[780] in libertarians
Re: Intellectual property rights
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Raymie Stata)
Mon Feb 27 17:40:48 1995
To: libertarians@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: Your message of Mon, 27 Feb 95 16:57:04 -0500.
<9502272157.AA23331@duke.cs.mcgill.ca>
From: Raymie Stata <raymie@larch.lcs.mit.edu>
Date: Mon, 27 Feb 95 17:36:33 EST
This is my last word; I'll let others have _the_ last word.
RE: "I argue that ... the development of new drugs would grind to a halt."
I don't think this is true. But more important, this kind of argument
this is not a proper defense of a proposed individual right.
I outlined such a defense for intellectual property rights in my 1st
post. I also indicated why ideas shouldn't be pattenable. Broadly
speaking, everyone seems to agree with this argument: no body thinks I
should be able to pattent f = GmM/r^2 or speed-reading techniques or,
to use Kevin's example, "a cure for AIDS."
So pattents boils down to spearating special, more deserving ideas
from other, non-deserving ideas, or "inventions" vs "discoveries" as
it's often put. But as I argued in my post, this is an arbitrary
distinction as far as property rights are concerned. For example, why
should asprin be pattenable but not Uranium? Why should the idea for
a certain kind of communication network be pattenable but the idea for
a certain kind of product distribution network? Why should a new
chemical process for separating desired molecules from undesired ones
be pattenable but not a new marketing process for separating potential
customers out of a larger group of people?
These seem like arbitrary distinctions to me. The only arguments I've
ever seen always come down to "this particular industry has come to
rely on these protections and if you get rid of patents the industry
will fall a part." Hardly a rigorous, individualist defense of
property rights.
RE: As per debating convention, I leave it to the advocate of the new
scheme to defend the new scheme.
And I leave it to advocates of patents to defend them. Those
advocating patents are arguing that the force of law should be used to
keep me from performing certain actions. If you want to restrict my
actions, you need to defend those restrictions. I'm all for laws that
have a rigorous philsophic basis in individual rights, but as I've
pointed out pattents do not.
RE: protection of '486 vs. protection of drug formulas
The '486 is an _expression_ of an idea, not an idea itself, and thus
deserves protections. Drug formulas are not expressions of ideas in
this sense. See my 1st post.
RE: I'm blaming the victim of theft for being "stupid"
It's not theft if pattents are not valid property rights; you're
begging the question.
RE: The founding fathers supported patents
The Consititution implicitly accepts slavery too; doesn't make it
right.
RE: One plausible scenario in which drugs could be developed w/out pattents
Research consortia.
