Re: [Patents] Software is not hardware, social sciences are not natural sciences.

[Bernard Lang <Bernard.Lang@inria.fr>]

On Mon, Mar 15, 2004 at 05:25:42PM -0500, Russell McOrmond wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 15 Mar 2004, Gregory Aharonian wrote:
> 
> > I hope Bernard realizes that his example is what underlies the logic of
> > US caselaw (such as Benson and Alappat) that provides for software
> > patenting - you have to be patenting a specific application, such as
> > this new drill application.
> 
>   I hope that Gregory realizes that most of us recognize that US caselaw 
> does no such thing in that the *drill*, the mechanical device used to 
> manipulate nature, is not required by the USA at all.  Remove the drill, 
> and what you have is a patent on an intangible unconnected with any 
> application of natural science.
> 
>   Business model patents are an intangible method of manipulating a social
> science, something that has absolutely no technical character (neither
> software nor business models are technical, but applications of social
> sciences), which should obviously not be patentable.  It is obvious except
> in countries that seem to think that software is an application a natural
> science simply because some special interest voodoo economists, lawyers
> and lobbiests have told them it is.

ok for lawyers and lobbyists ... but non economist that I know of.

economists agree on the stupidity of patenting software.

bernard

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