Major Copyright Judgement

[GreyICE]

No, we don't accept that. That human can do whatever he wants, and it's not immoral for that person to do whatever he wants (leaving aside the question of the ethical treatment of animals). However it does not follow that the human has a right to do whatever it wants.

Okay, what doesn't he have the right to do then? What distinguishes the things he can do from the things he has a right to do?

JAQing off much? It's your job to answer these questions, and to explain your answers, not ask them of thin air.

However you first need to answer the prior question about how you make that huge jump from "humans have quality A" to "humans therefore have right B".

I just did that. If you snip one sentence out of a multiparagraph explanation, it won't make sense, sadly.

That's called 'quoting out of context' and is a bad way to learn things.

At least I've discovered part of the problem, if you read more than every third sentence of my posts they might make more sense to you.

 

[GreyICE]

Now lets consider the stunning failures of your chosen system of governance, hedonism.

Hedonism is a rather awesome philosophy - everyone is happy. This is good.

What the problem is is trying to apply this to the real world. 1960s America. Study done. Homosexuals are happiest if they live in heterosexual relationships or in no relationship, and are least happy if they try to pursue a homosexual relationship.

Maximum social utility - reeducate gay people to be in straight relationships, and help them be happy with this. It's a mental illness, cure it!

Of course, you could hypothesize that gay people would be happiest if the social prejudice was removed, but that's silly. It might just be social pressure that makes manic/depressives unhappy, or any one of the other mental illnesses they had on the books. Very common practice, lobotomies and shock therapy to make people happier. Often worked very well, especially lobotomies - all evidence said they were happier!

You can of course ignore this problem of hedonism. Say that the maximum social utility would come about by massively disrupting society, altering stereotypes and roles that have existed for generations, and give women an active role in society, rather than cut out part of their brains to keep them happy.

But... there's no way to tell. Sitting that deep down the hole, you can't say with any certainty what will happen in 5, 10, 20, 100 years. It's tea leaf reading. You could justify any decision by saying that it will eventually maximize happiness - the Soviet Union did. Mao did. The French Revolution did.

Your philosophy of governance is utterly useless. One can no more govern by it than one can set sail in a sieve.

It's the philosophy of the revolutionary and the malcontent. "Everyone would be happier if they just listened to me."

As a philosophical starting point, it's not terrible, but doing what you are and applying it to government is the height of absurdity.

So you are sitting in a spun glass house and throwing bricks at a concrete bunker. Your philosophy is no more practical than is governing by the phrase 'all you need is love.' No wonder you demand simplistic answers to complicated questions!

 

[Rairun]

Of course we are entitled to think freely, and we should base human rights around this. We are entitled to live, to breath, to think, to observe, to conclude, to work, to create, by natural rights. We are entitled to because we are human.

That is what they are. You can see why I suggested that they're slightly fundamental.

As you've been told, that doesn't make any of those things a right. Sure, we live, breathe, observe, etc. We may even live terribly unfulfilled if we don't do those things. But once again, why do we have the right to fulfillment? What makes you think that our circumstances, be them environmental or man-made, must conform to those so-called rights?

Is it? How many societies truly controlled expression? What was printed? Sure. That's happened. What was even said to the wrong people? Yes. But it's like many have said about the right to privacy. When the founding fathers made the constitution, there was no right to privacy. If you wanted privacy, you walked out to the barn, and chatted with your friend in private.

You think that someone actually stopped expression? No. You can try to stop people from exercising their right to express their thoughts. You may even succeed for a time. But it costs an essential loss of humanity, and that's why it's a human right.

No matter how much we try, the weather seems to be pretty uncontrollable. We are able to affect it in various ways, but we just don't have the technology necessary to control rain, for example. We can't really extinguish droughts, nor can we avoid flooding. We create makeshift solutions to those problems, like irrigation or dams or whatever, but we can't really control the weather in any meaningful sense of the word.

