mwm@ucbtopaz.CC.Berkeley.ARPA (01/01/70)
In article <5366@utzoo.UUCP> laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) writes: >Whoops! <mike wants to do away with ``intellectual property''? >Whatever for? If I don't have the right to my own thoughts, then >how can I have the right to anything else? I'm using "intellectual property" in the same sense as it's used when talking about copyright and patent protection. I don't want to do away with your ownership of your thoughts. However, I reject the notion that you can own the copy you've given to someone else. The stance is similar to RMS's (is he listening??) stance on software, extended to cover the other kinds of intellectual property. Minus, of course, the implication that it's your duty to give your work to someone else. You are perfectly free to take your thoughts and hide them from the world. I'd consider such action antisocial, somewhat like not donating to charities. Something to be discouraged, but not justification for using force on the perpetrator. To put the boot on the other foot, can you justify using force on other people so they won't give away (legally obtained) copies of your software, if you don't have a contract with them to prevent such action? <mike
mwm@ucbtopaz.CC.Berkeley.ARPA (03/26/85)
In article <1853@sdcrdcf.UUCP> jonab@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Jonathan Biggar) writes: >>Not in my libertarian society, he didn't. The dead don't have property >>rights to be violated, so they can't state what the money should be >>used for. >Then your society isn't very libertarian. My society is every bit as libertarian as yours is, in that property rights are sacred. However, as it says above, in my society, your property rights end when you die. There are a variety of good reasons to do this, but the easiest one can be found in the use <-> own isomorphism. If you're dead, you obviously aren't using any property, hence can't own any. How can you give away something you don't own? >If I want to make a will >that designates the distribution of my worldly goods upon my death, >who are you to say that I can't do that? Is this any different than >putting money in a trust fund for my benificiary with the agreement >that as long as I live I can do anything I want with the money in >the fund? Yes, it is. In the trust fund case, you've established joint ownership of the funds before you died. >In a true libertarian society, my heirs have NO right to any of my >property, but I have EVERY right to give it to whomever I please >when I die. If you replace the word "when" with the word "before," I agree completely. Obviously, we have different definitions of "libertarian society." Yours is somewhat to the right of mine, but both are still libertarian societies. Granted that all libertarian societies respect property rights, that still leaves the question of "what is property" open. The practical definition is "property is that to which the state grants property rights." I find this unsatisfactory <- obvious sarcasm :->. I'm still working on a definition of "property" that fits my sense of propriety. It seems that if somebody using something doesn't deprive you (even temporarily) of the use of the property, then your property rights haven't been violated. As pointed out above, not allowing an inheritance doesn't violate any property rights. Likewise, the concept of "intellectual property" vanishes. Any comments from the hordes of the net? <mike
laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (03/28/85)
Whoops! <mike wants to do away with ``intellectual property''? Whatever for? If I don't have the right to my own thoughts, then how can I have the right to anything else? Laura Creighton utzoo!laura
mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) (03/31/85)
>Granted that all libertarian societies respect property rights, that >still leaves the question of "what is property" open. The practical >definition is "property is that to which the state grants property >rights." I find this unsatisfactory <- obvious sarcasm :->. I'm still >working on a definition of "property" that fits my sense of propriety. >It seems that if somebody using something doesn't deprive you (even >temporarily) of the use of the property, then your property rights >haven't been violated. As pointed out above, not allowing an inheritance >doesn't violate any property rights. Likewise, the concept of >"intellectual property" vanishes. > >Any comments from the hordes of the net? > > <mike In England, I was brought up to understand that there was no trespass without damage. In other words, if you did no damage someone's land or belongings, you could go anywhere you liked. I don't know whether this was or is true, but it seems like an idea that should go into <mike's definitions of property in a libertarian state. As for "intellectual property" it is precisely there that your "property" IS damaged if someone else uses it, because you can't sell your gizmo for as much if someone else is using your ideas to make gizmos that compete with yours. -- Martin Taylor {allegra,linus,ihnp4,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt {uw-beaver,qucis,watmath}!utcsri!dciem!mmt
garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) (04/02/85)
(I deleted a bunch of the articles listed under references; I hope no one is upset by that fact. The list was quite long.) Replying to <mike's reply to me: > In article <764@bunker.UUCP> garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) writes: > >2) Such a trust fund would be more complicated > >than a will, on average, and would therefore mean more money for > >lawyers and less for those I want to get it. > Interesting claim - and I suspect wrong. Do you have any proof, like a > comparison of the weight of paper describing the same size trust fund > and will? Of course I don't have proof; we are talking about something which would be done in hypothetical Libertaria. > >I thought one of the principles of libertarianism is to make > >things simpler. > Making the law simpler is among the aims of libertarianism. "Things" > would be more complicated for most people, as they couldn't depend on > the state to prevent them from doing something stupid. Then you agree that the trust fund, set up to achieve the effects now achieved by a will, would probably be more complicated. > >I can promise now that what I own will be someone else's, > >effective when such-and-such an event occurs. If the specified > >event is my death, than the promise is called a will. > Yes, but what if you no longer own it after such-and-such event? That's > the point: after you're dead, you have no rights to be violated, > including property rights. The transfer of ownership would be considered to be simultaneous with the death. Again we see that the trust I want to set up to replace the will must be more complicated; I am not a lawyer, but I am sure the trust can be worded to achieve the effect I want. "I hereby give to X (my heir), joint ownership of Y (my property), subject to the following terms: 1) As long as I am alive, such grant is revocable at any time for any reason or no reason; 2) As long as I am alive, my right to use, or determine the use of, Y overrides the rights of X to use or determine the use of Y." Now I think that that would have the same effect that a will has today, although it might take a few iterations in courts to nail it down. But it is certainly more complicated than "I bequeath Y to X." It certainly doesn't seem desirable to have property become the the government's when someone dies (as suggested by ?); if the government is too big now (which I believe, and I thought that libertarians did, too), then having it inherit everything, which will make it bigger, isn't a good idea. Giving things away in anticipation of death will delay but not prevent the government from owning everything. > >> It seems that if somebody using something doesn't deprive you (even > >> temporarily) of the use of the property, then your property rights > >> haven't been violated. > >This sounds like you think that as long as I'm not using my property > >(or can't for the moment, or don't want to), then it's all right > >for someone else to use it. I don't think that's what you mean, > >but I can't think of another interpretation. > That isn't what I meant. It seems even backwards of what I meant. Let me > try again (pause for thought). Ok, for hard property, if you can't > possibly *ever* use something, then somebody using the property won't > deprive you of the use of it. Any claim of "ownership" is ludicrous, > like you trying to claim the rings of saturn, or some european country > trying to claim the americas. I understand that claiming the rings of Saturn would be ludicrous, but some European countries could certainly use the Americas, so I don't understand what you mean by that example. How does claiming a parcel of land discontiguous from the land I currently stand upon differ from claiming a parcel of land adjacent to it? The only thing that prevents the Europeans from claiming the Americas (or vice versa) is the fact that the Americas are currently occupied. (Even that didn't stop the medieval Europeans from doing so.) For that matter, how do you know I can't *ever* use the rings of Saturn? > Assume that I buy some object X, and make a > copy of it via the fruits of my labor. It's mine, so I can do with it as > I like, right? Well, no, not if some "intellectual property" adheres to > it. I can't give it to someone else. In other words, the concept of > "intellectual property" means that I can't give the fruits of my labor > to someone else. This hardly seems like a libertarian ideal. You are also trying to give someone fruits of *my* labor -- inventing something, or writing a new novel (a redundant phrase) surely takes more labor than simply copying either. > >If you appropriate > >such intellectual property apart from the manner in which I have > >decided to distribute it, then you are depriving me of a portion of > >my living. Or are you