3] D. Rigby, P. Woodhouse, T. Young, M. Burton, Ecological Economics 39, 463 (2001).
[4] L. Horrigan, R. S. Lawrence, P. Walker, Environmental Health Perspectives 110,
445 (2002).
[5] P. F. O’Connell, Outlook on Agriculture 21, 6 (1992). (World Bank Publication, Washington, D.C., 2007; http://www.worldbank.org/
[6] D. Pimentel, P. Hepperly, J. Hanson, D. Douds, R Seidel, Bioscience 55, 573 (2005).
[7] S. Shrybman, “Trade, Agriculture, and Environmental Change: How Agricultural
Trade Policies Fuel Climate Change” (Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy,
Minneapolis, MN, 2000).
[8] C. Rosenweig, D. Hillel, “Climate Change and the Global Harvest: Potential Impacts
of the Greenhouse Effect on Agriculture” (Oxford University Press, England, 1998).
[9] B. Küstermann, M. Kainz, K. Hürlsbergen, Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems
23, 38 (2007).
[10] Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, “The State of Food Insecurity
36 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
the reduced production costs involved actually contributed
to the profitability of the farms after the conversion [16].
Although yields are similar between the two systems, other
costs often differ significantly. For example, sustainable systems
require on average about 15% more labor [6]. Energy input
from fossil fuels, by contrast, was 30% less for the sustainable
farm in the Rodale study. These calculations are similar across
the board: material costs tend to be lower in sustainable
systems, but labor costs higher. Studies consistently find that
although climate and region play a large role in production,
sustainable farms are almost always commercially profitable
[16]. In the Rodale study, a sustainable corn-based system
was 25% more profitable than a conventional one [6].
Getting Out of a Conventional Rut
Sustainable farming may not always be more profitable than
its conventional counterpart, but it has well-documented
environmental and socioeconomic advantages. In terms of
agriculture’s potential to nourish the world, the World Bank
stated in its 2008 World Development Report that small-scale
agricultural development in rural areas could be a major
source for economic growth and environmental stewardship
in all three country types—agriculture-based, transforming,
and urbanized [13].
Such a conversion would be costly, and many countries
must invest significantly in land reform that will promote
smallholder entry, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa and
many parts of Asia. But before every person in the world
sleeps on a full stomach, agricultural policy must change
everywhere. As it stands now, policies like the US Farm Bill
pump too much money into the conventional farming empire.
This not o_nly intensifies poverty by driving down crop
prices throughout the world, but it also strongly discourages
sustainable farming in the US.
An absolute conversion to a sustainable world farming
system might be a outlandish goal, but even more foolhardy
is the assumption that the conventional practices currently
in use will do anything but exacerbate the worst problems—
hunger, poverty, environmental destruction—that we see
today.
Baird Langenbrunner is a senior studying geology and chemistry
at Brown University.
in the World 2006; Eradicating world hunger—taking stock ten years after the
World Food Summit” (FAO Publication, Rome, Italy, 2006;
ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/009/a0750e/a0750e00.pdf).
[11] J. N. Pretty, J. I. L. Morison, R. E. Hine, Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment,
93, 217 (2003).
[12] P. B. R. Hazell, “Green Revolution: Cure or Blessing?” (International Food Policy
Research Institute, Washington, D.C., 2002; http://www.ifpri.cgiar.org/pubs/ib/ib11.
pdf).
[13] The World Bank, “World Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development”
wdr2008).
[14] C. Badgley et al., Renewable Agiculture and Food Systems 22, 86 (2007).
[15] N. Halberg, H. F. Alrøe, M. T. Knudsen, E. S. Kristensen, Eds, “Global Development
of Organic Agriculture: Challenges and Promises” (CAP International, Wallingford,
UK, 2005).
[16] Sustainable Agriculture Network, “Bulleting for Opportunities in Agriculture:
Transitioning to Organic Production” (SAN Publication, 2003; http://www.sare.org/
publications/organic/organic.pdf).
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Discrimination, Stigmatization, and Denial
of Rural Indian Physicians towards
Persons with HIV/AIDS
Kartavya Vyas 
I
n many nations, HIV/AIDS is considered an epidemic
mainly afflicting a community that is perverted and
sinful. Feelings of discrimination, stigmatization, and
denial (DSD) prevent these societies from taking necessary
actions to treat those with the disease and inhibit its spread.
Many such safe havens as healthcare settings, workplaces,
and schools have become infested with oppression and
intolerance. In particular, the role of rural physicians and
the protocol they follow has come into question because of
the high prevalence of the disease in less developed areas.
Reproduced from [13].
India, despite the advanced state of medical knowledge in
its urban universities and medical institutions, and despite
its success in dealing with previous healthcare challenges,
is a case in point.
In rural India, cognizance of the limited but possible
routes of infection and the role of medical treatment varies
from one socioeconomic group to another. The level of
awareness of this disease is only 30% among the general
population in rural villages compared to 70% in urban areas
[1]. In an effort to reduce DSD, the Indian government has
tried implementing several public policies to educate rural
communities. Unfortunately, while ethical medical policies
have been promulgated and even mandated, they are often
never implemented in practice by physicians; the Indian
government has created a sound HIV/AIDS policy, but there
seems to be a chasm between policy and action. Dr. Sudha
Sivaram of John Hopkins University states that this gap
is the “result of various issues ranging from stigma in the
community to lack of skills and resources among medical
providers to effectively manage HIV infection” [2].
Of the 5.7 million people known to be infected with
HIV/AIDs (PWHAs) in India, only 107,000 have been
provided antiretroviral treatment [1,2]. Doctors, nurses, and
administrators [3], who are responsible for providing quality
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
UCSD
healthcare, continue to neglect PWHAs by denying them
access to common eating utensils and sanitation, limiting their
movements, and using unnecessary protective gear [4]. This
only embarrasses, isolates, and prevents many of them from
receiving treatment, while separating them from families
and communities that could be caregivers. Labeling, name-
calling, social distancing, and forced resignation from work
are only a small part of the sociological consequences that
they must regularly face [5]. Rural communities continue to
be plagued by physicians who disregard medical protocol and
deny villagers basic treatment, contributing to the expansion
of the worldwide pandemic of HIV/AIDS.
The Indian National AIDS Control Organization (NACO)
is the primary instrument of the government in trying to
combat the acceleration of the epidemic. The public health
plans are comprehensively written and reasonably sound,
referring to treatment, prevention and the rights of patients
[6]. Furthermore, NACO acknowledges the problems in
implementing treatment, including “the often slow response
and action from the government sector, the recognition of
violation of rights such as denial of care for PWHAs by
medical practitioners,” and “the need to enhance technical
and managerial capabilities of program managers” [7]. The
NACO policy also contains specific policy initiatives that
are fundamental and essential to this cause. These include
“program management, advocacy and social mobilization,
participation of non-governmental organizations (NGOs),
surveillance and monitoring, policy on blood safety, HIV
testing and counseling, initiatives for PWHAS, control of
Of the 5.7 million people
known to be infected with HIV/
AIDS (PWHAs) in India, only
107,000 have been provided
antiretroviral treatment [1,2].
sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and condom education”
[8]. Although NACO clearly recognizes the difficulties of
containing and suppressing the epidemic rural physicians
and hospital administrators continue to resist its directives
or adopt them only half-heartedly. Hospital staff, community
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 37
UCSD

