8 ms·

Your definition of stolen goods is circular; stolen goods aren't stolen because someone stole them; they're stolen because consent was not granted by the owner.

Your definition of stolen goods is circular; stolen goods aren't stolen because someone stole them; they're stolen because consent was not granted by the owner. You can however contingently be sold a good, which means you are only allowed to have the good if you agree to certain conditions. Once you violate those conditions, you are forfeiting your ownership of that good if that's what you agreed to (and it is in the case of most digital content). As for control, it is decidedly not a fundamental part of ownership. You are not, for example, able to control driving your car into another person willfully, but you do still "own" your car. What it boils down to is the ethical obligation a person has to do what they said they would do. Are you ethically obligated to not lie? If so, when Bob tells Steve that he (Bob) isn't going to share Steve's secret with anyone else without Bob's permission, he would then break his word if he subsequently shared Bob's secret with you. You, knowing that Bob obtained the secret by lying to Steve, are complicit in Bob's lie, making you morally culpable. This is obviously complicated by the infinitely reproducible nature of digital goods, hence why I said you don't care much for capitalism if you don't agree with this notion, as capitalism introduces the concept of artificial scarcity to protect Steve's incentives to continue to produce secrets. There are many arguments suggesting that Steve would produce secrets regardless of incentive, but for a capitalist, the protection of the monopoly is paramount.

