The fallacies of intellectual communism, a compilation

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 1:49 PM

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Juan:

Did Stranger address the little problem that his fictitious IP conflicts with libertarian property rights ? Not that he would be bothered since he's a socialist/conservative who believes that we live in a 'capitalist' paradise where privilege is free-enterprise and black is white.

Fallacy 1, 8.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 2:08 PM

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Juan:

Stranger, in your communist world where individual rights are not respected, would people be allowed to copy industrial designs or would that be a violation of 'copyright' ?

It's up to the producer to decide, not me.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 2:30 PM

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filc:

Indeed! i fell right into it. The ole bait n switch.

Adult Stranger posted, than child Stranger followed through. I'm just glad I didn't waste my time writing a formal response.

Although the moderators somehow tolerate insults coming from the illiterates of this forum, I have been notified that I cannot respond in kind, and so do not expect any further replies from me.

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Juan replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 2:37 PM

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It's up to the producer to decide, not me.

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Pablo replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 4:58 PM

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demosthenes:

The IP debate just shows me that property rights and the NAP are nothing but gray areas, with any one person defining their own subjective borders to what is just and what is not just in a world of "property rights." To me, the solution is simple: eliminate the state, let the market handle it, and then we can talk about it. Since the state currently exists, I will consider the current statist system in regard to IP to be completely illegitimate. As for whether I think it's moral or not, that is my own preference and ultimately inconsequential.

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Juan replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 5:28 PM

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As for whether I think it's moral or not, that is my own preference and ultimately inconsequential.

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AJ replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 5:52 PM

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DBratton:

AJ:

The spectrum may be, but the waves are not.

Actually the spectrum is not scarce. Refer to the Archimedes Principle: For any two real numbers there are infinitely many real numbers between them.

Now substitute frequency for real number and you can see that it is only the capabilities of technological mechanisms for exploiting the spectrum which are limited.

Thanks, I didn't know that.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 8:21 PM

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Mises makes 'fallacy' 2:
The formula, the recipe, that teaches us how to prepare coffee, provided it is known, renders
unlimited services. It does not lose anything from its capacity to produce however often it is
used; its productive power is inexhaustible; it is therefore not an economic good. Acting man is
never faced with a situation in which he must choose between the use-value of a known formula
and any other useful thing.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:06 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

Mises makes 'fallacy' 2:
The formula, the recipe, that teaches us how to prepare coffee, provided it is known, renders
unlimited services. It does not lose anything from its capacity to produce however often it is
used; its productive power is inexhaustible; it is therefore not an economic good. Acting man is
never faced with a situation in which he must choose between the use-value of a known formula
and any other useful thing.

The formula for coffee is just knowledge, it is not information.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:10 PM

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i request that you explain the difference or point to somewhere it is explained. 

also is the story of a book, and the melody of a song, information, or 'just knowledge' ? (and why?)

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:19 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

i request that you explain the difference or point to somewhere it is explained. 

also is the story of a book, and the melody of a song, information, or 'just knowledge' ? (and why?)

Knowledge is bound to the human mind. It propagates through oral communication from one person to another.

Information, on the other hand, is bound to a media. It can only propagate from media to media. Because of strict physical limits of the mind's ability to process information, it is impossible for people to replicate it. So for example, if I asked you what this picture means:

You would be unable to extract any meaning from it, and you would of course be unable to reproduce it in any reliable form. That means that it is completely different from an idea. It is physical.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:26 PM

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These definitions, are they from any particular tradition? are they common/mundane? or are they your pets that you encourage others to adopt?

could I use a computer to analyse the fractal and deduce for me a formula by which it may be reproduced?

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:32 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

These definitions, are they from any particular tradition? are they common/mundane? or are they your pets that you encourage others to adopt?

They are part of information theory, which was a field that was only in its infancy during the lifetime of Mises. However, despite not having in-depth knowledge of information physics, previous economists (such as Rothbard) were able to recognize the scarcity of information regardless, and distinguish it from the scarcity of ideas.

As I stated before, it is only necessary, in order to distinguish information from ideas and identify information as scarce and ideas as superabundant, to observe how people act towards these two goods. The fact that there exists a black market for information, that people are willing to pay money to pirates and counterfeiters for it, demonstrates that it is irrevocably scarce. On the other hand, no one will ever pay a penny for an idea! No black market for ideas exist, demonstrating that ideas aren't scarce.

nirgrahamUK:

could I use a computer to analyse the fractal and deduce for me a formula by which it may be reproduced?