So, does the weather have rights? If we figured out a way to control it effectively, would it cost an essential loss of weatherity? What if our planet were destroyed by several collisions and its former atmosphere dissipated? You know, maybe the weather would indeed lose some of its defining traits that way. But it's still not entitled to weatherity, and humans are not entitled to humanity.

Also, you say that a concept of a human right is made up. Sure. How is the concept of social utility less made up? Certainly anything you may level at human rights in terms of being made up may also be similarly leveled at social utility (a fundamental weakness in Kevin's argument he has ignored - every shot he takes at rights, he takes at social utility too). Hell, the concept of a society seems about as questionable as that of a right, nevermind the concept of things being useful and non useful to that society.

It's not made up because social utility, individual utility or any other sort of utility is based on people's preferences. Those preferences aren't universal, and there are no empirical reasons to respect them; but as long as we desire things, it's in our best interest to protect the right conditions to achieve them.

We have rights because we got together and said, "Listen, it would suck to live without X and Y. Let's create institutions to protect our access to them." It's as simple as that. No one really cares about human lives other than humans.

 

[BobTheDonkey]

No one really cares about human lives other than humans.

Except our pets

 

[Rairun]

Except our pets

I actually thought something like this as I wrote that:

"No one cares about human lives other than humans. And our dogs. And some of our cats. And maybe horses and.. never mind, delete."

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

Okay, what doesn't he have the right to do then? What distinguishes the things he can do from the things he has a right to do?

You're the one who believes rights are anything other than rhetorical constructs made up entirely by humans, you tell me.

I just did that. If you snip one sentence out of a multiparagraph explanation, it won't make sense, sadly.

That's called 'quoting out of context' and is a bad way to learn things.

At least I've discovered part of the problem, if you read more than every third sentence of my posts they might make more sense to you.

Your "explanations" have completely failed to answer that question. You can't just put down any old string of words and call it an explanation. Your string of words actually has to have semantic content that explains the proposition under dispute.

So far you've tried waving your hands at unspecified philosophy books, waffling about "natural flow" and "natural law", and demanding that other people do your work for you. None of those are coherent arguments.

 

[Belz...]

This is a reasonable point, but that doesn't mean we can't distinguish between rules (or at least parts of rules) that primarily restrict versus those that primarily permit. The only thing that copyright laws do is stop people from doing things -- they don't actually allow you to do anything. So, copyright laws don't increase freedom; they restrict freedom.

But don't they allow the owners of the copyright to make a living in the way that they choose and from their "inventions" ? Surely, you agree that people who invent, compose or patent things should be the ones making money from them ?

 

[Belz...]

If they exist just because we made them up, then if they are no longer serving us well we can scrap them and make something else up.

Obviously. However it's the "us" I have a problem with. I understand that you think that society's needs trumps individual freedoms (correct me if I'm wrong, but that seems to be what you've been saying). The heck of it is, I disagree.

"Society's needs" is just as made up as "individual freedoms", first off, and second it simply doesn't work as well. It's also much harder to properly define. I mean, let's return to the composer who can't make a buck for his life work because some shmuck decided to steal his notes and make money off of them. I gather you think that that composer has no right to his compositions ? But doesn't that mean, by the same token, that NONE of us have a right to anything we do or make ? And how does THAT help society ?

 

[Belz...]

Really? You really want to try the slippery slope? Well, the simple answer is that "freedom to kill this person" is generally not beneficial to society. Have you been paying any attention to the discussion between GreyICE, Kevin_Lowe, and Avalon? Beside the simple fact that this could easily be turned against your argument that the artist has a right to his/her art.

The only person arguing for "society" rights, so far, has been Kevin. I was under the impression that the Bill of Rights, among other such documents, was based on individual freedoms, instead.

And it wasn't a slippery slope. He argued that individuals basically don't have rights. So, if it's "good" to society that some bloke dies, then he should be killed, right ?