really saying that I can only sell one copy > >of anything I write? > No, you can sell as many copies as you want (and can convince other > people to buy). It's just that you have to make sure that they don't > distribute it in a manner other than as you wish. If you give it to them > for some sum of money, then it's theirs, and they may do with it as they > wish, including give other people copies of it. If you make them sign a > contract stating what they will and won't do (like give it away), then > they will be held to that contract. I.e., copyrights and patents don't > exist, but trade secret still works. So you support the idea of intellectual property, if it is protected by trade secret, but not copyright or patent. Therefore, just as the effects of a will can be simulated by a sufficiently complicated trust fund, a copyright or patent can be simulated by a sufficiently complicated trade secret agreement. I predict that a group of lawyers will get together and write a standardized trade secret agreement, design a suitable logo to replace the (C) symbol, (which logo is, of course, subject to the same type of agreement), and authors will affix the new logo to their works instead of the (C), after paying Copyrights, Inc., the appropriate registration fee. Purchasers will then have to explicitly agree to abide by the contract, which we used to call a law, before they can purchase the work. What's the practical difference? I.e., why is this a better system than the one we have now? > So, as stated above, the law got simpler, but your life got more > complicated. If my life is going to get more complicated, then what's the advantage of the law getting simpler? Except that I will have to give more of my money to lawyers to get the same effect? > You can't depend on the state to do things for you, you > have to plan ahead to see that they get done the way you wish. This is already true; the state is not going to do things the way you wish, especially in the case of a will. But you seem to be trying to make it harder to do the same things which can be done now. Gary Samuelson ittvax!bunker!garys
laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (04/03/85)
Gary, I don't think that you have ever been involved in a will battle. They are awful. Simply saying ``I bequeath X to Y'' is not good enough. Z, who didn't get anything, and wants stuff will get his lawyer in to demonstrate that the deceased either owed something to Z, or was out of his mind when he wrote the will -- ``being of sound mind and body'' to the contrary. There are some good cases where a man was kicked out of home by his father and went off to make a fortune. As he lived he never gave his family a penny, and when he wrote his will he put in a paragraph to the effect that since they have never done anything good for him while he was alive they were jolly well not going to get anything from him while he was dead. The family contested the will and won. I think that all wills should be read and settled while the property owner is still alive. This approach will fail in the case of accidental death, though. Laura Creighton utzoo!laura
mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) (04/04/85)
>It certainly doesn't seem desirable to have property become the >the government's when someone dies (as suggested by ?); if the >government is too big now (which I believe, and I thought that >libertarians did, too), then having it inherit everything, which >will make it bigger, isn't a good idea. Giving things away in >anticipation of death will delay but not prevent the government >from owning everything. > Without taking sides (this time) on whether the government *should* own much, little, or nothing, I'd like to point out that passing an estate to the government on someone's death has nothing to do with the size of government, its growth or decline. The following *may* be a libertarian position consistent with those who think all a person's belongings should go to the government at death: The idea is that the heirs have no specific right to benefit from the labours of their ancestors. Hence the fruits of the labour of a dead person are equally due to everyone. When the property goes to the government, it is for the purposes of sale; the proceeds are distributed (or used to reduce taxes), and everyone benefits microscopically. The estate is probably worth a lot more as a unit than if everyone were given a square millimeter of land or a gram of house, so selling it is the best way to maintain the total wealth of the community (and please the purchaser). Not all libertarians think there should be no government, but here's a variant that might satisfy those who do. Let everybody who wishes to do so join a group (say a Tontine Group). When someone dies, the Group Administrator sells off the property and distributes the proceeds among the group members. Anyone joining this group would contract not to leave the group except by death or by repaying the group enough to compensate for the dividends received plus appropriate interest. The property of anyone who dies when not a member of a group would be considered to be up for grabs (like homesteading). It might get a bit nasty, but that's life in Libertaria, isn't it? (For those wondering about the name Tontine Group, it refers to a once-popular kind of life-insurance/lottery. A group of people, probably children of a similar age, would combine some entrance fees which would be invested during their lifetimes. The last one alive would get the lot. It was apparently quite interesting when there were only two or three of the original group left alive). -- Martin Taylor {allegra,linus,ihnp4,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt {uw-beaver,qucis,watmath}!utcsri!dciem!mmt