leaders, and public figures do not want to associate themselves creating a grassroots initiative to combat the epidemic, risky
with a disease belonging to the communities of the so-called actions related to sexual behavior and discrimination, which
perverted and sinful. discourage testing and treatment, can be reduced. Since the
Many professionals in the healthcare field acknowledge policies that the Indian government has taken seem to have
that feelings of discrimination, stigmatization, and denial little influence, community-based health education and clinical
originate from the practices of rural clinics, where there training are key in not only stopping HIV/AIDS from having
are a vast number of private its current trend of growth, but
physicians compared to the also in reducing its strength
relatively small number of long-term.
hospital medical practitioners; Since the policies that the Indian The number of PWHAs
yet these same sources seem in India seems to vary from
to place the blame elsewhere government has taken seem to year to year because of poor
[9]. For example, a majority of have little influence, community- population surveys, lack of
hospital staff agree that while testing documentation, and
they provide excellent care based health education and clinical increasing feelings of DSD
within the healthcare setting, training are key... within the rural communities.
most of the mistreatment While a comprehensive
and discrimination is of public health policy exists,
familial origin [10]. Families the discrimination in rural
often cut off all relations India results from the weak
with PWHAs, further reducing an implementation of such policy.
already weakened support resource. With an increasing population and
Women are particularly vulnerable growing economy, India is in a critical
to this familial stigma while men are situation right now. But without a
sometimes excused by family and strong foothold in rural communities
the community. where increasing local education and
Just as the level of awareness clinical training are utmost important,
varies from one demographic government policy targeting HIV/
criterion to the next, the different AIDS treatment will have very little
forms of stigma and discrimination effect. In reviewing NACO policy and
range from case to case: “The most the effects it has had, it becomes clear
commonly reported responses that the task remaining is to educate
include a refusal to admit or treat rural physicians on correct protocol
HIV-positive patients, the tendency and the importance of reducing the
to neglect patients, the habit of testing spread of this disease. With its past
for HIV without consent, and breaches accomplishments in fighting against
of confidentiality” [11]. Physicians polio, smallpox, and tuberculosis,
and other hospital administrators India must now come to realize the
oftentimes relay PWHAs to deadly potential of HIV/AIDS.
government-run hospitals that are
reputable for their low standards in Kartavya Vyas is a senior at the University
healthcare. In turn, these hospitals of California, San Diego.
complain about the high number of Reproduced from [14].
patients in need of care and their own funding limitations
[12]. In truth, rural clinics and hospitals should train their
staff in the proper care of infected patients, and should
promote education throughout their local communities. By

References:
[1] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[2] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[3] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[4] United Nations, India: HIV and AIDS-Related Discrimination, Stigmatization,
and Denial (UNAIDS Publication 01.46E, 2001; http://data.unaids.org/Publications/
IRC-pub02/JC587-India_en.pdf).
[5] United Nations, India: HIV and AIDS-Related Discrimination, Stigmatization,
and Denial (UNAIDS Publication 01.46E, 2001; http://data.unaids.org/Publications/
IRC-pub02/JC587-India_en.pdf).
[6] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[7] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[8] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[9] S. Sivaram, Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 12, 214-6 (2002).
[10] United Nations, India: HIV and AIDS-Related Discrimination, Stigmatization,
and Denial (UNAIDS Publication 01.46E, 2001; http://data.unaids.org/Publications/
IRC-pub02/JC587-India_en.pdf).
[11] United Nations, India: HIV and AIDS-Related Discrimination, Stigmatization,
and Denial (UNAIDS Publication 01.46E, 2001; http://data.unaids.org/Publications/
IRC-pub02/JC587-India_en.pdf).
[12] United Nations, India: HIV and AIDS-Related Discrimination, Stigmatization,
and Denial (UNAIDS Publication 01.46E, 2001; http://data.unaids.org/Publications/
IRC-pub02/JC587-India_en.pdf).
[13] http://www.usaid.gov/press/frontlines/fl_mar06/images/dots.jpg
[14] http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/global_health/id/images/photo/2005-103.jpg