Explain to me how the average pirate is making a living off someone else's art?

Well that's not exactly what I've been saying: my point was about the artist, not the pirate. But there ARE pirates who've been making quite a sum (not their main revenue, I guess) selling stuff that doesn't belong to them.

How is my downloading an album I wasn't going to buy in the store hurting the musician, or how is it making a living for someone else to share that album? The guy/girl I downloaded the album from made no money on the transfer, so this argument holds no water when it comes to the bit of piracy we've been discussing.

It depends whether you would've purchased the album had the option to download it not been available. And since there's really no way to establish statistics on this, we have to assume that SOME of the downloads represent lost sales.

 

[GreyICE]

You're the one who believes rights are anything other than rhetorical constructs made up entirely by humans, you tell me.

Okay, I have explained the basis of rights. I have explained why they arise naturally out of the necessity of having humans in close proximity. I have explained why your system, as a piece of government is a total failure.

You sit there with your arms crossed saying 'well you tell me' and 'godly butt fairies.'

I don't see how you bring anything to this.

 

[GreyICE]

As you've been told, that doesn't make any of those things a right. Sure, we live, breathe, observe, etc. We may even live terribly unfulfilled if we don't do those things. But once again, why do we have the right to fulfillment? What makes you think that our circumstances, be them environmental or man-made, must conform to those so-called rights?

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5646601&postcount=719

Is it just the word you have a problem with, or is there an actual disagreement here?

And I explained the reason why they have to conform to those rights. We can no more stop thinking than we can stop breathing. When agreeing what freedoms we relinquish to live in close proximity, and what freedoms we retain, we have to see which ones are essential human freedoms, and which ones are non-essential, and not part of our basic nature.

(See? I avoided the word rights which seems to short circuit the thinking of several people on this thread)

No matter how much we try, the weather seems to be pretty uncontrollable. We are able to affect it in various ways, but we just don't have the technology necessary to control rain, for example. We can't really extinguish droughts, nor can we avoid flooding. We create makeshift solutions to those problems, like irrigation or dams or whatever, but we can't really control the weather in any meaningful sense of the word.

So, does the weather have rights? If we figured out a way to control it effectively, would it cost an essential loss of weatherity? What if our planet were destroyed by several collisions and its former atmosphere dissipated? You know, maybe the weather would indeed lose some of its defining traits that way. But it's still not entitled to weatherity, and humans are not entitled to humanity.

Oh stuff and nonsense. Weather doesn't think. We do. Weather isn't alive. We are. Weather can't be killed. We can. Weather can't create. We do.

That's the worst comparison I've seen in a long time.

It's not made up because social utility, individual utility or any other sort of utility is based on people's preferences. Those preferences aren't universal, and there are no empirical reasons to respect them; but as long as we desire things, it's in our best interest to protect the right conditions to achieve them.

We have rights because we got together and said, "Listen, it would suck to live without X and Y. Let's create institutions to protect our access to them." It's as simple as that. No one really cares about human lives other than humans.

Well, yes.

Here, let me put in a context you might understand.

I have one set of rules, based around our best social science, our understanding of human nature, and time tested and honored.

I have another set of rules that was made up by a person who thinks he can maximize happiness by having us all live in communes and give up our property and sing songs all day.

One of these is empirically better than another.

What do you think I'm saying?

 

[entrope]

What services are being stolen? Legally speaking, infringement is absolutely not considered theft of services, it never has been. This is a criminal matter, and includes things such as tapping into a cable line, walking out on a bill, or sneaking onto the subway.

To add to this point, I would refer everyone to the case of Kevin Mitnick, who hacked Sun Microsystems in the 90s and stole the source code to their Solaris operating system. Valued at approximately 75 mil. He was charged and imprisoned under a number of laws, not including theft. I guess what I mean to say is that the law has never considered digital copyright infringement as theft.