mwm@ucbtopaz.CC.Berkeley.ARPA (04/05/85)
In article <775@bunker.UUCP> garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) writes: >> >2) Such a trust fund would be more complicated >> >than a will, on average, and would therefore mean more money for >> >lawyers and less for those I want to get it. >> Interesting claim - and I suspect wrong. Do you have any proof, like a >> comparison of the weight of paper describing the same size trust fund >> and will? >Of course I don't have proof; we are talking about something >which would be done in hypothetical Libertaria. Gee, that's odd. I thought we were discussing the question of wills. Since such things wouldn't exist in Libertaria, your original point doesn't make sense. Of course, this wouldn't invalidate the question that was asked - whether a trust fund or a will that covered a set amount of money was heavier. I guess ducking the question was easier than answering it. >> Making the law simpler is among the aims of libertarianism. "Things" >> would be more complicated for most people, as they couldn't depend on >> the state to prevent them from doing something stupid. >Then you agree that the trust fund, set up to achieve the effects >now achieved by a will, would probably be more complicated. No, I don't agree. You made an invalid jump from the general (most things) to the specific (wills vs. trust funds). The question of trust funds remains open, but I expect that the trust fund and the will would be about the same. >The transfer of ownership would be considered to be simultaneous >with the death. Again we see that the trust I want to set up to >replace the will must be more complicated; I am not a lawyer, but >I am sure the trust can be worded to achieve the effect I want. > >"I hereby give to X (my heir), joint ownership of Y (my property), >subject to the following terms: 1) As long as I am alive, such grant >is revocable at any time for any reason or no reason; 2) As long as >I am alive, my right to use, or determine the use of, Y overrides >the rights of X to use or determine the use of Y." You're right, that would be hard to make lawyer-tight. The problem (as DMcK pointed out) is that "the moment of death" is hard to define exactly. You want to try? Me, I don't need to. Your property remains in limbo until you're buried (or whatever), at which point "society" gets it. >It certainly doesn't seem desirable to have property become the >the government's when someone dies (as suggested by ?); if the >government is too big now (which I believe, and I thought that >libertarians did, too), then having it inherit everything, which >will make it bigger, isn't a good idea. Giving things away in >anticipation of death will delay but not prevent the government >from owning everything. That ? was me (among others). Sure, the US government is to big. The problem isn't the bigness per se, the problem is what I call the "bloat:" the excess size the government has because of it's monopolistic tendencies and collecting subsidies at gunpoint. You can remove the bloat directly, or you can remove remove the monopolistic tendencies and subsidies. I prefer the latter. Feeding the government unused properties (most of which it claims anyway) would ease the transition. I've dealt with the silliness of "the government owning everything" elsewhere in the newsgroup. >I understand that claiming the rings of Saturn would be ludicrous, >but some European countries could certainly use the Americas, so >I don't understand what you mean by that example. How does claiming >a parcel of land discontiguous from the land I currently stand upon >differ from claiming a parcel of land adjacent to it? >The only thing that prevents the Europeans from claiming the Americas >(or vice versa) is the fact that the Americas are currently occupied. >(Even that didn't stop the medieval Europeans from doing so.) Maybe you're getting the point, but I doubt it. The only thing that keeps the Europeans from claiming the Americas is that someone is using them - i.e., that they would deprive the current owners of their use of the property. Now, if nobody were using the Americas, then they would have a right to claim them - if they started using them. If not, then *anyone* else could claim them. (I hope we all agree that what medieval