38 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

Bits, Bytes, and Property Rights
Chris Milroy
A
n entirely new universe is emerging right under our
noses. It is invisible unless one has the technology
to detect and interact with it, but it contains societ-
ies just like our own. This universe is digital, composed of
tens of millions of humans interacting via internet-linked
computers, and broken into hundreds of self-contained,
virtual worlds.
The virtual universe lacks at least one other major
feature, besides physicality: property rights. Analyzing why
and how property rights are different in a virtual context
is critical to understanding the challenges faced by legal
systems and businesses as they move online in the 21st
century. Until the law catches up to the emerging realities
of virtual worlds, companies and individuals will have to
bear substantial risks.
Following John Locke’s assertion that the purpose of
government is to protect property from both internal and
external threats [1], most modern governments recognize
the right to property as one of the basic rights of a society.
In particular, the rights to prevent others from using or
destroying one’s property, when accompanied by limits
such as those provided by eminent domain laws, are an
important source of growth and development in modern
societies [2]. Such rights tie users’ interests to the long-
term sustenance and value of resources and prevent the
so-called “tragedy of the commons” [2], wherein each user
of a resource consumes, in the short-term, more than the
long-term optimal amount.
Virtual property, however, possesses several characteristics
that make it fundamentally different from material property.
Most importantly, virtual property is not scarce, in the sense
that everybody could in theory simultaneously have as
much as they want. Indeed, one upcoming online game,
Infinity: The Quest for Earth, claims that the number of full
potential planets in the game could reach the hundreds of
billions—which means that visiting one per second for 100
years would still cover under five percent of the total game
universe [3]. If everyone can have as much land as he or
she wants, the need for land rights is diminished.
Similarly, the ease with which the owners of virtual
worlds can create virtual property is a vast change from the
material world. Under a labor-based theory of property,
such as the one espoused by Locke, it would seem that the
property in a virtual world is nearly valueless to the creator
(since it takes little time to generate any individual piece of
property from computer code) but potentially very valuable
to the person who buys and develops it. On the other hand,
if the goal of property rights is to promote economic growth
and development, the lack of scarcity in virtual worlds
suggests that such rights are unnecessary except insofar as
they fulfill the function of intellectual property rights: creating
artificial scarcity for socially-useful purposes. The choice
of a philosophical foundation is therefore highly important
prior to extrapolating laws governing virtual property.
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
CHICAGO
This leads to a whole host of instances where standard
property rights would seem misapplied in a virtual context.
If courts assign virtual property a value in non-virtual
currency—as Chinese courts did in 2003, when they awarded
damages to a man whose account in the popular Chinese
online game Hongyue (Red Moon) was hacked and his virtual
weapons stolen [4]—then the companies that own virtual
worlds increase their liability every time they create an in-
world object that could be stolen or accidentally erased.
On the other hand, failure to establish ownership rights
to virtual property will leave the inhabitants of virtual worlds
unprotected. In South Korea, which does recognize virtual
property, the police received 22,000 complaints of cybercrime
involving virtual property and arrested over 10,000 teenagers
in a single year [5]. One would expect that such violations,
which appear to cause enough material damages to warrant
state intervention in countries such as China and Korea,
are simply going unreported in countries that do not have
such laws.
If corporate liability is tied to the value of virtual property,
then an important legal question will have to be answered.
How should the law treat world-owning corporations, which
have such omnipotent control over the people—or their
representations, called “avatars”—in the worlds? Corporations
can control every characteristic of virtual property: the amount
of it available (scarcity), whether it lasts forever or degrades
over time (durability), and how effective it is at producing
other property or achieving tasks (utility). Each of these
qualities affects the value of the property, and changing
any one of them could potentially be interpreted as stealing
value from the in-world owners of the property.
Such interpretations are not much removed from the
interpretations being asserted in court cases today. In Bragg v.
Linden Lab, the plaintiff claimed that the defendant (Linden
Lab, the owner of the virtual world Second Life), by deleting
his account after he allegedly engaged in transactions that
subverted Second Life’s land auction systems, owed him
damages for the value of the property that was removed
from his control by such deletion; the case has now been
settled for undisclosed terms [6].
The other major legal issue surrounding virtual property is
how it relates to the material property, owned by the company
managing the virtual world, on which the virtual world runs.
If virtual property has value, then shutting down the server
on which the world resides would be akin to destroying
an entire country. As far back as 2001, economist Edward
Castronova determined that the virtual world Everquest
produced a per capita gross national product (GNP) that,
in dollar terms, fell between those of Russia and Bulgaria;
its nominal hourly wage was found to be approximately
$3.42/hour, using the conversion rate derived from sales of
in-world goods on websites like eBay [7]. Newer worlds like
World of Warcraft have over 100 times the inhabitants that
Everquest had, so the dollar value of the property contained
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 39
CHICAGO
therein is likely much greater. In Second Life, almost 200
citizens are earning over $60,000 per year in US$ from their
activities in-world, buying and selling virtual goods, services,
and ideas for profit [8].
When virtual worlds have that much material property
value, the economic consequences of shutting them down
are substantial. Players’ claims to the value of their virtual
possessions may take the form of a request to require a
company to continue operating a virtual world after it has
decided that the world is no longer profitable. It is not
currently clear, given the vague legal status of virtual property
at present, what courts would make of such a demand.
Since virtual worlds have to be hosted on servers in
physical locations, real-world governments have varying claims
and interests over their economic and legal implications. The
Swedish government recently started taxing income derived
from virtual worlds, as Dan Miller, Senior Economist for the U.S.
House of Representatives’ Joint Economic Committee notes, and
United States citizens could potentially be required to pay taxes
to Sweden under that law [9]. Beyond taxation, governments
may want to involve themselves in the internal affairs of
virtual worlds for purposes of regulation, for protection from
political speech, or for other reasons. Enforcement becomes
a major challenge under these conditions: who is allowed to
intervene in virtual worlds, and for what reasons?
All of these issues are extremely complex and have been
the subject of intense legal debate. Various theories have been
advanced to reconcile modern law with the unique status of
virtual environments, and some user groups have started to
establish their own solutions as well. Internally, users have
formed in-game governments and political organizations that
control property and resolve disputes between members.
Examples include guilds in World of Warcraft, corporations
in EVE Online, and a variety of pseudo-self-governing
entities in Second Life including “Extropia” [10] and “The
Confederation of Democratic Simulators” [11]. While these
organizations have no legal force in the material world—they
cannot stop the virtual world owners from shutting down
the simulation, for example—they do have some measure
of power within the virtual world, deriving fundamentally
from the consent of the governed.
On the legal side, Edward Castronova has described
what he calls “interration” (from terra, Latin for world),
allowing a world to be defined by its owner as either allowing
or disallowing conversion of in-world assets into material
currencies [12]. Allowing such a process would open in-
world income up to taxation and regulation. An interrated
world—one that chose to legally form a entity completely
disconnected from the material world—would not be subject
to real-world governments because its virtual assets would not
be convertible to material ones or vice versa [12]. It would,
in effect, become an entirely separate world. Worlds that
References:
[1] Locke, John. Two Treatises of Government. Ed. Peter Laslett. Cambridge, UK:
Cambridge University Press, 2005. [p.268]
[2] Carrier, Michael A., and Greg Lastowka. Berkeley Technology Law Journal. 2007,
1494.
[3] Infinity: The Quest for Earth. Infinity: The Quest for Earth FAQ. 2006 http://www.
infinity-universe.com/Infinity/infinity_faq.php#a2.1
[4] CNN.com. Online gamer in China wins virtual theft suit. 2003 http://www.cnn.
com/2003/TECH/fun.games/12/19/china.gamer.reut/
[5] Fairfield, Joshua. Indiana University School of Law-Bloomington Legal Studies
Research Paper Series 2005, 1088.
40 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
did not go through interration, however, would be treated
as effectively sovereign countries—with taxes on “imports”
to the material world through purchases of virtual goods.
The number of people interacting in virtual worlds will
likely continue to grow exponentially with increasing internet
access. These pressing questions will need to be addressed
soon, so that these worlds can grow in a secure and stable
environment. Individual countries will have to answer the
question of whether they can fail to protect property rights
and risk world-builders moving their operations to other
nations.
Perhaps the same principle that applies in the material
world would work in relation to the virtual: in exchange
for robust protection of property rights, citizens of virtual
worlds would pay a tax to the world-owners, which would
pay for the upkeep and security of the servers on which
the world is run and other maintenance costs. In effect,
citizens would become shareholders in the world in which
they live, the god-like power of the owners limited by the
rights ceded to the citizens. Worlds would then be free
to establish their own governments—if they wanted them.
This policy would not only have the benefits of providing
a money-sink for world owners (an important element in
controlling inflation and maintaining value in the world)
and limiting owners’ liability for the results of in-world
events, but it would also distribute power democratically,
capitalizing on the leveling power of the internet.
If we fail to act swiftly, we face the likelihood of a new
virtual frontier growing up wild and unregulated. Unlike
the frontiers of old, this one is global, pervasive, and high-
tech—and potentially all the more dangerous because of
its reach. Virtual worlds could provide a place where all
inhabitants are really equal, free from the constraints into
which they were born. To provide that freedom, though, they
need to themselves be free of the intrusion of the material
world. Virtual property, thoroughly defined and applied, may
provide exactly this condition: a way to delineate the boundary
between the real and the virtual that provides maximum
freedom and adequate incentives for development.
If we do not deliberately and rapidly establish virtual
property law, however, we may be left with a system wherein
citizens of virtual worlds cannot be confident of anything—not
even that they will still exist tomorrow. How can worlds
grow beyond being games, in such an environment?
This is humanity’s first chance to create a universe from
scratch—it would be a shame to waste it.
Chris Milroy is a fourth year student of economics and philosophy.
He is interested in the social and economic implications of emerging
technologies and social structures. He heads the virtual worlds
research team for the student group Oeconomica, of which he is
also the executive director.
[6] Reuters.com. Linden Lab settles Bragg lawsuit. 2007 http://secondlife.reuters.
com/stories/2007/10/04/linden-lab-settles-bragg-lawsuit/
[7] Castronova, Edward. CESifo Working Paper Series. 2001, 1.
[8] Secondlife.com. Economic Statistics. 2008 http://secondlife.com/whatis/economy_stats.
php
[9] Economics of Virtual Worlds Blog. Sweden to Tax Virtual Income. 2008 http://
economicsofvirtualworlds.blogspot.com/2008/04/sweden-to-tax-virtual-income.
html
[10] Extropiacore.net. Extropia Core. 2008 http://core.extropiacore.net/
[11] Slcds.info. The Confederation of Democratic Simulators. 2008 http://slcds.info/
[12] Castronova, Edward. New York Law School Law Review 2004, 185-210.
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
CORNELL
The Autistic Pride Movement
Pranai Tandon
A
manda Baggs begins her popular YouTube video
In my Language by performing a series of strange
and inexplicable actions: she rocks back and forth
while flailing her hands in the air, bangs around a circular
metal object, and rakes her hands over a keyboard back and
forth several times, humming an unnerving song the entire
time. She never looks at the camera [1].
Such repetitive behaviors, called stereotypy, are
characteristic of Baggs’ diagnosis of low-functioning autism.
Because she does not speak, doctors decided that Baggs
could not meaningfully communicate or even feel empathy.
The medical establishment wrote Baggs off as just another
autistic, and the video seems to confirm it. Then the text
appears on the screen.
Baggs reveals that though she does not talk, she types
at 120 words per minute, and while most are apt to assume
she is mentally retarded, she is very capable of high level
thought. Her video challenges traditional notions of language
when she identifies her stereotypy as a “constant conversation
with every aspect of [her] environment, reacting physically
to all parts of [her] surroundings” [1]. In this sense, it is the
English language, not the stereotypy, that is deficient, because
it “consists of a much more limited set of responses.” Current
medical dogma dictates that a low-functioning autistic would
be unable to produce and articulate such complex ideas.
Baggs is one of the leading figures in a nascent Autistic
Pride movement, which stands firmly outside the academic
establishment. The movement directly challenges traditional
scientific knowledge with first person experiences of autistics
in order to garner acceptance for autism as a neurological
difference instead of a crippling disease.
The Medicine of Autism
Autism as a disease is best understood as a condition that
prevents proper integration into society [2]. In the Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV, the DSM-IV,
Autism spectrum disorders, synonymous with Pervasive
Development Disorders or PDDs, are divided into three
groups: Autistic Disorder, Asperger’s Syndrome, and PDD
not-otherwise-specified. The diagnosis of an autism spectrum
disorder is entirely behavioral, requiring impairment in
communication skills, social interaction skills, and the
presence of repetitive stereotypy or repetitive obsessions
in narrow ranges of interest. In practice distinctions between
the three kinds of autism spectrum disorders are difficult
to make [2].
Autism has a definite biochemical or neurological cause, as
opposed to a purely psychological one, because it is heritable.
Twin studies have shown that in monozygotic twins, if one
is autistic the other has a 70% possibility of being autistic as
well, while this probability is reduced to 10% in dizygotic
twins. Furthermore, genomic studies have identified a risk
locus for autism on every chromosome. Autistics show a
clear reduction in use of socio-affective areas of the brain
in comparison to average people [4].
This explains both the diagnostic criterion of social
deficits, and anecdotal reports of the trouble autistic people
42 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
have in understanding the emotions of other, a lack of basic
social understanding of why others feel and act the way they
do [5]. Also, autistics report an overload of sensory information,
in which stimuli like light and touch have overwhelming
effects on them, causing stereotypy [5]. Recently, vast sums
of money have been put into autism research, in an effort
to “cure” a perceived autism “epidemic” [6].
Autistic Pride: Tolerance versus a Cure
The autistic pride movement seeks to break with everything
just described. The goal of the movement is to construct
autism as an acceptable neurological variation instead of a
disease [6]. Although the movement is highly fractioned, all
adherents believe that autism is not an affliction to be exorcised
from their bodies, but a core part of their identities.
Understanding the jargon used in movement literature
is the best way to understand the ideas of the movement.
Jim Sinclair, a founder of Autism Network International,
opposes “person first” terminology [7]. Instead of saying “a
person with autism” (with the person first) Sinclair says “an
autistic person” (with the person second). The former phrase
constructs autism as a disease secondary to the person, while
the latter literally puts the autism first, making it integral
to personal identity.
This echoes the sentiment in his archetypal essay “Don’t
Mourn for Us,” which argues that the traditional view of
“losing” a child to autism is factually untrue. What actually
happened is that the “normal” child the parents were expecting
was never born – an autistic one was. The difference is subtle:
the “normal” child was not “lost” because it never existed,
and so should not be mourned. Instead, the autistic child
that was born should be celebrated.
“Normal” is quoted because the movement prefers
the word “neurotypical” for someone who does not have
an autism disorder [9]. “Neurotypical” does not have the
discriminating connotations of “normal;” this shift from
normative to inclusive language reflects a move in thought
about mental illness to accept neurologically different people,
called Neurodiversity [9]. Neurodiversity would manifest in
accepting natural behaviors of autism, such as stereotypy,
instead of forcing autistics to constantly suppress them [10].
This ideal is the endpoint of the trend in accepting behavioral
differences that were once considered mental illnesses, like
homosexuality, female hysteria, and left-handedness [6].
A final term that represents the creed of the movement is
“curbie,” a derisive term for a person, usually a neurotypical,
who is overly anxious to find a cure and eliminate autism [6].
Adherents feel that curing autism would negate their very
existence, and they take extreme affront to the suggestions
from some social workers that autistics should not have
children [10]. They say such practices stumble down the
slippery slope of eugenics.
Opposition and Auton v British Columbia
However, the anti-cure movement has found enemies in
the concerned parents of autistics, like Kit Weintraub, who
believe the movement overstates the gifts of autistics and
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 CORNELL

