On May 18, 1995, nearly two hundred religious leaders joined with biotechnology critic Jeremy Rifkin in a press conference named the “Joint Appeal against Human and Animal Patenting,” a move that many within the biotechnology industry could only interpret as seeking to inhibit biotechnological advances. What moral and religious concerns motivated this challenge to patenting? How could the biotechnology industry understand and respectfully attend to these concerns? What values were at play in the debates that followed the joint appeal? What lessons for future dialogue can be learned from attempts at conversation between the opposing positions? This supplement—the report of a Hastings Center research project of the Values and Biotechnology Program—addresses these questions.

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