Europeans did to the people who were using the Americas was, well, medieval.) >For that matter, how do you know I can't *ever* use the rings of >Saturn? Fine. Claim them. See how much good it does you if someone starts using them, and you try and enforce that claim. >> Assume that I buy some object X, and make a >> copy of it via the fruits of my labor. It's mine, so I can do with it as >> I like, right? Well, no, not if some "intellectual property" adheres to >> it. I can't give it to someone else. In other words, the concept of >> "intellectual property" means that I can't give the fruits of my labor >> to someone else. This hardly seems like a libertarian ideal. >You are also trying to give someone fruits of *my* labor -- inventing >something, or writing a new novel (a redundant phrase) surely takes >more labor than simply copying either. Nope, you still have the fruits of your labor. You've got the object you invented, or the novel you wrote (unless you gave me the only copy of said thing). If I create another copy, it is the fruits of *my* labor, and my labor only. True, you may have spent more labor in making the original than I did in making the copy, but none of your labor went into the copy I made. >So you support the idea of intellectual property, if it is >protected by trade secret, but not copyright or patent. No, I *do not* support the idea of intellectual property. I support the idea of the sanctity of a contract. Contracts can be used to keep ideas to yourself, but such behavior is antisocial, akin to not feeding a starving person. >Therefore, just as the effects of a will can be simulated by a sufficiently >complicated trust fund, a copyright or patent can be simulated by >a sufficiently complicated trade secret agreement. I predict that >a group of lawyers will get together and write a standardized trade >secret agreement, design a suitable logo to replace the (C) symbol, >(which logo is, of course, subject to the same type of agreement), >and authors will affix the new logo to their works instead of the >(C), after paying Copyrights, Inc., the appropriate registration >fee. Purchasers will then have to explicitly agree to abide by >the contract, which we used to call a law, before they can purchase >the work. Sorry, but putting a magic symbol on your toy (document, rom, pc layout, or reactionless drive) won't add any protection to it. You still have to get your purchasers to sign a license agreement. Also, Copyrights, Inc. won't be able to keep anybody from putting their symbol on a document after they've seen it, unless, of course, everybody who sees the symbol has already signed a contract stating that they won't do so. Sort of makes it worthless. >What's the practical difference? I.e., why is this a better >system than the one we have now? The system - even the screwy one you presented - has taken the monopoly of a service away from the government, and put the service in the free market. This should (most likely will) reduce the size of the government. Ditto for the cost of the service. >If my life is going to get more complicated, then what's the >advantage of the law getting simpler? Except that I will >have to give more of my money to lawyers to get the same >effect? Yes, but if you don't want the effect, you don't pay for it, as opposed to now, where everybody is paying for. Who knows, even those who want it might wind up paying less for it. >> You can't depend on the state to do things for you, you >> have to plan ahead to see that they get done the way you wish. >This is already true; the state is not going to do things the >way you wish, especially in the case of a will. But you seem >to be trying to make it harder to do the same things which can >be done now. I'm trying to do the same thing everybody does when they design a society - make it easy for people to behave correctly, and hard for them to behave incorrectly. It's just that I object to shooting or imprisoning them for behaving incorrectly, so incorrect behavior must be discouraged in less obnoxious ways. Of course, if the state isn't going to do things the way I wish, doing away with it would seem to be the best alternative. <mike
laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (04/05/85)
To put the boot on the foot, can you justify using force on other other people so they won't give away (legally obtained) copies of your software, if you don't have a contract with them to prevent such action? Mike, I don't use force on people to prevent them from doing things. I use *threat* of force on people for this purpose. I get around to using force on people *after* they get around to doing things that I find immoral, not the other way around. . . .and not even in every case of people doing things I find immoral. When I write software I generally write only 2 kinds. The sort which I comment as ``free to distribute everywhere, please *do* *not* keep my name in this source if you modify it significantly'' and the sort which I expect not to get distributed anywhere except where I have contracted to do the work. I now put a distribution clause in contracts as a matter of course, but I would like this to be the default -- just as by default you can't sell magazine articles I write or books that I write under your own label. Defaults are important. Otherwise, when I sell a game to Apple, and they put it on a hundred thousand hard floppies, and sell them, the first 100 people will buy them and the next thousand will make a bootleg copy. At that rate I have to charge far too much money because I have to make my initial investment back fast. Laura Creighton utzoo!laura