Absolutely impossible. It is a feature of the Mandelbrot Set that you could explore it for the entire lifetime of the universe and never arrive at the same output. Besides, your proposal is equivalent to saying that you can look at an animal and deduce its DNA.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:49 PM

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Stranger:

They are part of information theory, which was a field that was only in its infancy during the lifetime of Mises. However, despite not having in-depth knowledge of information physics, previous economists (such as Rothbard) were able to recognize the scarcity of information regardless, and distinguish it from the scarcity of ideas.

As I stated before, it is only necessary, in order to distinguish information from ideas and identify information as scarce and ideas as superabundant, to observe how people act towards these two goods. The fact that there exists a black market for information, that people are willing to pay money to pirates and counterfeiters for it, demonstrates that it is irrevocably scarce. On the other hand, no one will ever pay a penny for an idea! No black market for ideas exist, demonstrating that ideas aren't scarce.

Can you point to an 'information theory' primer that schools new readers in the technical definitions of information and knowledge as they are used formally within that science? 

I note that we have introduced a third term, we had information and knowledge. now you mention information and ideas. What are you saying about information? the information in a book, is patterns of ink on paper that by looking at and interpreting using a scheme I can form ideas about. 
I agree that ink on paper is scarce. media is scarce. but you don't advocate 'media rights' especially. all ibertarians advocate media rights. so, we have our common ground... where do we depart.?

shall we say that the 'information' in the book refers to merely the fact that the arrangement of ink has a statistical chance of giving rise to  (inexhaustable and non-rival) ideas/knowledge in my mind if I were to observe the scarce physical media...  or shall we say something else?

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 9:53 PM

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Stranger:

nirgrahamUK:

could I use a computer to analyse the fractal and deduce for me a formula by which it may be reproduced?

Absolutely impossible. It is a feature of the Mandelbrot Set that you could explore it for the entire lifetime of the universe and never arrive at the same output

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:03 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

Can you point to an 'information theory' primer that schools new readers in the technical definitions of information and knowledge as they are used formally within that science? 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory as good a place to start as any.

nirgrahamUK:

I note that we have introduced a third term, we had information and knowledge. now you mention information and ideas.

Ideas are a form of knowledge. Facts are another form of knowledge.

nirgrahamUK:

I agree that ink on paper is scarce. media is scarce. but you don't advocate 'media rights' especially. all ibertarians advocate media rights. so, we have our common ground... where do we depart.?

Copyrights are media rights. They are limits on the use of media. The intellectual communists do not recognize these limits.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:07 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

Stranger:

nirgrahamUK:

could I use a computer to analyse the fractal and deduce for me a formula by which it may be reproduced?

Absolutely impossible. It is a feature of the Mandelbrot Set that you could explore it for the entire lifetime of the universe and never arrive at the same output

I don't think you posted a infinity onto the board but something discrete. 

You are not getting it right. The amount of information in the Mandelbrot Set is infinite. The slice of information that I posted is one recording made of a unique process of extracting information from the Mandelbrot Set. It is this uniqueness that makes it scarce. Because the amount of information in the Mandelbrot Set is infinite, it is possible to perpetually extract unique information from it to infinity.

The old proverb asks whether an infinite number of monkeys on an infinite number of typewriters would ever produce the works of Shakespeare. According to information theory, the answer is no.

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AJ replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:18 PM

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This fractal example fizzles as soon as you identify what the IP is supposed to be.

- If the IP is the picture above, if it is seen and recorded (with a camera, etc.) it can be reproduced.

- If the IP is the algorithm, if it is seen and recorded (with a camera, etc.) it "is possible to perpetually extract unique information from it to infinity."

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abskebabs replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:19 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

Can you point to an 'information theory' primer that schools new readers in the technical definitions of information and knowledge as they are used formally within that science? 

L.Brillouin, Science and Information theory (Academic
Press Inc, New York, 1956).

The above is an excellent book on the subject, needless to say I must caution that I think Stranger is talking hogwash at this point.

Strictly, in information theory: Information is equivalent to data, and hence may be quantified e.g. if I receive a word with some letters missing, given that I know the probabillity distribution of the occurence of letters in the english language, I may be able in some way to "quantify" the total information I have received.

This is distinguished from knowledge which may take information and produces something far more broad and meaningful, after being interpreted through human reasoning. This is and has always been recognised by information theorists to be outside the bounds of information theory, at least as currently conceived in the form developed from Shannon's work. Yet this is precisely the object of our interests in an IP debate.