denies them treatment that would help them integrate into Newer forms of internet communication also lend
society [11]. They say the movement cannot represent their themselves to autistics, most notably Second Life. Second
low-functioning children because it is entirely comprised life lets users interact with 3D avatars, which let autistic
of high-functioning autistics [3]. This debate quickly gets people interact with physical representations of others without
to the very nature of autism, because vocal members of the leaving their “comfort zone” at home. There they experience
movement are by definition high-functioning. Even though social interaction in a non-threatening way [16].
leaders like Baggs point out that they were once considered low-
functioning, true low-functioning autistics by definition cannot Steps Offline, Steps into the Future
participate for lack of communication skills. While people like Autism Network International has been moving autistic
Baggs highlight the difficulty culture offline and into
in identifying low-functioning the real world with their
autistics, the representation of springtime convention
the movement will always be As early as 1997 Harvey Blume called “Autreat,” in which
a moot point. autistics show solidarity
The issue was formally declared that the internet would be by meeting and attending
addressed in the landmark to autistics what sign language is to workshops where autistic
court case Auton v British behaviors are accepted and
Columbia, in which a group of
the deaf [14]. participants indicate whether
British Columbians argued that they are comfortable with
Applied Behavioral Analysis conversation or not [6].
(ABA) should be paid for by the The movement has even
state as a medically necessary made steps in the formal realm
treatment for autism [12]. Applied Behavioral Analysis of science. Michelle Dawson has been debunking the claim that
is a powerful therapy that modifies behavior via operant 75% of autistics are severely mentally retarded by investigating
conditioning. ABA has been successfully used to eliminate the standard measure of IQ in children, the Wechsler Intelligence
autistic stereotypy [6]. Michelle Dawson, another prominent Scale. This test consists of oral questions, which autistics have
autistic pride advocate, provided expert testimony as an difficulty in processing. On nonverbal intelligence scales autistics
autistic, in which she argued that autistics cannot consent score between 30 and 70 percentile points higher than they do
to a treatment that can change their personality, leaving on the Wechsler [17].
behaviorists accountable to no ethical authority other than The movement has created essays, websites, videos, forums,
social whimsy [13]. By this standard ABA could be used to and organizations that question the scientific dogma on autism, but
eliminate previously perceived disabilities like homosexuality they do not constitute scientific data. It is important to remember
and left handedness [13]. The court ruled that ABA should that the firsthand experiences of highly visible autistics like
not be paid for, as it is not a core treatment for autism [12] Baggs and Dawson neither justify generalization nor formally
challenge the disease model of autism. Because no survey of
The Internet and Autistic Culture the autistic population has been done, the validity of the ideas
Considering that autism is defined as an inability to integrate of the movement is uncertain; Baggs may be an exception to
into social groups, a movement of autistics is oxymoronic. the rule. Even so, it is these unexplainable phenomena that
This conundrum is resolved with the internet; the evolution spark great revolutions in thought.
of Autistic culture is directly linked with the evolution of Extraordinary testimony does not challenge scientific
the internet. data, but it does invite science to change itself. Baggs’ video
Autistics are uncomfortable in interpersonal situations, does not pass any test of statistical significance, but it does
with verbal interaction that they cannot tolerate [14]. These obligate the scientific community to rethink what it knows,
problems evaporate over e-mail. As early as 1997 Harvey break up long ossified ideas, and continue the movement the
Blume declared that the internet would be to autistics what autistics started.
sign language is to the deaf [14]. The rise of mailing lists in
the 1990’s saw the first autism email list server at St. Johns Pranai Tandon is a sophomore studying biology at Cornell
University, soon followed the multitude of organizations University.
that exist today [15].