laura@utzoo.UUCP (Laura Creighton) (04/08/85)
<mike, if the state gets everybody's property when they die, they will become rich. they will look around for ways to spend this money. we will get a plethora of state programs again -- more bloat. Sounds bad to me. On the other hand, if the state does not represent the ``society'' that my property reverts to, what does? How do you keep it from adopting the problems we currently have with state governments? Laura Creighton utzoo!laura
garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) (04/08/85)
> In article <775@bunker.UUCP> garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) writes: > >> >2) Such a trust fund would be more complicated > >> >than a will, on average, and would therefore mean more money for > >> >lawyers and less for those I want to get it. > >> Interesting claim - and I suspect wrong. Do you have any proof, like a > >> comparison of the weight of paper describing the same size trust fund > >> and will? > >Of course I don't have proof; we are talking about something > >which would be done in hypothetical Libertaria. > > Gee, that's odd. I thought we were discussing the question of wills. > Since such things wouldn't exist in Libertaria, your original point > doesn't make sense. Of course, this wouldn't invalidate the question > that was asked - whether a trust fund or a will that covered a set > amount of money was heavier. I guess ducking the question was easier > than answering it. OK, one more time, slowly: If, in Libertaria, there is no such thing as a will, then people who desire to achieve the results which a will is supposed to achieve will create some other legal document, such as a carefully worded trust, to replace the will. How do you suggest I prove that such a trust, which doesn't exist, since Libertaria doesn't exist, would be more complicated than a will is today? And how can you accuse me of ducking the question, when you quoted my answer? "Do you have proof?" "I don't have proof." An amazing new way to "duck" a question. I confess! I was speculating! I made a statement I didn't have 29 reliable authorities to quote! I stated, *gasp*, an opinion. I did try to explain why I had that opinion, but, alas, I cannot prove it. (Of course, I am sure you have proof that things in Libertaria would work as you hope.) > >> Making the law simpler is among the aims of libertarianism. "Things" > >> would be more complicated for most people, as they couldn't depend on > >> the state to prevent them from doing something stupid. > >Then you agree that the trust fund, set up to achieve the effects > >now achieved by a will, would probably be more complicated. > No, I don't agree. You made an invalid jump from the general (most > things) to the specific (wills vs. trust funds). The question of trust > funds remains open, but I expect that the trust fund and the will would > be about the same. Fine, where's *your* proof? In any event, the main point is that results achieved by a will could be achieved in Libertaria by some other document -- do you dispute this (speaking of question ducking)? If the will effect can be simulated by some other document, why is it important to eliminate the will? > >The transfer of ownership would be considered to be simultaneous > >with the death. Again we see that the trust I want to set up to > >replace the will must be more complicated; I am not a lawyer, but > >I am sure the trust can be worded to achieve the effect I want. > >"I hereby give to X (my heir), joint ownership of Y (my property), > >subject to the following terms: 1) As long as I am alive, such grant > >is revocable at any time for any reason or no reason; 2) As long as > >I am alive, my right to use, or determine the use of, Y overrides > >the rights of X to use or determine the use of Y." > You're right, that would be hard to make lawyer-tight. The problem (as > DMcK pointed out) is that "the moment of death" is hard to define > exactly. You want to try? Difficult from a medical standpoint, but not from a legal standpoint. Legally, the moment of death is when the coroner signs the death certificate. (Of course, if a person for whom a death certificate has been duly signed turns out to be alive, there are nasty problems, but that's already the case.) > Me, I don't need to. Your property remains in > limbo until you're buried (or whatever), at which point "society" gets > it. > >It certainly doesn't seem desirable to have