Hence bringing up information theory is a red herring. See Claude Shannon's original paper too, it's surprisingly readable if you know a little basic maths.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:23 PM

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AJ:

If the IP is the picture above, if it is seen and recorded (with a camera, etc.) it can be reproduced.

No. The source is a unique event. A picture of a man who died decades ago cannot be retaken.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:25 PM

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Stranger:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory as good a place to start as any.

Stranger:

Ideas are a form of knowledge. Facts are another form of knowledge.

Stranger:

Copyrights are media rights.

Stranger:

They are limits on the use of media.

if you transferred property title concerning a tomato over to another party in exchange for a dollar and on the condition that the purchasing party would not clap his hands in the next 2 hours. if the receiving party should clap his hands after a mere five minutes, the original title holder to the tomato would be in a position to reclaim his tomato on the basis that the original title transfer had been conditional, and the condition had not been met. the original title holder could not claim more than this. and must relinquish his claim to the dollar (as the original title transfer had not been concluded) if he wishes to reclaim the tomato.

do you agree/disagree?

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:25 PM

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abskebabs:

 

L.Brillouin, Science and Information theory (Academic
Press Inc, New York, 1956).

 

The above is an excellent book on the subject, needless to say I must caution that I think Stranger is talking hogwash at this point.

This is a very old book. Much progress has been made in 80's and 90's, particularly in computer science and complexity science.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:29 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

Stranger:

Copyrights are media rights.

no, they must be something beyond, otherwise the rights to the scarce property would be enough, just as when the scarce property is a car, tomato or human body....

Perhaps copyrights are simply mislabeled. In fact what they explicitly declare is a "copyright reserved", thus implying that all other rights have been sold except for this particular right. Since it would be impractical to conclude a contract that enumerates all rights being purchased other than the right to copy, copyrights fulfill this purpose quite practically.

nirgrahamUK:

if you transferred property title concerning a tomato over to another party in exchange for a dollar and on the condition that the purchasing party would not clap his hands in the next 2 hours. if the receiving party should clap his hands after a mere five minutes, the original title holder to the tomato would be in a position to reclaim his tomato on the basis that the original title transfer had been conditional, and the condition had not been met. the original title holder could not claim more than this. and must relinquish his claim to the dollar (as the original title transfer had not been concluded) if he wishes to reclaim the tomato.

do you agree/disagree?

This depends on whether the property being exchanged is perishable. If I sell a concert ticket with the obligation to arrive one hour before the concert, and the purchaser is late and finds the doors closed, then he has forfeited his right to enter and his money. He certainly does not have an unlimited right to enter the venue at any time for all time.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:32 PM

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Stranger:

AJ:

If the IP is the picture above, if it is seen and recorded (with a camera, etc.) it can be reproduced.

No. The source is a unique event. A picture of a man who died decades ago cannot be retaken.

You have dodged the issue, dodged the content of AJ's post. Yeah, a source may be unique, but information about it can be encoded in media and transferred from one place to another, the knowledge of the images content can be known by multiple parties (not just one individual for all time). a picture of a man who died decades ago can be reproduced.....the question is why should someone be allowed to restrict me (by recourse to law) from observing the image and reproducing it. of course they can recourse to keeping secrets, to physical evasion so that the light does not reach my eyes or my photography reproducing equipment. but the copyright goes beyond that to recourse to law, and I haven't yet read you make the case that my camera should not be allowed to record particular wave patterns....

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AJ replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:33 PM

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Stranger:

AJ:

If the IP is the picture above, if it is seen and recorded (with a camera, etc.) it can be reproduced.

No. The source is a unique event. A picture of a man who died decades ago cannot be retaken.

Well good then, I can freely copy CDs of all dead singers because the original master tape recordings are "unique events." You've painted yourself into a corner.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:33 PM

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Stranger:

This depends on whether the property being exchanged is perishable. If I sell a concert ticket with the obligation to arrive one hour before the concert, and the purchaser is late and finds the doors closed, then he has forfeited his right to enter and his money. He certainly does not have an unlimited right to enter the venue at any time for all time.

may we us assume imperishable(over relevant timescales) and proceed...?

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:35 PM

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Stranger:

This is a very old book. Much progress has been made in 80's and 90's, particularly in computer science and complexity science.

Sadly I am no closer to reading a scholarly work that address the formal lexicon adopted by information theorists as no pertinent source has been recommended despite recent attempts....

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:36 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

the knowledge of the images content can be known by multiple parties (not just one individual for all time).

