tadmjones
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2022 -
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Posts posted by tadmjones
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Ayn Rand was very explicit to define property rights over material objects (see #91). Isn't this enough to explain it from the point of view of Objectivism?
Also this:
I think you are asking all the wrong questions here:
Look at this from this perspective:
If you have a sandwich and you eat is. You have exercised your right on your property. But now it's consumed.
If you have an idea and you use it for whatever, you still have that idea.
If you have a patch of land and you rent it for 50 years. You can't do anything else with it during that time.
If you have an idea and you use it this morning, you can use it again in the afternoon!
If you have a car and you drive it to work. Your wife needs to find other means of transportation. The car can't be in two places.
If you have an idea and you use it for yourself. Then you can share it with your wife and she can apply it. Guess what? You can still continue to utilize that idea. So can your wife.
It is not economics. It's the difference in nature, difference between mental entities and material entities.
All of these examples(of practical applications of property) accurately describe instances of me enjoying disposal over my property, but in a society with a government based on a theory of negative rights as it relates to the individuals that make up that society, where do these examples show other people using my property?
Why are not my ideas just as scarce as my car?
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Muhuk re google
My question was an honest one. I thought I remember you as stating in perhaps another thread , that since Rand wrote about property rights and copyrights patents, that the innovations in IT have change the paradigm as relates to IP. Perhaps I misremember.
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The question was not if ownership applies only to physical objects, but why does,it only apply to physical objects.Any idea can be viewed as seperate from other ideas.
Any idea is different than any other idea except itself. Even if the difference between two ideas are infinitesimal, they would still be unique with respect of each other.
So your question:
...becomes:
(Emphasis mine.)
Here is my answer: why, not. I would recognize an idea as an existent or entity.
Ayn Rand seems to agree with me on this:
However, your other question:
I still say no, ideas cannot be owned. And if that statement is too jarring; the concept of ownership cannot be applied to ideas. And if that statement is too strawmanish or google-treasurehunt-worthy; the concept of ownership can only be applied to material objects. 3 ways of saying the same thing.
This is my honest and straightforward answer. I'd be happy to expand on anything that doesn't make sense.
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Is this a reference to page ranking or some algorithm they have protected? Or about posters cutting and pasting and implying unoriginal responses , but then you could have said Wikipedia.Right. But you forgot appeal to googleTM.
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By violently prevent, I assume you mean to call in the govt gunslingers when some one claims a violation of IP.No, it is not easy (at least for me) to see why one man's use of an idea should lead to him violently preventing another man's use of that same idea.
Do you also oppose violently preventing bicycle theft?
Because it seems your anti IP stance is grounded in the protection of the imitators from the govtmuse of force per se regardless the validity of the offense.
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Because you can't eat your lunch if I have eaten it, but you can use an idea which I have used. The lunch issue is what economists refer to as "scarcity". Scarcity does not apply to ideas. They don't get "used up" and one person's use does not preclude another person's use.
How does the consumption of the good affect the assignment of the rightful owner?
You could take my lunch by force and eat it, but that doesn't mean you owned it in a legal or moral sense. So I don't follow your use of the economic term in this instance.
How does the scarcity principle apply to rights in land property?
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muhuk said in #118
"Also you haven't addressed any of my questions in #108. Was I wrong to think that you knew what you were talking about?"
By discrete idea, I meant an idea that can be viewed as separate from other ideas.
By unique idea , I meant an idea that is unlike any other.
I was being facetious when I used identifiable, based on the fact that we keep using the word idea and I assumed we were refering to a referent in reality, so identifiable would be redundant.
And then I just listed them, so perhaps just embellishment. But look around, you must see that I am one of, if not the least articulate posters on this forum.
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I think you are trying to steer the discussion from an abstract, principles level to a more practical level and discuss the applications and practical consequences of IP. But you are making a big mistake by implying that principles change based on social context (the `yes` part of your answer).