References:
[1] Baggs, Amanda. In my Language. YouTube [video]. 2007, Jan 14. Available from http://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=Jnylm1hI2jc
[2] Filipek, Pauline, et al. The Screening and Diagnosis of Autistic Spectrum disorders. J Autism and
Devel Dis [serial on the Internet]. 1999 [cited 2008 May 18]; 29(6):439-484. Available from http://www.
springerlink.com
[3] Wolman, D. The Truth About Autism: Scientists Reconsider What They Think They Know. Wired.
2008 Mar 16.
[4] Muller, Ralph Axel. The Study of Autism as a Distributed Disorder. MRDD Research Reviews [serial on
the Internet]. 2007 [cited 2008 May 18]; 13(1):85-95. Available from http://www3.interscience.wiley.com
[5] Blackrburn, J. Autism, What is it …? [document on the Internet]. Autistics.org; 1997. Available from
http://www.autistics.org/library/whatis.html
[6] Harmon A. How About Not ‘Curing’ Us, Some Autistics Are Pleading. The New York Times. 2004
Dec 20.
[7] Sinclair, J. Why I dislike ‘person first’ language [document on the Internet]. Autism Network International;
1999. Available from http://web.syr.edu/~jisincla/person_first.htm
[8] Sinclair, J. Don’t Mourn for Us. Our Voice. 1993.
[9] Harmon, A. Neurodiversity Forever; The Disability Movement Turns to Brains. The New York Times.
2004 May 9.
[10] Trivedi, B. Autistic and Proud. New Scientist. 2005 Jun 18.
[11] Weintraub, K. A Mother’s Perspective [document on the Internet]. Association for Science in Autism
Treatment; 2004. Available from http://www.asatonline.org/forum/articles/mother.htm
[12] Auton (Guardian ad liten of) v British Columbia (Attorney General), 2004 SCC 78, CanLII (2004).
[13] Dawson, Michelle. Intervener’s Report in Auton v British Columbia, Available from http://www.leaf.
ca/legal/disability.html#target
[14] Blume H. Autistics, freed from face-to-face encounters, are communicating in cyberspace. The New
York Times. 1997 Jun 30.
[15] Dekker M. On Our Own Terms: Emerging Autistic Culture [document on the Internet]. Autistic
Culture; 1999. Available from http://www.autisticculture.com/index.php?page=articles
[16] Saidi, N. ‘Naughty Auties’ battle autism with virtual interaction. CNN; 2008 Mar 28. Available from
http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/conditions/03/28/sl.autism.irpt/index.html
[17] Dawson, Michelle, et al. The Level and Nature of Autistic Intelligence. Psychological Science [serial on the
Internet]. 2007 [cited 2008 May 18]; 18(8):657-662. Available from http://www.blackwell-syngergy.com

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 43
CAMBRIDGE
Air-Conditioned Earth
Jenny Molloy
C
limate change and global warming are currently big
news on the political agenda, and have recently become
firmly engrained in the public psyche. After decades
of environmental concern and the recent international drive
to lower carbon emissions, carbon emissions continue to rise
and the trend of global warming shows no signs of abating
[1]. A time lag between action and results would be expected
due to the persistence of CO2 in the atmosphere. However,
the pressing question is, will reversal occur quickly enough to
save the planet from a catastrophic incident such as the collapse
of the Arctic sea ice? Current research suggests perhaps not.
Arctic sea ice following the 2007 melt season was 40% below
the 1979–2000 average, and may be almost non-existent by 2030
[2]. Therefore, while cutting emissions is still believed to be the
optimum long-term strategy, scientists have also investigated
the planet’s short term emergency options—utilising technol-
ogy at the planetary scale to engineer a global cooling system
and gain control of the climate.
Predicting exactly how the planet would respond
to interventions such as those described in the box is an
enormously complex task, perhaps almost impossible. As
such, geoengineering is regarded by most as an insurance
plan, to be used only in the case of impending catastrophe.
However, there were concerns that the presence of such
‘insurance’ might lead to a reduction in the sense of urgency
surrounding climate change, and increasing political inertia.
This ‘moral hazard’ objection had, until recently, been a
deterrent to serious consideration of geoengineering methods
[9]. However, a conference held at Harvard University in
November 2007 showed no sign of this concern. As one
delegate reported: “I think a lot of us came away from that
meeting much more scared than we were when we went in...
Frightened about climate change, and frightened about what
humans might get desperate enough to do about it.” [10]
The consequences of global warming in different
regions are disparate with respect to both their severity and
their nature. As environmental researcher Dale Jamieson,
of New York University, acknowledges; “Climate change
Figure 1: The total carbon dioxide emissions from fossil-fuel burning, cement production, and gas flaring for the world’s countries in 2000. The
map was created by a team of climate and health scientists led by Jonathan Patz, at UW-Madison, and is reprinted courtesy of the Center for
44 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
involves winners and losers”. Africa will bear the majority
of the burden of death through climate mediated changes
in infectious diseases rates [11], as well as reduction in crop
production [12]. It appears that the hardest hit nations will
be those that are least equipped to adapt to climate change,
and those that have contributed least to atmospheric CO2
levels (Figure 1). Africa has some of the lowest per-capita
emissions of greenhouse gases, but regions of the continent
are gravely at risk from warming-related diseases such as
malaria and malnutrition [11]. Estimated deaths attributable
to climate change in 2000 were 88 per million across Africa
compared to a world average of 28 [11]. However, the USA,
despite being the world’s top emitter of greenhouse gases,
had a mortality rate of less than 0.15 [11].
For many developed nations, the foreseeable effects
will be much milder and may even be beneficial, especially
with regard to crop production [12]. As President Putin joked
at a global conference “an increase of two or three degrees
wouldn’t be so bad for a northern country like Russia. We
could spend less on fur coats, and the grain harvest would
go up” [13]. Last summer, the North West shipping passage
opened through the Arctic for the first time in living memory
after a record ice melt, cutting thousands of miles off shipping
routes between Europe and Asia, giving an economic benefit
to northern nations [14]. The increased accessibility of the
Arctic has prompted several countries to lay claim to the
possibly oil rich ocean floor below [15]. A Russian mission
which planted a flag beneath the North Pole in August 2007
was challenged by Canada and criticised by the US; all three
parties stand to gain from what is generally perceived as
an environmental disaster [14].
Should the technology eventually become available to
‘air condition’ the earth, the major question will be: Who
controls the thermostat?
The effects of climate change cause much political tension,
as seen at the 2007 UN conference on climate change in Bali,
where negotiations nearly fell apart as the US demanded
firmer commitments from developing countries, before
Sustainability and the Global Environment [22].
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.

