Re: [Patents] You have rights.. Software Patents are Illegal

[Jonas Maebe <jonas.maebe@ugent.be>]

On 14 mei 2004, at 12:48, Flemming Bjerke wrote:

> > Within the computer, material aspects of the
> > coding of information are a means.
> In the computer, there are nothing but material aspects.

In your brain as well (chemical reactions, neurons, electricity). 
Regardless of how you represent information, it will always be using 
material and physical/technical effects. That's because us humans 
cannot interact with or detect incorporeal things (some mediums aside 
:). That's why looking the some representation or processing means of 
information is doomed to fail if you want to use it to obtain a 
meaningful distinction: you will at the end always be left with only 
physical things.

With you view, a story is also completely physical, as is a financial 
management technique. You have to see the distinction with the means 
with which the information is stored/processed, and the information 
itself (which is completely independent of those means).

There are no Informatium particles which can be combined together to 
construct or build a song or a management technique. And information 
itself can have no effect, only a machine/person/... can have an effect 
on itself or something else by doing something based on 
reading/interpreting the (represented) information.

> My point is: That software is not technique, is not a law of nature, 
> but a
> wise political decision. It is a question about power, domination and
> democracy, not about the ontology of mind and matter.

It is both. Of course, the former works better to convince people than 
the latter, because it's much easier to understand and also much more 
important in real life.


Jonas