Yes, that is exactly what I am doing. Principles divorced from their practical applications and consequences are useless. I never said principles change, the idea I was trying to convey is that IP or the trade thereof can only arise in a civilized, division of labor society based on the principles of capitalism.
And I am not sure what you mean by part of O'ism , does this mean a citation by Rand herself(or her intellectual heir(?)?).
As for compatible , I think, it certainly is. I do not see why a widget design can not in principle be property. Obviously if it can, I assume you would agree that the principle of property rights in the O'ist sense would be satisfied.
So it seems the argument is whether or not the principle of ownership is only applicable to physicality.
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What difference does it make? Do (material) property rights cease to exist in a primitive society or a communist one? Are certain principles, like IP, dependent upon the context?.
Yes and no, the principle of property rights is based or founded on the immutable nature of man qua being. Societies that recognize and implement laws to protect ownership are or can be established. Principles are man made , epistemologic, but based on objective reality.
Ownership , the right to disposal of a thing , is protected in society by principled actions of those individuals that make up society. Society is the abstraction whose referent is the aggregate actions of the individuals subsumed under that particular group , this or that society.
I contend in LFC society, it is reasonable to develope principles that would protect ownership rights in things like widget designs.
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DonAthos
My comments were an answer to your scenario, but directed to muhuk in that post to flesh out or start to set a context in which I see how the property of property (in conjunction with the concept ownership)is assigned , or manifests, to things.
The context of a civilized division of labor society is the only context that the validity of IP can be discussed, yes?
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an example of a discrete unique idea would be the design of a widget that does 'x', or a novel whichever
and as an aside, my answer to Franz's piano woud be that if Franz lived in isolation from society there would be no need for the abstraction ownership, if Wolfgang alone showed up, they may use ownership to politely denote specific items among themselves but still very lttle context in which to use the concept.
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My statement about wet was admittedly snarky, but my moronic attempt was to present the question in pass/agg, socratic, rhetoric, kinda way.
Why is it that the concept of ownership can only apply to physical objects? Why can't an identifiable , discrete, and unique idea, eg a widget design be recognized as an existent or entity ?
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Do you still consider it a straw man if I rephrase it like this:
All properties are purely physical objects.
Is the phrase suppose to mean, "the abstraction 'ownership' can only apply to physical objects"? I do not thik that you meant" 'wet' is a physical object".
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Assuming rational standard/practice of recognizing an innovator's creation or idea and registration thereof ie patents, copyrights and such, why would violations be criminal and not civil? It seems must opponents of IP argue based on the idea that such violations are not actual violations of NAP. Why would the onus of prosecution necessarily be on the government , doesn't making it a civil matter (meaning the injured party has to prove ownership rights and show that the guilty party knowingly abused their rights) reduce the opponent position?
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Let me see if I have this straight: our elected officials are serving us best by "being in office, to ensure one or the other party is the problem." And then, "they are the solution and that works because the majority of the voting public decide on that premise." Based on what evidence do you contend that "that works"? What is it that works? Government?
To be certain, politicians will not change our national cultural or philosophical norms. And if Libertarian leaders cannot stay true to a laissez-faire capitalist agenda, there is no reason to openly support them. I would defend their attempts to direct the national discourse toward a more capitalist system. But how can you defend the Republican or Democrats? Merely because they have "figured out the best way at being in office"?
My point is that I think the entrenched two party system serves career politicians well. Libertarian candidates as a whole may be more ideologically motivated, but I do not share their 'ideology'. I agree with certain ideas that 'they ' seem to hold, but I do not think there is an integrated philosophy behind the various ideas touted as 'libertarian'.
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Repairman
Cynical,or not I think the major parties and their politicians have figured out the best way to succeed at being in office is to ensure one or the other party is the problem and they are the solution and that works because the majority of the voting public decide on that premise.