Figure 2: The estimated numbers of deaths per million people that could be attributed to global climate change in the year 2000. Drawing
from data from the World Health Organization, the map was also created by Patz’s team. Map courtesy the Center for Sustainability and the
eventually agreeing to the proposals [16]. As UN Secretary-
General Ban Ki-moon stated, “there is a divide of position
between and among countries” [16]. Any geoengineering
project, which would inherently operate globally and have
differential effects on geographic populations, is almost
certain to be subject to even wider international disagreement.
Developing countries, who will be most seriously affected by
global warming, would probably want more drastic action
sooner than more comfortable first world nations.
Critically, there is currently no international agreement
or democratically elected group to make this decision. The
level of global consent that constitutes a mandate for action
would have to be decided, as unanimity could be difficult to
obtain given the possible risks of geoengineering. The UN
could take responsibility for forming a governing body, as
the majority of independent states have agreed to honour
its decisions, and it can enforce sanctions on those who fail
to comply [17]. No other organisation currently has this
level of influence, and any global governing body would
need such abilities to manage resources, monitor results and
maintain authority for several decades at least.
The financiers of globally agreed projects would likely
be developed or rapidly industrialising countries such as the
US, Russia and China. This is likely to cost less than reducing
their emissions [18], but there is a serious risk that subsequent
decisions would be biased in their favour. It is also worth
noting that any of these nations, or a coalition of smaller
states, would be able to finance a project autonomously, if
they felt it to be in their best interests. However, any climate
alteration undertaken in the absence of complete international
agreement raises serious judicial issues. There would be no
clear procedure for appeal, and the countries performing the
References:
[1] Rahmstorf, S. et al. Science 2007, 316, 709.
[2] National Snow and Ice Data Centre 2007 www.nsidc.colorado.edu/news/press/2007_
seaiceminimum/20071001_pressrelease.html
[3] The Economist 2007 www.economist.com/search/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8765930
[4] Robock, A. Science 2002, 295,1242–1244.
[5] Crutzen, P.J. Climatic Change 2006, 77, 211-220.
[6] US Department of Defense Budget 2007 www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/
defense.html
[7] Salter, S. et al. 2007 www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/media/9/6/Ottawa_formatted.PDF
(currently unpublished)
[8] Boyd, P.W. et al. Deep-sea res. 2001, 48, 2425–2438.
[9] Keith, D.W. Annu. Rev. Energ. Env. 2000, 25, 245–284.
[10] Kintisch, E. Science 2007 www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/318/5853/1054/DC1
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
CAMBRIDGE
Global Environment [22].
modification may not be willing to pay compensation for
cross-boundary harm.
Should a nation decide to go ahead with unilateral
climate modification without international approval, there
is also the risk of the technology being used as a weapon.
Climate modification could serve to increase a country’s
economic success, while slowly disrupting that of its enemies.
The UN already has a convention prohibiting the use of
environmental modification techniques as a military weapon
(ENMOD), which has been ratified by 73 countries [19]. The
international response to a rogue state taking the climatic
fate of others in its hands would be severe, but the climate
could take several years to return to its previous state after
the perturbation, if indeed it ever could [20].
There is currently no consensus on when we will
be capable of deliberately altering the amount of energy
our planet absorbs. What is clear is that, even if scientific
advancement were to allow the advent of an air-conditioned
Earth, political and economic factors would still be a serious
problem. Negotiations over when and how to employ such
radical measures need to begin soon, so that an international
framework is already in place should we ever need to undertake
such drastic measures, and before any risks become reality.
Regulations to control the pollution that deposited acid rain
on Scandinavia were agreed only after the damage had been
done [21], but with the possibility of deliberate attempts to
modify the climate, such agreements must be made before
any country could start geoengineering projects.
Jenny Molloy is a 1st year reading Biological Natural Sciences
at Corpus Christi College.
[11] Patz, J. et al. Nature 2005, 438, 310–317.
[12] Fisher, G et al. Global Environ. Chang. 2004, 14, 53–67.
[13] New Scientist 2003 www.newscientist.com/article/dn4232-global-warming-will-
hurt-russia.html
[14] BBC 2007 news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6995999.stm
[15] BBC 2007 news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6927395.stm
[16] BBC 2007 news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7145608.stm
[17] UN 2007 www.un.org/aboutun/charter/
[18] Barrett, S. Environ. Resour. Econ. 2008, 39, 45–54.
[19] UN 1977 untreaty.un.org/English/UNEP/military_english.pdf
[20] Nature Reports: Climate Change 2007 www.nature.com/climate/2007/0708/full/
climate.2007.27.html
[21] Matthews, H.D. et al. P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 2007, 104, 9949–9954.
[22] Courtesy of the Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment
THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 45
BROWN
Brain Scans: Valid Legal Evidence
for Criminals?
Christie Ciarlo
I
n 1966, Charles Whitman, a student at the University
of Texas at Austin, climbed to the top of an observation
tower and murdered 14 people before being killed by the
police. Shortly before the incident, Whitman wrote, “lately
(I can’t recall when it started) I have been a victim of many
unusual and irrational thoughts. These thoughts constantly
recur and it requires a tremendous mental effort to con-
centrate on useful and progressive tasks” [1]. Later, when
doctors performed an autopsy on Whitman, they found that
he had a malignant brain tumor compressing his amygdala,
an area of the brain involved in the regulation of fear and
emotional responses.
It is easy to jump to the conclusion that the tumor must
have caused Whitman’s actions, especially considering his
writings. Yet experts still disagree as to whether the tumor
could have been the cause of Whitman’s actions, or if it
was even related. If different medical experts interpret the
results of a neuroimaging test very differently, is it legitimate
to allow them to be presented as evidence to a jury? Even
what seems to be a clearly relevant piece of evidence can be
denied admittance based on legal standards that require the
general acceptance of scientific evidence in its field.
In terms of criminal defense, neuroimaging results have
found erratic success and ubiquitous controversy in the United
States for the past 25 years. Two relevant legal defenses are
the diminished responsibility on the part of the defendant and
the excuse of insanity; the validity of each depends upon the
definition of pathology, which can be highly variable. Other
issues include reproducibility of results and the distinction
between association and causality. More fundamentally,
brain imaging studies are statistical analyses of groups of
people and cannot be directly applied to an individual with
certainty. In light of these difficulties, current standards for
the admissibility of scientific evidence are insufficient for
evaluating the appropriateness of neuroimaging results as
evidence in criminal defense.
Diminished Responsibility vs. Insanity
Neuroimaging results have been presented as evidence in
both determination of guilt and imposition of punishment. A
defense that has been supported by neuroimaging evidence
is that of mental impairment as a mitigating circumstance.
At least two cases have occurred in the United States in
which positron emission tomography (PET) scans have been
introduced as evidence of mental impairment and secured
a life sentence in place of the death penalty [2]. There have
been numerous other cases in which neuroimaging evidence
was successfully introduced but failed to sway the jury in
favor of the defendant.
A second defense is the excuse of insanity, which has
had several notable and somewhat surprising successes
involving the use of neuroimaging evidence. The federal
test for insanity requires determination of whether “at the
46 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
time of commission of the acts constituting the offense, the
defendant, as a result of severe mental disease or defect,
was unable to appreciate the nature and quality of the
wrongfulness of his acts” [3]. Most state legislatures have
adopted similar rules. The federal test for insanity was
implemented as the Insanity Defense Reform Act after
the acquittal of John Hinckley, Jr. in 1982. Hinckley shot
Ronald Reagan, attempting to assassinate him, and was
acquitted based on evidence of brain atrophy. A CT scan
indicated that Hinckley had enlarged sulci, or brain grooves,
contributing to the suggestion that he was schizophrenic: as
Dr. David Bear testified, one-third of schizophrenics have
enlarged sulci, as compared to 1 in 50 non-schizophrenics
[4]. Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity, and
after the trial several jurors acknowledged the importance
that the psychiatric testimony played in their decision [5].
It seems that in the case of the Hinckley trial the ability for
evidence to mislead was commensurate with its usefulness
as an indicator of disease.
Interpreting Abnormality
The defenses supported by neuroimaging evidence depend
on determining the point at which a neurological abnormality
becomes pathological. Without the distinction between
abnormality and pathological abnormality (e.g. insanity),
one could imagine that the predisposition to violence could
be used to argue reduced responsibility on the part of the
defendant. The logical end of such reasoning implies a complete
overturn of the current standard on which legal punishment
is based: the premise of free will. If the distinction between
conscious action and mental predisposition is neglected, the
notion of a fair punishment collapses. Though recent research
suggests that the brain may begin to produce actions before
intention becomes conscious, the exoneration of criminals
based on a predisposition to violent or antisocial behavior
would be detrimental to public safety [6, 7].
Determining the boundary of mental pathology has
remained a difficult problem faced by psychologists, even with
the advent of functional neuroimaging techniques. Computed
tomography (CT), a structural neuroimaging technique, is
used to produce images similar to traditional x-ray images,
which show differential tissue density. Magnetic resonance
imaging (MRI) can distinguish tissue types by analyzing
the relaxation times of protons in a magnetic field. More
recently developed functional neuroimaging techniques such
as functional MRI (fMRI), PET, and single photon emission
computed tomography (SPECT) produce images indicating
metabolic activity in different brain regions based on glucose
or oxygen consumption. These images provide a wealth
of information not only on the functions of different brain
areas but also on time dependent patterns, the significance
of which is only beginning to be discovered. However, in
terms of identifying disease, neuroimaging has not advanced
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 BROWN