fluoridation 3y ago
>Your definition of stolen goods is circular No, it's not circular. A good is a stolen good if it has been stolen. That's not circular. There's a distinction between something being stolen and something being a stolen good, and the definition of the latter rests upon the definition of the former. I didn't define "stealing" because I didn't think it was necessary, as I thought we all know what it means. But it seems we actually don't agree on what "stealing" means. I think you "steal" something if you remove someone's possession of an item without their permission. If there's such a thing as agreement between two parties that if violated can void one of the parties rights to exploit an item then that's not stealing. When you purchase something you acquiring complete ownership over the thing. If there's strings attached that can turn the purchase into a "theft" then it's not a purchase. Perhaps it's a lease of some kind. >As for control, it is decidedly not a fundamental part of ownership. You are not, for example, able to control driving your car into another person willfully, but you do still "own" your car. You're using control in a different sense than I. What I mean is that you can decide what to do with the object as you like, with regards to the object itself. No, you can't drive your car anywhere you like, but you can sell or gift your car to anyone you like, and you destroy it you like, or you can leave it parked forever if you like. None of these are things you can do with a car you don't own, are they? >You, knowing that Bob obtained the secret by lying to Steve, are complicit in Bob's lie, making you morally culpable. Well, let's stick to one thing at a time, eh? If you have yet to convince me that my behavior is unethical, much less are you going to convince me that it's immoral. >What it boils down to is the ethical obligation a person has to do what they said they would do. I don't think a person has an ethical obligation to keep promises that are based on unethical grounds. Such as attaching strings to things that you sell. If you *sell* me a car and make me sign a contract that says I can't gift it to whoever I please, you bet I'm going to do whatever I please. Your contract is nonsensical and opposite to the notion of property. If you sell me something you relinquish all rights to the thing you sell me and acknowledge my right to do as I please with it. If you don't relinquish those rights then you can't call it a sale, and you have to price the transaction accordingly. >This is obviously complicated by the infinitely reproducible nature of digital goods, hence why I said you don't care much for capitalism if you don't agree with this notion, as capitalism introduces the concept of artificial scarcity to protect Steve's incentives to continue to produce secrets. There are many arguments suggesting that Steve would produce secrets regardless of incentive, but for a capitalist, the protection of the monopoly is paramount. If you want to say that capitalism cannot exist without intellectual property rights then I'll have to ask you to argue for it.
- WendyTheWillow 3y ago
  So you must believe that Steve can't condition the sale of his secret with Bob upon Bob's behavior, according to you? Steve can't say, "Bob, this is yours as long as you don't tell fluoridation. If you break this, you forfeit ownership of this secret, and it is now mine again." What mechanism prevents Bob and Steve from entering into such an agreement? To me, that would be a violation of freedom, to limit the kinds of agreements people can enter into. Besides, if one could enter into such an agreement, what would you call the deliberate violation of the agreement, resulting in you knowingly possessing what then becomes Steve's secret again upon sale to you? To me, knowingly possessing something that does not belong to you seems like a fair definition of theft. If you don't believe people are free to enter into contingent ownership agreements, I do think you'll have a pretty large problem with capitalism, even separate from intellectual property, as it questions the very nature of both freedom and ownership. Even by your own definition of "control", wouldn't I not have control over something if I can't concoct whatever rules for that thing that I like?
  - Kbelicius 3y ago
    > What mechanism prevents Bob and Steve from entering into such an agreement? To me, that would be a violation of freedom, to limit the kinds of agreements people can enter into. I don't know of any country in the world that allows anything and everything to be put in a contract and for good reason. Why do you think that it is so? > Even by your own definition of "control", wouldn't I not have control over something if I can't concoct whatever rules for that thing that I like? When you sell it? Absolutely not. Why do you think that you should have control over something when you sell it?
    - WendyTheWillow 3y ago
      To be clear, we limit freedom in a great many ways. There's nothing wrong with that, in principle, but it is a limitation of freedom.
  - ineptech 3y ago
    By reading the rest of this comment, you agree to give me all your money forever. (edited to emphasize "rest of" which OP apparently missed) Assuming you're still here, what's the ethical difference between this and "by purchasing this DVD you agree to blah blah"? In neither case did anyone agree to anything.
beej71 3y ago
Stolen goods are also not in the possession of the original owner. Anything still in the possession of the original owner isn't stolen, by definition. The notion of "stealing" doesn't really work for piracy. Stealing: perpetrator has 1 apple, victim has 0 apples. Piracy: perpetrator has 1 apple, victim has 1 apple. A better analogy is required than "possession of stolen property". Saying it's stolen is like saying "someone copied the movie, and therefore the studio can no longer stream it".
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  > Stolen goods are also not in the possession of the original owner. Right. Unauthorized use of property that does not deprive the owner is trespass [0], not theft. [0] to land for real property, to chattels for tangible personal property; trespass to intangible personal property is usually a whole mess of specific statutory torts and/or crimes with names that don't have "trespass" in them for particular classes of intangible personal property.
dragonwriter 3y ago
> stolen goods aren't stolen because someone stole them; They literally are, the act of stealing a good that makes it a stolen good. There is nothing circular about that, its linear from A to B, with no loop back. It's perhaps not helpful, because what you really need is not to just to define "stolen good" but to define "stealing", and so the definition is unsatisfying. But, that's solvable, "stealing", or "theft", is the act of intentionally taking the personal property of another without permission and with the intent to deprive the owner of the property. > You can however contingently be sold a good, which means you are only allowed to have the good if you agree to certain conditions. Once you violate those conditions, you are forfeiting your ownership of that good if that's what you agreed to (and it is in the case of most digital content). That's not a contingent sale, its conditional license where the original owner remains the owner. (If the original owner has the right to claim the property back but it does not automatically revert with an action to exercise that rgight, then it is still probably a conditional license, and that is the most simple way of doing that, but it could nearly-equivalently -- but for the additional complication in execution -- be a sale, part of the consideration of which is a commitment made to the original owner and secured by a lien against the property.) > as capitalism introduces the concept of artificial scarcity Artificial scarcity is older than capitalism.
- WendyTheWillow 3y ago
  Fine, it's tautological, if not circular. The point remains it's useless on its own, i.e. in the context of this conversation. And yes, we get into the difference between ownership and licensure in... another comment somewhere, I don't recall specifically where. And can you say more about the introduction of artificial scarcity predating capitalism? I'm sure you're right now that you say it, but I'm curious what you think is most relevant.
  - fluoridation 3y ago
    Again, it's neither tautological nor circular. It would be tautological to say "stolen goods are stolen goods". It would be circular to say "stolen goods are stolen. Something is stolen if it's a stolen good". What I said was >"Stolen goods" are stolen because someone stole them There's nothing tautological about that. I'm laying out the relationships between the words "stolen" and "steal", and between "stolen" and "stolen good". The sentence isn't void of information, particularly in a discussion where you were arguing that something could become stolen retroactively regardless of the manner in which it was acquired. You can't have in your possession a good that nobody stole, that is also a stolen good because of actions you took after it came into your possession. That's nonsense. If you have such a confusion of ideas, I have no option but to state the obvious: something is stolen if someone stole it.

