Really, let's start with some basic facts. The countries with the strongest patent systems are the richest most technological advanced. This is true not only today but throughout history. Those of you argue against patents are like socialists, complaining about sweatshops in capitalist countries while ignoring gulags and starvation in socialist countries.

Try using evidence and logic. Try using understanding the source of property rights.

welcome to our world :) well I am not going after waitresses

Alright Dale, time to dial it back. We love you, but let's leave the name calling to the lesser. ( http://www.galtsgulchonline.com/faq#f... )

Thanks.

We were impugned first in that thread, jdg. Our livelihood was brought up in an attempt to say we were disingenuous. Please point me to where Db "lied" about what you said? The threads are long and keep in mind, we are clearly in the minority on this site, which would be disappointing to Rand.

efficiency and morality go hand in hand?

Dale's arguments are solid, you just choose to believe something else. He has written two non-fiction books on point with citations of course. Have you read them? Did you perform a clearance opinion on your software programs before selling them? Good luck.

let's just take all recent areas of explosive invention and say-no-this doesn't qualify cuz I say so. bah! "ever since software exploded in the 90s" when the heck was it going to "explode" the 30s?! the same thing happened with light bubs, sewing machines, you name any disruptive invention.

The fact that people want to ignore proprty rights is called what exactly? The fact that george washington thought it so important it was the ONLY right spelled out inthe Constit. and coincidence - that 's when everything in the world economically changed and for the first time millions were pulled out of subsistence living over the next few decades. Not evidence. Got it.

No one keeps you from using your own tinkering. It is selling that, which you MAY not do and even that might not occur. The owner of a patent my not have the resources ro take you to court.

Unfortunately, some Objectivists are. Check the ARI site for some examples. For a good explanation, see Michael Shermer's "The Most Unlikeliest Cult." That may not be the exact title, but it is close. I am traveling and do not have access to his book ("Why Peopole Believe Weird Things) "that contains the chapter.

I fully support WilliamShipley's line of inquiry here. I did not see Dale or Kaila address what I took to be his main point: the moral thought experiment of being precluded from using one's own inventions. WilliamShipley had an excellent example of this happening in practice, when presumably in-earnest patent filings are rejected due to findings of prior art. Precisely because intellectual invention /is/ integral to one's life, the possible preclusion of one's own independent invention is a moral result that should at least be acknowledged, recognized, worthy of taking a passing thought about. All of this is true even if, as WilliamShipley points out, there is a practical problem with claims of independent devisement, and that as one of the many compromises made for living among society, the possible preclusion of one's own independent invention is an accepted result.

Yes, the economists you list are pro-individual rights -- but they start their arguments from utilitarianism as a premise, in order to demonstrate to their students that utilitarianism implies individual rights, rather than assume their own conclusions. They are using logic where you are using dogma.

Every time I try do debate this topic with you or (especially) db, he lies about what I've said, makes baseless accusations that I've contradicted myself and am not rational, and basically breathes fire. Try debating logically and honestly, and don't make assertions like those without explaining yourselves. Otherwise you only build reputations as something other than spokesmen for rationality.

If you're going to use the same fallacies the religious leaders do to try to sell AR's philosophy, people are going to lump you with them as just another religion.

And I've reported the messages where he called people scum.

On the contrary, it works fine with consistent use of any reasonable property rights scheme. As Coase showed, once property rights are well defined and tradeable, the market will move them to the most efficient owner. David Friedman discusses this in several of his books.

Libertarians already do all those things. They lose because most voters today have an attention span of one sound bite. Which is certainly deliberate on the part of the unions that control our schools.

Whoever started this thread is the one who lumped them together.

You do realize that calling me names does not actually convince me of the rightness of your argument, don't you?

Your arguments seem to be based on emotion rather than reason. Clearly being disagreed with by experts in the software industry makes you angry.

Yes, it has ever since we decided to be politically correct with religionist, conservatives, and libertarians. SCB's, we are Objectivists. Not mealy mouthed, trying to get power, pandering idiots

200 years ago the biggest challenge was producing more things. Now we're buried in things. Even things like gently used tablets and smartphones are nearly free. The value now is in design-- i.e. what makes people pay hundreds of dollars for a stylish new iPhone when they have several phones in good condition that they could hardly sell. I can imagine a world in which you can manufacture things cheaply on a desktop printer, and all the value is in the electronic CAD files.

I do not understand this IP / patent law debate, but it really seems to me that today's world holds way more value in IP than the world 200 years ago.

Once again you prove you position is based on faith. SCUM

provide real evidence. Oh year you don't care about evidence. You know you are guilty

"Libertarians seem to by and large, promote the idea of not only less government but no government at all."
I observe this too. I think there are many "moderate libertarians" for lack of a better word who do not get the details of Objectivist philosophy but know they want less gov't. I consider myself in this group. We're going the wrong way on gov't spending and intrusiveness, and just stopping right here and not getting any worse would be a huge win.

Bow and arrow. Multiple cultures, multiple continents. Many steps.

We've been through this. It's an interesting argument which tries to make software into hardware but it's not really appropriate.

It's like saying switching a light switch is a way of changing your house wiring, but no one really believes their house has been rewired because they switched on the lights.

The computer is unchanged by the software running on it just as the televisions circuits are turned on and off by the television program. But we've been down this road. My contention is that 40 years of software design has given me a deep understanding of the process which may be more relevant than 20 years of legal training. We disagree, that does not make me religious any more than you are. I am unconvinced.

You have not looked at the evidence, but you are not interested in evidence. Patent law were the reason for the Industrial revolution