Very interesting: you make a good point about hardware. If I were to take my interpretation of software being unpatentable to the absolute extreme, I would say

Very interesting: you make a good point about hardware. If I were to take my interpretation of software being unpatentable to the absolute extreme, I would say that the microcode in modern CISCy CPUs would also be unpatentable. This could lead to an interpretation where CPUs are also not patentable. I had an inkling feeling that the software/mathematics argument is not compelling (not because software isn't mathematics, but because the practicality of invention and patent render it different in practice), but couldn't articulate it. I still think that software patents have turned out to be dangerously unproductive in practice and so would rather see them abolished entirely than in their current form, but I think I more fully understand my position now. Thanks, Colin, for participating in this little Socratic dialog.