fluoridation 3y ago

>Your definition of stolen goods is circular No, it's not circular. A good is a stolen good if it has been stolen. That's not circular. There's a distinction between something being stolen and something being a stolen good, and the definition of the latter rests upon the definition of the former. I didn't define "stealing" because I didn't think it was necessary, as I thought we all know what it means. But it seems we actually don't agree on what "stealing" means. I think you "steal" something if you remove someone's possession of an item without their permission. If there's such a thing as agreement between two parties that if violated can void one of the parties rights to exploit an item then that's not stealing. When you purchase something you acquiring complete ownership over the thing. If there's strings attached that can turn the purchase into a "theft" then it's not a purchase. Perhaps it's a lease of some kind. >As for control, it is decidedly not a fundamental part of ownership. You are not, for example, able to control driving your car into another person willfully, but you do still "own" your car. You're using control in a different sense than I. What I mean is that you can decide what to do with the object as you like, with regards to the object itself. No, you can't drive your car anywhere you like, but you can sell or gift your car to anyone you like, and you destroy it you like, or you can leave it parked forever if you like. None of these are things you can do with a car you don't own, are they? >You, knowing that Bob obtained the secret by lying to Steve, are complicit in Bob's lie, making you morally culpable. Well, let's stick to one thing at a time, eh? If you have yet to convince me that my behavior is unethical, much less are you going to convince me that it's immoral. >What it boils down to is the ethical obligation a person has to do what they said they would do. I don't think a person has an ethical obligation to keep promises that are based on unethical grounds. Such as attaching strings to things that you sell. If you *sell* me a car and make me sign a contract that says I can't gift it to whoever I please, you bet I'm going to do whatever I please. Your contract is nonsensical and opposite to the notion of property. If you sell me something you relinquish all rights to the thing you sell me and acknowledge my right to do as I please with it. If you don't relinquish those rights then you can't call it a sale, and you have to price the transaction accordingly. >This is obviously complicated by the infinitely reproducible nature of digital goods, hence why I said you don't care much for capitalism if you don't agree with this notion, as capitalism introduces the concept of artificial scarcity to protect Steve's incentives to continue to produce secrets. There are many arguments suggesting that Steve would produce secrets regardless of incentive, but for a capitalist, the protection of the monopoly is paramount. If you want to say that capitalism cannot exist without intellectual property rights then I'll have to ask you to argue for it.

