Re: [Patents] "Betrayal of physics"

[Xavi Drudis Ferran <xdrudis@tinet.org>]

El Thu, Jul 08, 2004 at 07:25:14PM +0200, Carsten Svaneborg deia:
> 
> No it's simple retorics. If something is complicated to explain, then
> it's 90% wrong from a retorical POV. The patent office can just
> claim "we know what we are doing, don't worry, we've been doing
> it for hundreds of years" if asked. We are fighting an uphill battle.
>

Maybe an uphill battle, but we outnumber them :)
The problem is castles happen to be placed at the top of hills, 
no point fighting downhill.

I think the mind-matter approach is needed, but not necessarily 
as the first retorical device. You first explain why swpats must be avoided
(because of economics, liberties, etc) and only when that is an stablished 
need you look at what can be done to avoid them. And for what concerns
the directive mind-matter is needed.
  
That it is needed does not mean that it is sufficient.
Having a working patent system and the right incentives 
for ptos is allso needed, but you can't do with just that
and wrong substantive law.

> 
> Hence the stable solution is not to create the optimal legislation
> which is complicated to avoid loopholes, but to create legislation
> that create optimal means of checking and correcting the practice,
> such that EPO can't grant patents on software innovations.
>

this piecewise approach is too slow, expensive and error prone
by itself, it needs to be used in addition too a good patentability
criterium.
 
> 
> Regarding the "forces of nature" criterion anybody knows what
> friction is and how it works, and you can make inventions getting
> rid of it (lubricants), or increasing it (glue/tape). Try to explain
> friction on the basis of the four fundamental forces! Basically
> you are in deep trouble.
>

you don't need a grand unified theory for patenting a mouse trap. 
Explaining friction by four fundamental forces is not needed to 
understand friction  is a case of those forces in action, and 
poetry isn't


> My input is to spending inordinate amounts of time on
> http://gauss.bacon.su.se/sql/
> 
Thank you very much


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Xavi Drudis Ferran
xdrudis@tinet.org
http://patents.caliu.info