past the point of association, an issue that played a central the method [2, 10]. On the other hand, in People v. Weinstein
role in the Hinckley trial. Certain patterns of brain activity (1992), PET scan images, which showed reduced brain function
are associated with certain diseases, but the associations are in and around a cyst in the defendant’s frontal lobe, were
not exclusive: healthy individuals may demonstrate these successfully introduced under Frye as evidence that he was
patterns as well. not responsible for his actions: Weinstein was charged with
Diseases whose existence in individuals has been manslaughter rather than murder [11, 12].
supported by neuroimaging evidence include schizophrenia, The fact that the same analytical method was determined
bipolar disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Others to be “generally accepted” by one court and not by another
have produced evidence of decreased activity or size in an points to the insufficiency of such a standard in determining
area of the brain, often in the frontal lobe. The frontal lobe the appropriateness of neuroimaging in criminal trials.
includes the prefrontal cortex, an area of the brain that, along Neuroimaging confounds the idea of general acceptability
with the temporo-limbic region, has been shown to function by prompting the question: the general acceptability of what?
abnormally in individuals with It is generally accepted that
psychopathic disorders. A functional neuroimaging can
main theory of psychopathic display levels of metabolic
disorders points to deficits in activity, but what those patterns
anticipation of rewards and of metabolic activity mean is
punishments, which has still largely unverified. It is
been shown to correlate with generally accepted that certain
abnormal prefrontal activity metabolic patterns correlate
[9]. Studies such as these point statistically with disease
to a physical basis for criminal states, but correlation is not
behavior, but neuroscience causation, and the consistency
has no way of determining of the correlations themselves
causality—whether abnormal is far from ideal. This is not to
brain activity can be said to say that neuroimaging should
cause violent or anti-social be completely excluded from
behavior or if the two are evidence in criminal trials, for
inextricably tied. it has the potential to offer
valuable insight, especially
Admissibility of Scientific in the cases of defendants
Evidence with traumatic brain injuries.
Standards regarding the Practical rules for the
admissibility of scientific admittance of neuroimaging
evidence are referred to in evidence should include well-
terms of the cases in which demonstrated correlations
they were established: the of results identifying brain
Frye approach and the structure or activity with brain
Daubert approach [10]. The disease or damage, as well as
Frye approach, established in Reproduced from [13]. verification of the significance

1923, states that the science upon of these results by multiple

which evidence is based should have “gained acceptance in
the particular field in which it belongs,” while the Daubert
approach, established in 1993, puts forth four criteria under
which the judge should determine admissibility: general
acceptance in the relevant scientific community, testability,
subjection to peer review and publication, and known or
potential error rate. Neuroimaging results have been both
admitted and rejected under these rules. For example, in
the 2001 case of People v. Protsman, the defense attempted
to admit a PET scan demonstrating decreased frontal lobe
activity due to traumatic brain injury, but the scan was denied
admittance under Frye due to lack of “general acceptance” of
unbiased experts. Science, aided by large data sets, aims to
understand by constantly questioning its own theories, which
evolve over long periods of time. Law, on the other hand,
holds standards based on traditional precedents and aims to
judge individuals in a limited time span. These fundamental
differences make the introduction of neuroimaging results
as legal evidence uniquely challenging.
Christie Ciarlo is a senior studying Physics at Brown
University.

References: [6] B. Libet, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 8, 529-566 (1985).

[1] G. M. Lavergne, A sniper in the tower: the Charles Whitman murders (University
of North Texas Press, Denton, 1997).
[2] The President’s Council on Bioethics. Staff working paper: An Overview of the
Impact of Neuroscience Evidence in Criminal Law. (2004; http://www.bioethics.gov/
background/neuroscience_evidence.html).
[3] R. F. Becker, Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology 18, 41-45 (2003).
[4] United States v. Hinckley, 525 F. Supp. 1324 (D.D.C. 1981).
[5] D. Linder, The Trial of John Hinckley (University of Missouri-Kansas City Law School,
2002; http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hinckley/ACCOUNT.HTM).
[7] D. M. Wegner, Trends in Cognitive Science 7, 65-69 (2003).
[8] N. Eastman, C. Campbell, Nautre Reviews Neuroscience 7, 311-318 (2006).
[9] D. Mairead, Hospital Medicine 6, 337-340 (2002).
[10] People v. Protsman, 88 Cal. App. 4th 509 (2001).
[11] B. Garland, P. W. Glimcher, Current Opinion in Neurobiology 16, 130-134
(2006).
[12] People v. Weinstein, 591 N.Y.S.2d 715 (Sup. Ct. 1992).
[13] http://www.calbar.ca.gov/calbar/images/CBJ/2008/BrainScanArt.jpg

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 47
BROWN
The Tendency toward Being: Thermodynamics
and the Origin of Complexity
John Szymanski
S
cience explains how things work— it is a reasoned
response to the fundamental human sense of wonder
at existence. Facing the challenge of explaining the
enormous complexity of the universe, early scientists began
to break it down into parts, explaining each on its own
terms. Following this reductionist paradigm, in the past
few centuries humanity has witnessed tremendous progress
in understanding phenomena at every level of complexity,
from the basic physical nature of matter and energy to the
intricate biochemical systems that constitute an organism.
Scientific inquiry has elucidated complex interactions within
many fields, but where did that complexity come from, and
why does it exist in the first place? A thermodynamic view
of the question presents a paradox: if the universe can only
tend toward disorder as entropy increases irreversibly, how
can we account for the existence of order, for the presence
of the sort of coherent structures that can fall apart?
A March Toward Homogeneity
Classical thermodynamics examines energy in isolated
systems within adiabatic boxes. In his 1824 Reflections on
the Motive Power of Fire, Sadi Carnot revealed that heat can
do useful work only in its transmission from a hot body to
a cold body, through its coherent motion. In 1865, Rudolph
Figure 1: A cross-sectional diagram of Bénard cells in thermal convection. Reproduced from [8].
48 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008
Clausius termed this spreading-out of heat “entropy.” Heat
flows from hot to cold, and once that gradient is gone, it is
lost irreversibly to entropy. When heat is distributed evenly,
entropy is maximized and the system is in equilibrium. This
became the second law of thermodynamics: the entropy
of an isolated system will not decrease over time. Non-
thermal forms of energy all contain a certain amount of
free energy, or capacity to do work. In the process of doing
useful work, some energy is always lost to heat, irreversibly
generating entropy [1]. Thus, entropy gives us an “arrow
of time,” an essential asymmetry between before and after
that seems intuitively obvious but is absent in the reversible
laws of physics. Physical equations relating the behavior
of objects operate the same forwards and backwards, but
homogenization—the production of entropy—is one-way
[2].
Viewing the universe as an isolated system, the question
arises as to why it does not seem to be approaching equilibrium.
Far from a homogeneous mixture of matter with a uniform
temperature, we find ourselves in universe full of differentiated
features on all scales. In the fundamental proliferation of
matter after the Big Bang, from whence sprang the immense
complexity of galaxies, stars, planets and life if no process
can decrease the total entropy of the universe?
© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
 BROWN