And as for the discussion on file sharing/piracy, this is how I see it. A lot (I'd like to say most) of popular music is freely, "legally" available on the Internet, through services such as YouTube, or streaming radio. So if I can easily go to YouTube and listen to essentially any song I want, how is having a copy of that song on my hard drive any different? It is freely accessible to me, just as it is on YouTube.

I would compare the whole scenario to a photocopier in a library. If I can, at any time, freely go to the library and view any one of the collection of books, where is the harm in photocopying it and having a hard copy of the text for myself? To say that using the library (someone else's server) to use the material is legitimate, but photocopying pages and removing them from the library is not, to me, makes no sense.

So I guess what I'm saying is, if you don't want your books to be in libraries, don't write books.

 

[Rairun]

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5646601&postcount=719

Is it just the word you have a problem with, or is there an actual disagreement here?

And I explained the reason why they have to conform to those rights. We can no more stop thinking than we can stop breathing. When agreeing what freedoms we relinquish to live in close proximity, and what freedoms we retain, we have to see which ones are essential human freedoms, and which ones are non-essential, and not part of our basic nature.

(See? I avoided the word rights which seems to short circuit the thinking of several people on this thread)

It's short-circuiting people's thinking because having a right really isn't the same as being able to do things. If now you're saying it's wise to take a good look at our behavior and see where we can and cannot comfortably compromise (thus creating rights), I'm all for that. But I'm sorry, that's not what you originally said.

Once again, freedoms =/= rights. You can have freedom of speech without the right to freedom of speech. It just means your freedom of speech is undefended.

Oh stuff and nonsense. Weather doesn't think. We do. Weather isn't alive. We are. Weather can't be killed. We can. Weather can't create. We do.

That's the worst comparison I've seen in a long time.

It makes perfect sense if you consider what I was responding to. I was arguing against the fact that you think freedom of thought is a inherent "right" (before society even comes into play, according to you) just because we can't control people's thoughts.

Well, yes.

Here, let me put in a context you might understand.

I have one set of rules, based around our best social science, our understanding of human nature, and time tested and honored.

I have another set of rules that was made up by a person who thinks he can maximize happiness by having us all live in communes and give up our property and sing songs all day.

One of these is empirically better than another.

What do you think I'm saying?

I think that's a very simplistic understanding of it. You seem to ignore the fact that society is composed of different groups with different needs and aspirations. I'm pretty sure copyright law is good for the artists' pockets (and if they don't like it, they can give up the rights they were granted). I'm also pretty sure there are millions of people who don't benefit from copyright law. Taking "human nature" into consideration does nothing here. You either please the artist, or you please everyone else.

I think a decent argument against copyright is that artists don't create anything in a vacuum. When you write a pop song, most of the hard work has already been done for you. You're drawing from a pool of knowledge that isn't your own. Imposing too many limits on the way art is exchanged stifles that process. I don't see why people should be forcibly deprived of things that have been fed back into popular culture.

For the record, I'm comfortable with outlawing the unauthorized commercialization of other people's art. I don't think a record label should be able to produce CDs and artwork whose rights they don't own and then compete with the original label. But I don't see anything wrong with individuals using their own grassroots means of making personal copies and listening to them. It makes for a much more fulfilling cultural experience, and in that sense artists themselves benefit from being exposed to more resources and ideas.

In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a starting artist today who hasn't benefited from more diverse influences provided by piracy. Really, everyone downloads things illegally. This is one of the few places on the Internet where you can find some sizable opposition to it.

 

[GreyICE]

In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a starting artist today who hasn't benefited from more diverse influences provided by piracy. Really, everyone downloads things illegally. This is one of the few places on the Internet where you can find some sizable opposition to it.

Oh come on. This graduated into outright reality denial. We have a critically acclaimed game where the maker is moving to another platform because it's not profitable for him on the PC. OVER 95% OF THE COPIES ARE PIRATED!