WendyTheWillow 3y ago
So you must believe that Steve can't condition the sale of his secret with Bob upon Bob's behavior, according to you? Steve can't say, "Bob, this is yours as long as you don't tell fluoridation. If you break this, you forfeit ownership of this secret, and it is now mine again." What mechanism prevents Bob and Steve from entering into such an agreement? To me, that would be a violation of freedom, to limit the kinds of agreements people can enter into. Besides, if one could enter into such an agreement, what would you call the deliberate violation of the agreement, resulting in you knowingly possessing what then becomes Steve's secret again upon sale to you? To me, knowingly possessing something that does not belong to you seems like a fair definition of theft. If you don't believe people are free to enter into contingent ownership agreements, I do think you'll have a pretty large problem with capitalism, even separate from intellectual property, as it questions the very nature of both freedom and ownership. Even by your own definition of "control", wouldn't I not have control over something if I can't concoct whatever rules for that thing that I like?
- Kbelicius 3y ago
  > What mechanism prevents Bob and Steve from entering into such an agreement? To me, that would be a violation of freedom, to limit the kinds of agreements people can enter into. I don't know of any country in the world that allows anything and everything to be put in a contract and for good reason. Why do you think that it is so? > Even by your own definition of "control", wouldn't I not have control over something if I can't concoct whatever rules for that thing that I like? When you sell it? Absolutely not. Why do you think that you should have control over something when you sell it?
  - WendyTheWillow 3y ago
    To be clear, we limit freedom in a great many ways. There's nothing wrong with that, in principle, but it is a limitation of freedom.
- ineptech 3y ago
  By reading the rest of this comment, you agree to give me all your money forever. (edited to emphasize "rest of" which OP apparently missed) Assuming you're still here, what's the ethical difference between this and "by purchasing this DVD you agree to blah blah"? In neither case did anyone agree to anything.

beej71 3y ago

Stolen goods are also not in the possession of the original owner. Anything still in the possession of the original owner isn't stolen, by definition. The notion of "stealing" doesn't really work for piracy. Stealing: perpetrator has 1 apple, victim has 0 apples. Piracy: perpetrator has 1 apple, victim has 1 apple. A better analogy is required than "possession of stolen property". Saying it's stolen is like saying "someone copied the movie, and therefore the studio can no longer stream it".

dragonwriter 3y ago
> Stolen goods are also not in the possession of the original owner. Right. Unauthorized use of property that does not deprive the owner is trespass [0], not theft. [0] to land for real property, to chattels for tangible personal property; trespass to intangible personal property is usually a whole mess of specific statutory torts and/or crimes with names that don't have "trespass" in them for particular classes of intangible personal property.

dragonwriter 3y ago

> stolen goods aren't stolen because someone stole them; They literally are, the act of stealing a good that makes it a stolen good. There is nothing circular about that, its linear from A to B, with no loop back. It's perhaps not helpful, because what you really need is not to just to define "stolen good" but to define "stealing", and so the definition is unsatisfying. But, that's solvable, "stealing", or "theft", is the act of intentionally taking the personal property of another without permission and with the intent to deprive the owner of the property. > You can however contingently be sold a good, which means you are only allowed to have the good if you agree to certain conditions. Once you violate those conditions, you are forfeiting your ownership of that good if that's what you agreed to (and it is in the case of most digital content). That's not a contingent sale, its conditional license where the original owner remains the owner. (If the original owner has the right to claim the property back but it does not automatically revert with an action to exercise that rgight, then it is still probably a conditional license, and that is the most simple way of doing that, but it could nearly-equivalently -- but for the additional complication in execution -- be a sale, part of the consideration of which is a commitment made to the original owner and secured by a lien against the property.) > as capitalism introduces the concept of artificial scarcity Artificial scarcity is older than capitalism.

WendyTheWillow 3y ago
Fine, it's tautological, if not circular. The point remains it's useless on its own, i.e. in the context of this conversation. And yes, we get into the difference between ownership and licensure in... another comment somewhere, I don't recall specifically where. And can you say more about the introduction of artificial scarcity predating capitalism? I'm sure you're right now that you say it, but I'm curious what you think is most relevant.
- fluoridation 3y ago
  Again, it's neither tautological nor circular. It would be tautological to say "stolen goods are stolen goods". It would be circular to say "stolen goods are stolen. Something is stolen if it's a stolen good". What I said was >"Stolen goods" are stolen because someone stole them There's nothing tautological about that. I'm laying out the relationships between the words "stolen" and "steal", and between "stolen" and "stolen good". The sentence isn't void of information, particularly in a discussion where you were arguing that something could become stolen retroactively regardless of the manner in which it was acquired. You can't have in your possession a good that nobody stole, that is also a stolen good because of actions you took after it came into your possession. That's nonsense. If you have such a confusion of ideas, I have no option but to state the obvious: something is stolen if someone stole it.