property become the > >the government's when someone dies (as suggested by ?); if the > >government is too big now (which I believe, and I thought that > >libertarians did, too), then having it inherit everything, which > >will make it bigger, isn't a good idea. Giving things away in > >anticipation of death will delay but not prevent the government > >from owning everything. > > That ? was me (among others). Sure, the US government is to big. The > problem isn't the bigness per se, the problem is what I call the > "bloat:" the excess size the government has because of it's monopolistic > tendencies and collecting subsidies at gunpoint. You can remove the > bloat directly, or you can remove the monopolistic tendencies and > subsidies. I prefer the latter. Feeding the government unused properties > (most of which it claims anyway) would ease the transition. > I've dealt with the silliness of "the government owning everything" > elsewhere in the newsgroup. > >I understand that claiming the rings of Saturn would be ludicrous, > >but some European countries could certainly use the Americas, so > >I don't understand what you mean by that example. How does claiming > >a parcel of land discontiguous from the land I currently stand upon > >differ from claiming a parcel of land adjacent to it? > >The only thing that prevents the Europeans from claiming the Americas > >(or vice versa) is the fact that the Americas are currently occupied. > >(Even that didn't stop the medieval Europeans from doing so.) > Maybe you're getting the point, but I doubt it. Is that type of snide remark really necessary? > The only thing that > keeps the Europeans from claiming the Americas is that someone is using > them - i.e., that they would deprive the current owners of their use of > the property. Maybe some countries refrain from invading (or "using") other currently occupied countries out of respect for rights, but other countries have no such respect for rights, and refrain from invading other countries only out of respect for military strength. > Now, if nobody were using the Americas, then they would > have a right to claim them - if they started using them. If not, then > *anyone* else could claim them. (I hope we all agree that what medieval > Europeans did to the people who were using the Americas was, well, > medieval.) Well, no, I don't agree that what medieval Europeans did was "medieval;" such behaviour doesn't seem to be limited to any particular era. I agree that it was morally wrong, if that's what you mean. > >> Assume that I buy some object X, and make a > >> copy of it via the fruits of my labor. It's mine, so I can do with it as > >> I like, right? Well, no, not if some "intellectual property" adheres to > >> it. I can't give it to someone else. In other words, the concept of > >> "intellectual property" means that I can't give the fruits of my labor > >> to someone else. This hardly seems like a libertarian ideal. > >You are also trying to give someone fruits of *my* labor -- inventing > >something, or writing a new novel (a redundant phrase) surely takes > >more labor than simply copying either. > Nope, you still have the fruits of your labor. You've got the object you > invented, or the novel you wrote (unless you gave me the only copy of > said thing). If I create another copy, it is the fruits of *my* labor, > and my labor only. True, you may have spent more labor in making the > original than I did in making the copy, but none of your labor went into > the copy I made. The design is incorporated into the copy as much as it is into the original (otherwise, you could have built your machine independently, rather than copy it). The design is the fruit of my labor. Ergo, your copy contains the fruit of my labor as well as yours. > >So you support the idea of intellectual property, if it is > >protected by trade secret, but not copyright or patent. > > No, I *do not* support the idea of intellectual property. I support the > idea of the sanctity of a contract. Contracts can be used to keep > ideas to yourself, but such behavior is antisocial, akin to not feeding > a starving person. > >Therefore, just as the effects of a will can be simulated by a sufficiently > >complicated trust fund, a copyright or patent can be simulated by > >a sufficiently complicated trade secret agreement. I predict that > >a group of lawyers will get together and write a standardized trade > >secret agreement, design a suitable logo to replace the (C) symbol, > >(which logo is, of course, subject to the same type of agreement), > >and authors will affix the new logo to their works instead of the > >(C), after paying Copyrights, Inc., the appropriate registration > >fee. Purchasers will then have to explicitly agree to abide by > >the contract, which we used to call a law, before they can purchase > >the work. > > Sorry, but putting a magic symbol on your toy (document, rom, pc layout, > or reactionless drive) won't add any protection to it. You still have to > get your purchasers to sign a license