How the hell did he benefit from piracy? How the hell has any video game company benefited from piracy? Off the top of my head, how has Blizzard, Valve, Bungie, THQ, Capcom or Sega benefited?

Don't like video games? How has Cameron, Scorsese, Ridley Scott, et al benefited?

Benefited? What the hell? How is there a benefit there?

Straight up reality denial is not acceptable.

Also, what is this whining about oversimplification? I post. You post that I don't understand it. I post. You post that I don't understand it. I put it in the simplest terms possible. You complain its too simple.

WTF?

 

[GreyICE]

Also, seriously, most of the hard work of a song is coming up with an idea for one? WHAT?!?

You have to write at least 3 minutes of music for 3-5 instruments, to accompany a vocal piece, you have to write the lyrics and time them to the music, you have to practice this piece until you can play it perfectly...

And the hard part is coming up with an idea for a song?

This is some other universe.

 

[entrope]

How the hell did he benefit from piracy? How the hell has any video game company benefited from piracy? Off the top of my head, how has Blizzard, Valve, Bungie, THQ, Capcom or Sega benefited?

I wouldn't say any game developers have benefited, per se. I would say, however, that a company who makes good games (like Blizzard) has not lost much due to piracy. If you look at the titles Blizzard offers, they are all primarily multi player games, which cannot be used as intended if they are pirated. WoW aside (well, its included, but MMOs are a class of their own), every game Blizzard has put out since Warcraft II B.Net edition cannot be enjoyed unless it is purchased. I don't see Blizzard as being one of the companies that has been hit hard by piracy. In fact, I'd surmise it has hardly affected their bottom line.

And this is the problem with other companies. Sure, there was a day when I would pay 40 bucks (or whatever it was) for crappy Sonic the Hedgehog (was fun at the time). People don't see any value for their money in single player only games. But developers think they can still get away with this. The fact of the matter is, the market demands multi-player based games with unlimited replay value, and companies are pushing out titles with 15 hours of single-player gameplay (and no multi). Personally, while I loved a game, like, say, Mass Effect, I felt really cheated when it was only 15 hours long, with virtually no replay value.

So then the problem, as I see it, is twofold: the game developers churn out far too many extremely poor to mediocre titles, and the developers focus too much on single player. I always think back to Half-Life. Granted, the single player was ahead of its time, but I don't think I ever played through it. If there were no multiplayer, I would have undoubtedly pirated the game. I bought the game specifically to play Counter Strike, and play Counter Strike I did. For many thousands of hours. Now that's value for money, and 60 bucks I don't mind spending. Gamers are discouraged by throwing money at games which are either extremely ******, or offer zero replay value. That's why they pirate, and I'm especially surprised by the number of high-budget single-only games that have come out in recent years. I thought developers would have realized this by now?

.02

 

[Rairun]

Also, seriously, most of the hard work of a song is coming up with an idea for one? WHAT?!?

You have to write at least 3 minutes of music for 3-5 instruments, to accompany a vocal piece, you have to write the lyrics and time them to the music, you have to practice this piece until you can play it perfectly...

And the hard part is coming up with an idea for a song?

This is some other universe.

I was talking about how songs, even when they are considered original, follow a very old template that has been built over the centuries. Only a minimal part of the final result is the fruit of the artist's own effort. It's the whole "standing on the shoulder of giants" thing.

And yes, writing and arranging music is harder than the actual recording process.

 

[GreyICE]

I wouldn't say any game developers have benefited, per se. I would say, however, that a company who makes good games (like Blizzard) has not lost much due to piracy. If you look at the titles Blizzard offers, they are all primarily multi player games, which cannot be used as intended if they are pirated. WoW aside (well, its included, but MMOs are a class of their own), every game Blizzard has put out since Warcraft II B.Net edition cannot be enjoyed unless it is purchased. I don't see Blizzard as being one of the companies that has been hit hard by piracy. In fact, I'd surmise it has hardly affected their bottom line.

