GregNews: "technology" is antonym to "craft mystery"

[Hartmut Pilch <phm@a2e.de>]

Greg Aharonian's Newsletter takes an article on history of technology to
argue what "technical" should mean in patent law.  He also cites a 
text from Axel Horns, taken from

        http://www.ipjur.com/2004_02_01_archive.php3#107729755840839722

and, and doctors this text so that "FFII" becomes "FeeFoFiII", apparently 
in an attempt to make it difficult for GregNews readers to inform 
themselves independently.

Words usually denote a set of semantic features which varies from context
to context, depending on the purpose of their use.

When you oppose "technology" to "craft mystery", it is clear that you
focus on the features "applied science", which is what GA wants
"technology" to mean. He of course does not tell his readers that the full
definition contains one more feature and should read "applied natural
science".  Aharonian is of course aware of this extra feature and counters
it by claiming once more that "information is physical". But he doesn't
want his readers to be aware.  

Misinformation is probably also physical.  The misinformation particles
that emanate from books and computers must have a deforming effect on the
skulls of those who are exposed to them. Axel Horns, usually a libertarian
vigorously defending the Internet against all control attempts by RIAA,
nation states or entrenched forces of all kinds, turns the argument into
the opposite direction when it comes to patents, claiming that any failure
of patents to control the digital world means that the digital world is
being denied modernity.  That certainly strikes a chord of resonance with
the deformed skulls of his patent lawyer peers.  But Horns wouldn't go so
far as to deform "FFII" to "FeeFiFoII".  Greg seems to be an even worse 
affected victim.

===8<==============Original message text===============

!20040226  From craft mystery to science as the basis of technology

The Irish Presidency of the European Union recently released a compromise
proposal for the patenting of computer-related inventions in Europe.  It
is purely political, i.e., a nice compromise that achieves nothing. Why?
Because the Irish compromise also pretends that there are no connections
between science and technology to define "technical" - a betrayal of
Europe's scientific heritage.  Alex Horn, an IP lawyer in Europe,
summarizes the Irish compromise:

        It seems to be quite clear that the Council as well as
        the Commission refuse to provide any fixed definition of
        "technicality".  This will surely prevent us from being
        bombed back to the world of the nineteenth century as
        intended by the FeeFiFoII but it might render the entire
        Directive fruitless in views of its ultimte goal to provide
        legal certainty.  If the Directive should eventually be
        enacted more or less as proposed by the Irish Presidency,
        I expect that the legal disputes before the Patent Offices
        and Courts will continue, fueled by different approaches
        to the concepts of "technology", "technicality", "technical 
        contribution", etc.

What is really sad this issue the nature of "technology" was very nicely
addressed about 50 years ago by Prof. Ubbelohde of the Imperial College
of Science and Technology in London.  The title of his paper is a very
short and very clear resolution of "techn-":

              THE BEGINNINGS OF THE CHANGE FROM CRAFT MYSTERY
                   TO SCIENCE AS A BASIS FOR TECHNOLOGY


You are "craftful" when you know how to do something, but can't explain
how to do so to others (you give people fish).  You are "scientific" when
you know how to do something, and can prove so to others (you can prove
others can fish).  And you are "technical" when you apply the science
(you teach people to fish).

...

I will be blunt.  Anyone in Europe who says "technical" et.al. can not
be more well-defined for patentability purposes is either incompetent or
unethical. To deny this semantic grounding is to betray science, technology,
and hundreds of years of their history in Europe.  To so betray science and
technology is to delegitimize the entire patent system.  Is economics a
science (i.e. becoming less of a craft and more a science) for business
methods to be technical?  Is information physical, for the applied physics
of information processing (software/computing) to be technical?  These are
the questions that should be directly addressed, not the easily answerable
question - "what is technical?".  As a scientist trying to learn much about
IP law, I am offended at this ignorance of science and technology semantics
by lawyers.

-- 
Hartmut Pilch, FFII & Eurolinux Alliance              tel. +49-89-18979927
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation       http://swpat.ffii.org/
300,000 votes 2000 firms against software patents    http://noepatents.org/