Russell's contempt for the motivation of scientists and engineers

[Gregory Aharonian <srctran@world.std.com>]

Russell writes:
>I think I am most comfortable with software copyright because I think of
>the software I create similar to how an artist or author thinks of what
>they create.  It is not simply about economic incentives, but about who
>we are. The software we write is not simply a set of functionality in an
>industrial sense, but an expression in a human readable language of
>something that is part of us.

Nice insult of all of the science community, a contempt I see too often.
Let me illustrate:

    The circuit diagrams we write are not simply a set of functionality
    in an industrial sense, but an expression in a human readable
    language of something that is part of us.

The symbols and structures of circuit diagrams qualify as a human readable
language.

    The chemical process flows we write are not simply a set of
    functionality in an industrial sense, but an expression in a
    human readable language of something that is part of us.

Much of chemistry and chemical engineering is the exchange of new ideas
using chemistry-based languages to express information.

And the same for every other area of science and engineering, of which
software is just one part.  If there is something "software-ish" in you
that can be so expressed, so to is there something "chemistry-ish" and
"physics-ish" in others to be expressed.  Read the book, I think the
title is "The Existential Pleasure of Engineering".

But at least in light of American case law (which given recent global
treaties is easily extendible around the world), if the aesthetic
aspects of something pale in comparison to the functional aspects,
as is the case with most of software, it isn't copyrightable.  No way
I can see any significant motivational differences between programmers
and other engineers sp that the expression of software, especially source
code, could rise to the level of its functionality.

So when you stop insulting the other patented branches of science and
engineering, you are left with yet another aspect that software has
in common with all other patented areas - that its inventors are
motivated in a variety of ways.

Greg Aharonian