They are not my Republicans or Democrats, the are our statists ,if only of varying degrees. I doubt political change will drive philosophic or cultural change. The culture will have to rediscover the ideas of individual rights and what recognition and protection of those rights entails.
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Repairman
Would you call yourself a Libertarian or libertarian ?
Do you recognize an integrated libertarian school of thought (philosophy)?
Or do you agree with certain planks in their political platform, and therefore see their candidates as worthy of support?
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I was surprised at the author's view of the 'genesis' of property rights , along with rights in general. In another blog post he discusses various contexts in which rights should be viewed the most fundamental being 'inborn rights'. The comment section of that blog post is worth the read.
I am somewhat confused as there seems to be no difference between the Libertarian Party and the libertarian school of thought or movement at least in the article. Do people who identify as libertarian mean both always?
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I read Myth of the Robber Barons a few years ago, I may revisit it.
What does one expect when investing? At the least, partial ownership.
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In some respects it's funny that seemingly educated people can question what infants and turtles take for granted.
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Unlawful assembly is unlawful, that I agree. Though everything else is intent, and the participants' moral choices (even taken collectively) can not be judged separate from or in conjunction with assembly lawful or not.
A law that forbids trade with x, y, or z group is an inappropriate use of force . Organizing a demonstration that unreasonably impedes the free movement of nonparticipants(physically blocking a store front) is a use of force against private property and free association and legal action should be taken against the organizers and participants. Simply disseminating the idea that one should not purchse the products of x,y, or z should not be considered a restraint of trade punishable by law. It is a restraint or an effort to bring restraint, targeted even, i fail to see it as an immoral(action) use of force.
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The difference is that the shun/boycott of an individual isn't coercive, because choosing whether or not to buy someones product is a free market choice, the goal being to promote free trade. Success or failure is determined by a marketers ability to attract a customers, given that they don't have to buy. By contrast, organizing consumers not to buy someones product is coercive because the goal is to force the marketer to perform other than he freely chooses to do. Are potential customers who are offended by a particular marketers practice, entitled to run him out of business?
Vigilantes "freely associate" to coerce, and their actions contradict law.
There is no 'goal' of a free market, other than that individual traders receive what they consider value in an exchange, voluntarily. The promotion of a free market is the realm of politics, the principles by which a societyshould be organized to facilitate free trade ie recognition of individual rights and the removal of force from personal interactions.
Is the coercive aspect to be found in the action of acquiescing and participating in a boycott, or in the organization and suggestion of participation in a boycott?
If it is in the former, how is participation in a boycott a use of force, the literal not taking action (not trading)? Or if it is the latter, how is suggestion to others that they refrain from taking action a use of force? It seems they could only be force if the withholding of trade violated someone's property rights, which I assume you would agree can only be violated by an act of force. Is withholding of action, an action ?
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GR8 Topic - Thanks for posting
Individually, the choice to shun/boycott is a moral action, however socially, the choice to shun/boycott is a political action. I draw this distinction because it's fairly obvious that free association among individuals includes the freedom not to associate for any reason, whereas organized efforts to publicly chastise a particular individual/company involves coercion according to some form of social justice and therefore requires legal justification.
Would a free market society promote actions that are essentially political? It seems to me that organized efforts to shun/boycott sanction the use of force, and therefore contradict the practice of a FMS where one expects an individual/company to succeed or fail non-coercively. In my mind, the appropriate venue for achieving the goal of a social shun/boycott is in the courts; the threshold for action being primarily a legal one.
How does individuals' or even groups of individuals' right to free association amount to coercion , do they owe their current or future economic trade to anyone , other than those they have agreed to trade with?
Intellectual Property: A Thought Experiment
in Political Philosophy
Posted
Without engaging in equine juxtaposition, like answering my question about the moral principle of ownership with an economic term , why is stealing a bike wrong? But please don't start with NAP, it is not fundamental to morality or politics , it is a principle that describes the moral use of force. Saying that the only way to violate rights is by the use of force is not the justification of morality.