[ExI] Problem with Pattents

Tue Mar 4 01:23:14 UTC 2008

On Mon, Feb 25, 2008 at 11:10 PM, Tom Tobin <korpios at korpios.com> wrote:

>
> I think you discount the potential of open-source, collaborative means
> of invention and authorship; given the currently available body of
> ideas and a mandate to go nuts (and maybe a RepRap), why shouldn't the
> same blooming of useful creative work happen in other fields just as
> with computer programming?

### I am warmly supportive of open-source programming, and any donation of
intellectual property to the public domain. However, the vast majority of
useful products involve *toil* rather than fun which is why most people
making them want to get paid.

-----------------------------------------------------------

 Insofar as *feelings* go, I actually believe that all IP is unethical;just
as a conviction that all slavery is unethical, this doesn't stemfrom reason
or a cost/benefit analysis.

### I think that Stefano answered this well but let me add some more.

The essence of property is the right of exclusion. This legal theory posits
that all the other rights usually bundled in property rights are secondary
to this one fundamental right. Right of exclusion means that you have the
recourse to the legal system should somebody enter the property in question.
You may demand restitution, and even retribution so as to remain in sole
possession of your property.

If you say that IP is unethical, it means that you have no right to exclude
others from your own mind, wouldn't you say? It is unethical to own ideas
and thoughts, such as the invention of a new mousetrap, or a new poem,
therefore you have no right to deny access to such thoughts. Should somebody
demand the source code to the web page you created, you must obey. You don't
own your intellectual creations, remember?

So, are you going to humbly obey and regurgitate the contents of your mind
to all comers? Or do we need to use some "persuasion" to get our due?

-----------------------------------------------------------

>
>
> Conflating IP with physical property gets far too messy for the point
> of any analogy to shine through.

### I am exquisitely aware of the differences between the various forms of
tangible, intangible and intellectual property. The PC IP
(perpetual-competitive IP) in propose is an attempt to make IP more like
tangible property, and I know what I am doing, since tangible property is in
general easier to own (i.e. establish the rights of exclusion) than IP.

---------------------------------------------------------

>
> Yes and no; my feelings don't help me reach goals, but they're also
> the reason I *have* goals in the first place.  If my desire is a
> zero-IP world, then all the cost/benefit analysis in the world doesn't
> really do me any good.

### Not quite. Most of our desires are secondary, they exist in the context
of certain beliefs about the world. You may strongly desire a "strong man"
to lead the country, if you believe that this is what it takes to make you
safe, and you may enthusiastically wave flags, march and beat up "others".
Once you grow up, and see that strongmen don't make anybody better off, that
desire may subside. Lots of desires are lost as we grow up, and understand
the trade-offs better.

 -------------------------------------------------------------

>
> >  Now, since you seem to speak with a great degree of conviction,
> >  claiming that IP limits innovation, how can you explain the plain fact
> >  that innovation is fastest in countries with strong IP laws? How does
> >  that play into your thesis?
>
> The economist's mantra: Correlation does not imply causation.

### Wait, you expressed a conviction that IP limits innovation.... based on
what data? Correlation does imply a direct or indirect causal relationship
between quantities, it just doesn't prove it, and by itself does not give
you the direction of causation. Positive correlation between IP and
innovation implies that either IP helps to innovate, or innovation leads to
IP, or there is a positive feedback loop between them, or there is a common
cause for both IP and innovation. It most definitely does not imply that IP
limits innovation. Most beliefs about causation are indeed built from
correlations, especially once mechanistic theories of cause and effect are
developed to explain correlation.

Therefore, my statement adduces circumstantial evidence against your claim,
so you need to give arguments of your own. It's just as if we were arguing
if high horsepower engines help cars drive faster,  and you dismissed the
positive correlation between the two as *mere* correlation, claiming that
engines make cars slower.

--------------------------------------------------------

> Besides the current unfeasibility (which I won't hold against it —
> we're on a transhumanist list, after all), what happens to those who
> don't want to play the game?  What happens to people who want to
> dedicate their work to the public domain?  If they "reinvent"
> something, are all the royalties to the other inventors cancelled?
>

### Do I really need to spell it out? Whoever generates an IP, can charge
any price whatsoever, which means he can give it away to everybody for free.
Other inventors can of course still charge money but nobody is forced to buy
from them. Every customer is free to choose between them.

------------------------------------------------

 >Anything involving mind-scanning strikes me as horrid; I'm even infavor of
laptops
>and other mental prostheses receiving complete

> privacy protection from all outside parties, including governments
> with search permits.  So as a means for figuring out who "reinvented"
> something, err, I'd pass.

### Mind-scanning is going to happen, so you'd better make sure the law is
on your side. If you think IP is unethical, what recourse do you have to
deny others access to your thoughts?

Nobody would force you to be mind-scanned under PC IP. You would volunteer
only if you wanted to make money on an invention.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

>
> Ultimately, I'll readily admit that I wouldn't care *how* cheap IP
> might be under this system: the notion that I might hear about an
> invention and be forever tainted is simply too awful.

### What do you mean by "tainted"? If you heard about an invention and
wanted to make money off it, you could always have the memory removed and
try to reinvent it. Or else, you could use the memory to try and invent
something even better and make even more money. I don't see how it would
taint you.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

> >  You might find it easier to think about IP like you do about bread.
>
> Except that I can't think bread into existence, or, more aptly, I
> can't create a clone of a piece of bread (or a Platonic ideal of
> bread) that exists somewhere else already by thinking it up.  And with
> bread, the baker no longer has it if I take it.  (Can you tell I don't
> like analogies with physical property?)  ^_^

### Indeed, Intellectual property does not have the "exclusivity property"
that is inherent in most forms of tangible and some intangible property.
This is a true difference, however  it is not substantive to my argument.
Can you elaborate on why do you think that lack of exclusivity is a decisive
argument against IP?

----------------------------------------------------

Again, ideas are *nothing whatsoever* like bread.  Hell, we need to

> stop using the term *IP* (I've been guilty of it, too), because it's
> not *property*, it's a government-granted monopoly right.

### So, just to go back to basics, what is "property"? And why can't you
imagine privately managed IP? Did I ever imply that what I want is
government-controlled IP? Knowing my aversion to the gummint, you should
expect I want the opposite.

Rafal
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