Actually my entire point is that there cannot be knowledge of the image if it is information. Knowledge is not scarce, information is.

If you simply know about a picture of a man, you are still unable to reproduce it! You must have the physical information in order to do this, and this information is property, and you are explicitly forbidden from using this information in combination with reproduction devices.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:37 PM

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AJ:

Stranger:

AJ:

If the IP is the picture above, if it is seen and recorded (with a camera, etc.) it can be reproduced.

No. The source is a unique event. A picture of a man who died decades ago cannot be retaken.

Well good then, I can freely copy CDs of all dead singers because the original master tape recordings are a "unique events." You've painted yourself into a corner.

I fail to see how that follows.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:39 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

Stranger:

This depends on whether the property being exchanged is perishable. If I sell a concert ticket with the obligation to arrive one hour before the concert, and the purchaser is late and finds the doors closed, then he has forfeited his right to enter and his money. He certainly does not have an unlimited right to enter the venue at any time for all time.

may we us assume imperishable(over relevant timescales) and proceed...?

No, we may not.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:39 PM

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when I see an image, and I recognise it, it is there in front of me, patterns and shade. is the information always beyond my mind? are you saying that when i see i do not see? when a person looks at a photo, and paints a version are they not accessing the information in their minds? are people literately ignorant of information that is on the media that they look to to gain knowledge from ? 

Stranger:

Actually my entire point is that there cannot be knowledge of the image if it is information.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:43 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

when I see an image, and I recognise it, it is there in front of me, patterns and shade. is the information always beyond my mind?

Your mind can never fully record the information. That is just one of its limitations.

Even the most prolific, most autistic minds cannot do a pixel-precise reproduction of complex information.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:43 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

may we us assume imperishable(over relevant timescales) and proceed...?

Stranger:

No, we may not.

care to explain your objection? I wanted to analyse copyright by appeal to Rothbardian title transfer theory. I recognise with you that the perishability of physical goods has bearing on how failures to conclude title-transfers must be resolved. I should think the only reason for you not to grant the assumption and to continue to discuss is that you think that it is either  impossible for books and cd's to be imperishable over the relevant time-spans ....or that your theory does not concern such imperishable books and cd's but only whatever books and cd's do perish within the relevant time-spans....

please explain

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nirgrahamUK replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:45 PM

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Stranger:

nirgrahamUK:

when I see an image, and I recognise it, it is there in front of me, patterns and shade. is the information always beyond my mind?

Your mind can never fully record the information. That is just one of its limitations.Even the most prolific, most autistic minds cannot do a pixel-precise reproduction of complex information.

so the information can't be permanently housed in all its glory... can it not even be passing through on the train to being forgotten?

you chose to post a response to only half of what i had posted in that entry. here is the other half again so we dont forget it

 Stranger:

Actually my entire point is that there cannot be knowledge of the image if it is information.

Are you saying images can never be known since they are always information? that a poem cannot be known since it is information?

perhaps this is where you concede that for you photographers have copyright whereas authors of short (or long works that can be memorised and recited at length) do not have copyright....

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:47 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

care to explain your objection? I wanted to analyse copyright by appeal to Rothbardian title transfer theory. I recognise with you that the perishability of physical goods has bearing on how failures to conclude title-transfers must be resolved. I should think the only reason for you not to grant the assumption and to continue to discuss is that you think that it is either  impossible for books and cd's to be imperishable over the relevant time-spans

Whatever the material structure of the media, the information has still been consumed. It cannot be refunded.

One cannot claim a refund from a barbershop because the scissors have not been worn down.

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AJ replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:48 PM

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Stranger:

nirgrahamUK:

when I see an image, and I recognise it, it is there in front of me, patterns and shade. is the information always beyond my mind?

Your mind can never fully record the information. That is just one of its limitations.

Even the most prolific, most autistic minds cannot do a pixel-precise reproduction of complex information.

Good, so I can freely create and sell non-pixel-precise reproductions of paintings, photographs of them, etc.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:49 PM

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nirgrahamUK:

perhaps this is where you concede that for you photographers have copyright whereas authors of short (or long works that can be memorised and recited at length) do not have copyright....

Even very short stories will be corrupted and some information lost when recited from memory. For an identical copy to be made requires the original media.

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Stranger replied on Sat, Jan 23 2010 10:50 PM

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AJ:

 

Good, so I can freely create and sell non-pixel-precise reproductions of paintings, photographs of them, etc.

Only if you can prove that you did so without using the media, for then it is a derivative work and the original information producer owns all the rights.