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I'm not entirely sure what point you're making. That's not physical law in the same sense – nothing compels you to take something from me (or prevents you from

I'm not entirely sure what point you're making. That's not physical law in the same sense – nothing compels you to take something from me (or prevents you from taking something from me if you're sneaky or strong enough, as you said). On the other hand, you and I can't both have the same object even if we wanted; it has nothing to do with ability or circumstance. edit: I should clarify that you and I can share something in the sense that we can freely give it back and forth, but if we have one shovel, we can't both be shovelling at the same time (and can't share it at all if we live far apart). And if we're talking about food, well, we can't both take the same bite of bread.

anikan_vader 4y ago
Well, collective ownership and communal property are arguably just as “natural” as private property.
- robobro 4y ago
  Rather than "private property" do you mean "personal property" ?
travisgriggs 4y ago
> nothing compels you to take something from me What if you’ve hoarded all the food or all the water, and I need it to survive? Would that be compelling? I’m with the other guy. These distinctions are arbitrary. They may be useful for a society that attempts to maximize “happiness@ (also arbitrary), but it remains that they are not universally obvious.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
encomiast 4y ago
My point is that you are picking and choosing which parts of nature you value. The idea of "having", of ownership, is not natural. Many people like Locke have tried to connect it nature, but with limited success — it's still a human construct. In the natural world ownership is defended purely by force or guile. So you are taking this idea of ownership, protected by human constructs of law, and then adding a caveat that it only applies to physical objects. But that's not a natural consequence of the idea of ownership. We make up laws based on the outcomes we desire. One of those outcomes, to promote the progress of science and useful arts, is explicitly called out in the US Constitution. Maybe you don't think promoting those things are important, or maybe you don't think copyright is effective at doing that, but you are not making that argument. You are making some novel, unsupportable argument about natural law and physics that frankly doesn't stand up to any sort of rigorous argument.
- agalunar 4y ago
  I believe I understand what you're saying, but I feel we're talking about different things, so I may have miscommunicated my point. I'm not talking about ownership as recognized or enforced by people (in fact, I never used the word "own" or "ownership"). All I mean is that if something is over here by me, it can't be over there by you, because things can't be in two places at once. On the other hand, the exact same spatial arrangement can be in two places at once (e.g. the state of bits on a disk, or the idea of a shovel, i.e. the pattern of a shovel as exemplified by two distinct shovels). All of that's obvious. I think what OP was trying to suggest is: Despite the obvious difference between physical things and ideas, we often treat them similarly (specifically, we treat ideas like physical objects). And perhaps that would seem a bit strange if we weren't so used to it.
  - fhsm 4y ago
    I am similar unclear on where this supposed bright line sites but to try and steal man your argument a bit is it possible you looking for the distinction between excludable and rivalrous goods?
    - eyelidlessness 4y ago
      Just reading through, the distinction seems pretty obvious to me. It doesn’t reinforce several of my ideological perspectives, even contradicts some, but the distinction is plain as day. Physical things are subject to the laws of physics (can’t be in two places at once), idea “things” are much more ephemeral and thus much less restricted by those same rules (an idea can propagate basically infinitely and be “had” by basically all who wish to have it, barring arbitrary rules to the contrary). The former has concrete, immutable scarcity, and the latter only has scarcity people assign to it.
      - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
        As a general rule we don't enforce copyright at the point of having an idea, but rather at the point of putting that idea into some sort of medium that can be transmitted to others, and then we enforce copyright at the transmission point. The transmission has concrete, albeit somewhat mutable scarcity.
coldtea 4y ago
>I'm not really sure what point you're making. That's not physical law in the same sense – nothing compels you to take something from me Tons of thing compel someone to get the thing another has - them being hungry, just fancying it, mere greed, etc. All of those are natural feelings. In nature the stronger getting what they wont is the norm. There are no property rights. >On the other hand, you and I can't both have the same object even if we wanted; it has nothing to do with ability or circumstance. So? Physics is not the basis of law in a society. Just a hard limit of what can be done. But one can e.g. just kill you by hitting you with a rock, and physics is 100% fine with that, as is biology. Physics doesn't care either way. It's just a bunch of equations that describe how matter interacts, not a legal or moral code, and it doesn't get into the baseline state of animal behavior in nature... We still have laws against it though.
freejazz 4y ago
> nothing compels you No more than nothing compels you to take exclusive ownership of something that comes from the land!