Crucially, there was space

for the hot matter from the big
bang to disperse and cool off.
At the extraordinarily high
temperatures present at the
beginning, the random motion
of heat dominated the effect of all
other forces. Once things cooled
sufficiently by expansion, the
force of gravity began to take
precedence, pulling any regions
of slightly higher density together
into planets and stars, whose
internal reactions emit energy
to their surroundings [3].
Still, the complexity of structures
surrounding us cannot be
explained by mere gravitational
clumping. A clod doesn’t do
much but get bigger and hotter.
Beyond heterogeneity, there must
be a mechanism for the formation Figure 2: A ten second exposure of Bénard cells from above visualized with suspended aluminum flakes. Reproduced from
[9].
of coherent structure—that is, systems that do something—
while the total entropy of the universe increases. The crux from the previous homogeneity. In this process of thermal
is that nothing in the real world is isolated. Far from the convection, hot fluid at the bottom rises to the top due to
insulated adiabatic boxes of classical thermodynamic study, its lower density, where it loses its heat through the top
real systems are open to exchange with their surroundings. surface, regaining density and flowing back down (Fig. 1).
The field of nonequilibrium thermodynamics studies these An ordered structure of hexagonal cells develops in which
open systems: when energy flows through matter, things fluid rises through the center of each before sinking along its
begin to get interesting. edges. Adjacent cells, viewed in cross section, flow alternately
clockwise and counterclockwise, facilitating the efficient
Nonequilibrium and Self-Organized Coherence transfer of hot fluid up and cold fluid down [4] (Fig. 2).
A relatively simple system in which to examine energy flow Spontaneous cyclical motion of the fluid is amplified when
is the transfer of heat through a fluid. In an experiment first it is energetically favorable: when it hastens the dispersal of
performed in 1900 by Henri Bénard, the space between two the thermal gradient, accelerating the production of entropy
closely-spaced parallel plates is filled with a fluid. Without outside of its borders. In this way, complex structures are
any heat input (ΔT=0), the liquid quickly homogenizes to compatible with the second law of thermodynamics—their
an equilibrium state with entropy at a maximum. If the low-entropy internal structure serves to generate entropy
system is perturbed with a transient introduction of heat elsewhere, increasing the net entropy of the universe through
or coherent motion, the effects quickly die out as entropy local organization [5].
maximizes once again. An equilibrium state is stable, and
quickly returns following random perturbation. Metastable dissipative structures
When the fluid is heated from below, it is brought out Once Bénard cells are established, their structure and direction
of equilibrium. If heat is added slowly (ΔT is small), it is stable while the heat gradient is maintained. The flow
simply conducts through the stationary fluid. The only of energy keeps them in a state termed meta-stable by the
difference from equilibrium is that the bottom is hotter than American statistician Alfred Lotka, but their initial direction
the top— this is thermal conduction. is entirely dependent on chance [6]. As ΔT is increased past
When the rate of heating is increased past a critical ΔTC, the system goes through a bifurcation in which chance
value (Δtc) determined by the fluid’s viscosity, something fluctuations determine whether each cell flows clockwise or
extraordinary happens: a coherent motion of fluid develops counterclockwise. This sort of metastable structure retains
its order while energy is flowing through it, but falls into
disordered equilibrium when the energy flow ceases.
The Belgian physicist Ilya Prigogine advanced the
What the thermodynamics study of these “far-from-equilibrium” systems that are open
of complexity can offer is an to the flow of energy and material. He coined the term
dissipative structures for systems that cohere to dissipate
explanation for the existence of an energy gradient that exists across their auspices. Similar
coherent structure in general. organization can be seen in many natural phenomena. In
a whirlpool, water molecules move in a spiral to facilitate
quicker draining, dissipating gravitational potential energy.
A hurricane dissipates the temperature gradient between the

© 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved. THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 49
BROWN

warm ocean and the cold upper atmosphere. Indeed, the series of bifurcations in which distinct populations of
entropic dissipation of energy seems to be the purpose of all successive generations stumbled upon a better way to
structured behavior of matter. If organized systems did not access a certain kind of energy, increasing their fitness
dissipate energy gradients and produce entropy, they would and prevalence wherever its source is found. Thus, life
not be energetically favorable, and would not exist. Energy diversified by natural selection to fill all energetic niches
dissipation is thus the utility of all macroscale structure with the immense variety
under the strict parsing of of reproducing dissipative
thermodynamic law, and the structures that we see on earth
reason why it exists. Each today.
instance of life on earth is Empirical truth often conflicts
also a dissipative structure, its with traditional worldviews
coherent organization serving that explain the origin of
to generate entropy outside of ourselves and the things
its boundaries [7]. around us, providing people
with a sense of purpose and
Reproduction, Evolution, and identity. As such, science may
Increasing Complexity be criticized for debasing these
All living things are metastable beliefs while failing to provide
dissipative structures: without any satisfactory answers of
energy input, they die. Be it in its own. Indeed, science can
the form of sunlight or food, all provide no specific explanation
organisms need energy to keep for why we exist on this
their low-entropy organized planet with these particular
structure together, and their surroundings—it is the result of
use of that energy dissipates it, eons of whimsical bifurcation.
generating entropy externally. What the thermodynamics
The key to life’s complexity is of complexity can offer is an
its ability to reproduce—to save explanation for the existence of
its current metastable state in coherent structure in general.
the genetic code of its progeny The purpose of organized
before it succumbs to entropy matter is to facilitate the
within its body, to inevitable production of entropy. Each
death and decay. structure taps into a cache
The evolutionary of energy, using it to sustain
development of the its metastable organization
astoundingly complex and continue its dissipative
purposeful structure of each existence, increasing the net
protein in a living system (not entropy of the universe in
to mention the interactions agreement with the second
between them) was made law of thermodynamics.
possible by the storage of its
structure in DNA, a molecule
John Szymanski is an undergraduate
stable enough to replicate
at Brown University.
functional systems while
Figure 3: A hurricane brings heat from the ocean into the cold upper atmosphere.
allowing the minor changes Reproduced from [10]
necessary for natural selection. It is not known how the
first reproductive system came about, but once complex
metastable states could be revisited, each generation gained
the opportunity to build upon the fitness of its progenitor.
Within this paradigm, living structures went through a

References: [7] Schneider & Sagan, 2005.

[1] J. Gowan. “’Heat’ as the currency of work.” General Systems, Graviation, and the
Unified Field Theory. 2008. Cornell University. 28 June 2008. < http://people.cornell.
edu/pages/jag8/heat.html>
[2] I. Prigogine, I. Stengers. Order Out of Chaos. (New Science Library, 1984)
[3] I. Prigogine, I. Stengers, 1984. p. 126
[4] I. Prigogine, G. Nicolis, Exploring Complexity. (W.H. Freeman and Company,
1989), pp. 9-12.
[5] E. Schneider, J. Kay. Mathematical and Computer Modeling. 19:25-38 (1994).
[6] E. Schneider, D. Sagan. Into the Cool. (The University of Chicago Press, 2005),
p. 79.
[8] “Convection cells.” Wikipedia. 2007. 21 July 2008. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Image:ConvectionCells.svg>
[9] “Rayleigh-Benard Convection Cells.” Pattern Formation. 1982. Environmental
Technology Lab, National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration. 21 July 2008.
<http://www.etl.noaa.gov/about/eo/science/convection/RBCells.jpg>
[10] National Science Foundation. 21 July 2008. <http://www.nsf.gov/news/overviews/
chemistry/assets/photo_q1.jpg>
[11] “Food web.” Field Trip Guide. 1998. Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation,
United States Geological Survey. 21 July 2008. <http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/1998/of98-805/
lessons/chpt11/foodweb.gif>

50 THE TRIPLE HELIX October 2008 © 2008, The Triple Helix, Inc. All rights reserved.
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