agreement. Also, Copyrights, Inc. > won't be able to keep anybody from putting their symbol on a document > after they've seen it, unless, of course, everybody who sees the symbol > has already signed a contract stating that they won't do so. Sort of > makes it worthless. What? No Trademark protection either? You're going to let anyone use a company's name freely? How will I know that anything I buy is what it claims to be? > >What's the practical difference? I.e., why is this a better > >system than the one we have now? > The system - even the screwy one you presented - has taken the monopoly > of a service away from the government, and put the service in the free > market. This should (most likely will) reduce the size of the > government. Ditto for the cost of the service. I think it's a fine idea to reduce the size of the government -- now, what does that goal have to do with the elimination of the concept of intellectual property? > >If my life is going to get more complicated, then what's the > >advantage of the law getting simpler? Except that I will > >have to give more of my money to lawyers to get the same > >effect? > Yes, but if you don't want the effect, you don't pay for it, as opposed > to now, where everybody is paying for. Who knows, even those who want it > might wind up paying less for it. "WHO KNOWS?" You are proposing radical changes to the government (almost to the point of disbanding it entirely), and you don't know what the effects will be? > >> You can't depend on the state to do things for you, you > >> have to plan ahead to see that they get done the way you wish. > >This is already true; the state is not going to do things the > >way you wish, especially in the case of a will. But you seem > >to be trying to make it harder to do the same things which can > >be done now. > I'm trying to do the same thing everybody does when they design a > society - make it easy for people to behave correctly, and hard for them > to behave incorrectly. It's just that I object to shooting or > imprisoning them for behaving incorrectly, so incorrect behavior must > be discouraged in less obnoxious ways. I guess another misconception bites the dust -- I thought libertarian ideology held that each person should be able to decide on an individual basis what "correct" behaviour is; and now it seems that the libertarians (at least one, at any rate) want to impose their moral standards on the rest of us, the difference being that they want to use more subtle means of doing so. > Of course, if the state isn't going to do things the way I wish, doing > away with it would seem to be the best alternative. Simplistic. The state does some things the way I wish, but not others. Let us not throw the baby out with the bath. > <mike (signing off from this discussion -- it's getting too long) Gary Samuelson ittvax!bunker!garys
garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) (04/08/85)
> Gary, I don't think that you have ever been involved in a will battle. True. > They are awful. Simply saying ``I bequeath X to Y'' is not good enough. > Z, who didn't get anything, and wants stuff will get his lawyer in to > demonstrate that the deceased either owed something to Z, or was out of > his mind when he wrote the will -- ``being of sound mind and body'' to > the contrary. Granting the above, is it your conclusion that there should be no such things as wills in Libertaria, or that the way wills are handled should be fixed? Or are you merely challenging my speculation that a will is less complicated than the arrangement I would have to create in Libertaria to simulate a will, if they are eliminated? > There are some good cases where a man was kicked out of home by his father > and went off to make a fortune. As he lived he never gave his family a penny, > and when he wrote his will he put in a paragraph to the effect that since > they have never done anything good for him while he was alive they were > jolly well not going to get anything from him while he was dead. > The family contested the will and won. The man's mistake may have been in including his rationale for not giving them anything in the will. If his family could show that they had done *something* for him, then the rest of the paragraph could also be discarded. But in any case, I don't think throwing out wills entirely is the best way to fix the problem (that wills are subverted). > I think that all wills should be read and settled while the property > owner is still alive. This approach will fail in the case of accidental > death, though. I.e., this approach will fail in precisely those cases where a will is most necessary. If I have some idea when I'm going to die -- I have a terminal illness, for example -- then I can give everything to those I wish to be my heirs before I die. What to do with property in the case of unexpected death, either through accident or sudden illness (e.g., heart attack) is the problem a will is supposed to solve. > Laura Creighton > utzoo!laura Gary Samuelson ittvax!bunker!garys