anikan_vader 4y ago

Well, collective ownership and communal property are arguably just as “natural” as private property.

robobro 4y ago
Rather than "private property" do you mean "personal property" ?

travisgriggs 4y ago

> nothing compels you to take something from me What if you’ve hoarded all the food or all the water, and I need it to survive? Would that be compelling? I’m with the other guy. These distinctions are arbitrary. They may be useful for a society that attempts to maximize “happiness@ (also arbitrary), but it remains that they are not universally obvious.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

encomiast 4y ago

My point is that you are picking and choosing which parts of nature you value. The idea of "having", of ownership, is not natural. Many people like Locke have tried to connect it nature, but with limited success — it's still a human construct. In the natural world ownership is defended purely by force or guile. So you are taking this idea of ownership, protected by human constructs of law, and then adding a caveat that it only applies to physical objects. But that's not a natural consequence of the idea of ownership. We make up laws based on the outcomes we desire. One of those outcomes, to promote the progress of science and useful arts, is explicitly called out in the US Constitution. Maybe you don't think promoting those things are important, or maybe you don't think copyright is effective at doing that, but you are not making that argument. You are making some novel, unsupportable argument about natural law and physics that frankly doesn't stand up to any sort of rigorous argument.

agalunar 4y ago
I believe I understand what you're saying, but I feel we're talking about different things, so I may have miscommunicated my point. I'm not talking about ownership as recognized or enforced by people (in fact, I never used the word "own" or "ownership"). All I mean is that if something is over here by me, it can't be over there by you, because things can't be in two places at once. On the other hand, the exact same spatial arrangement can be in two places at once (e.g. the state of bits on a disk, or the idea of a shovel, i.e. the pattern of a shovel as exemplified by two distinct shovels). All of that's obvious. I think what OP was trying to suggest is: Despite the obvious difference between physical things and ideas, we often treat them similarly (specifically, we treat ideas like physical objects). And perhaps that would seem a bit strange if we weren't so used to it.
- fhsm 4y ago
  I am similar unclear on where this supposed bright line sites but to try and steal man your argument a bit is it possible you looking for the distinction between excludable and rivalrous goods?
  - eyelidlessness 4y ago
    Just reading through, the distinction seems pretty obvious to me. It doesn’t reinforce several of my ideological perspectives, even contradicts some, but the distinction is plain as day. Physical things are subject to the laws of physics (can’t be in two places at once), idea “things” are much more ephemeral and thus much less restricted by those same rules (an idea can propagate basically infinitely and be “had” by basically all who wish to have it, barring arbitrary rules to the contrary). The former has concrete, immutable scarcity, and the latter only has scarcity people assign to it.
    - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
      As a general rule we don't enforce copyright at the point of having an idea, but rather at the point of putting that idea into some sort of medium that can be transmitted to others, and then we enforce copyright at the transmission point. The transmission has concrete, albeit somewhat mutable scarcity.

coldtea 4y ago

>I'm not really sure what point you're making. That's not physical law in the same sense – nothing compels you to take something from me Tons of thing compel someone to get the thing another has - them being hungry, just fancying it, mere greed, etc. All of those are natural feelings. In nature the stronger getting what they wont is the norm. There are no property rights. >On the other hand, you and I can't both have the same object even if we wanted; it has nothing to do with ability or circumstance. So? Physics is not the basis of law in a society. Just a hard limit of what can be done. But one can e.g. just kill you by hitting you with a rock, and physics is 100% fine with that, as is biology. Physics doesn't care either way. It's just a bunch of equations that describe how matter interacts, not a legal or moral code, and it doesn't get into the baseline state of animal behavior in nature... We still have laws against it though.

freejazz 4y ago

> nothing compels you No more than nothing compels you to take exclusive ownership of something that comes from the land!