And this is the problem with other companies. Sure, there was a day when I would pay 40 bucks (or whatever it was) for crappy Sonic the Hedgehog (was fun at the time). People don't see any value for their money in single player only games. But developers think they can still get away with this. The fact of the matter is, the market demands multi-player based games with unlimited replay value, and companies are pushing out titles with 15 hours of single-player gameplay (and no multi). Personally, while I loved a game, like, say, Mass Effect, I felt really cheated when it was only 15 hours long, with virtually no replay value.

So then the problem, as I see it, is twofold: the game developers churn out far too many extremely poor to mediocre titles, and the developers focus too much on single player. I always think back to Half-Life. Granted, the single player was ahead of its time, but I don't think I ever played through it. If there were no multiplayer, I would have undoubtedly pirated the game. I bought the game specifically to play Counter Strike, and play Counter Strike I did. For many thousands of hours. Now that's value for money, and 60 bucks I don't mind spending. Gamers are discouraged by throwing money at games which are either extremely ******, or offer zero replay value. That's why they pirate, and I'm especially surprised by the number of high-budget single-only games that have come out in recent years. I thought developers would have realized this by now?

.02

So we're back to the 'oh it's too expensive' and 'I don't want to play single player games?'

Bad news. Many of us enjoy single player games. You don't? Don't buy them. You do? Buy them.

This is just robbery, plain and simple.

 

[Rairun]

It's not robbery, GreyICE. It's piracy.

Say you invented the wheel. You make a beautiful, well-crafted wheel and exchange it for food with your neighbor. Your neighbor carefully observes the wheel, crafts another one and gives it to his friend. He wouldn't be stealing a single thing. Yes, he would be using the idea you had, but he wouldn't be stealing a material thing nor your services.

This is exactly the same situation with music and video games. The only difference is that the neighbor has invented or bought a machine that makes perfect copies of the wheel. When he does that, he's not stealing objects or services. The object has already been made and paid for. He's only reproducing an idea someone else came up with.

And that's the heart of the issue. No one is stealing material goods. No one is making the creator provide more services (if creating an idea is a service). They are doing their own thing and reproducing an idea. And it's ridiculous to think that the creator has an absolute right over that idea, especially considering that the idea is heavily based on the intellectual work of others.

I think that it's fine to encourage creativity. I would outlaw the commercialization of other people's ideas, but not because it's "stealing". I just figure that if we are going to pay for something, we might as well encourage the ones who are likely to come up with more good ideas. But simply forbidding the reproduction of ideas, the reproduction of human culture, is way beyond what I'd be comfortable with. It's an admittedly arbitrary line, but that's where I'd draw it.

 

[entrope]

Rairun

A reasonable analogy. I'd like to add to that by saying that the Internet was designed to copy data. That is its intended purpose: one massive, fully populated electronic library. For sharing bits. When an author writes a book, he knows that libraries will purchase copies of the book for the express purpose of letting people use the copy free of charge. Likewise, when an artist releases an album, or a development company releases a game, they should be well aware of this giant library called the Internet which people use to share bits. If they don't want their bits to be shared, they should protect them.

Know I know that the immediate response will be that "if you don't want people to steal your car, you should protect it". But this is comparing apples and oranges. As has been harped on in this thread, the theft of my car represents a real, tangible loss to me, whereas the loss to an artist of bits represents a potential sale.

On that note, I don't see authors suing libraries or their patrons for file sharing their books. It comes with the territory. However, I'd argue that libraries represent real losses to authors, as without them, we would have to purchase every book we wanted to use, and authors would be much better off. Just as releasing books for sale comes with libraries purchasing a master copy and sharing it with potentially thousands of people, so too does releasing bits for sale on the Internet come with people purchasing master copies, and making them available on their server. I don't see any difference other than the fact that the Internet is all-encompassing. So, are we to conclude that, libraries may share books, so long as they are not too large? Should they get too large, they will be breaking the law?