Is It Possible to Possess Ideas, Thoughts, Or Other Mental Processes? Is Mental Property Ethical? Let’s Get Metaphysical!
Previous articles from the series
- Truth
- Life Pillars
- Everything is Scale
- Sadness
- Good X Bad
- Mental Property
One of the biggest Ancap problems
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I have recently joined a forum on Facebook where libertarians of all sorts gather to discuss matters. A huge argumentation is currently lasting for about two weeks. The question is easy – is it possible to own ideas, thoughts and so on? Finding the answer is seemingly hard, but from the point of view of an Information scientists, it’s actually not so much. All we need is one (up until now) incontrovertible epistemology vastly adopted by information scientists.
![](https://steemitimages.com/640x0/http://www.arglab.ifilnova.pt/img/uploads/700x394_0e6c7740fb0dd0e9f315ed139b2361a0.jpg)
Theory of 3 worlds
In one of my previous articles from the Information science series I described its epistemologies. What is theory of 3 worlds and how is it connected to property?
World 1
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World 1 is the world of physical entities. As far as I’m concerned, most of the people would agree upon a consensus that people have the right to own physical objects. Basically everyone but insane radical communists that would readily take away that right from you and make everything one big “commons” would agree on that (rule of thumb).
There is though one not so obvious important thing. I have to say it now, despite the fact that the reason why I even am saying it will start to make sense at the very end of the article. Basically EVERYTHING is physical. It doesn’t matter whether the object is human body, brain, its processes, virtual stuff, or basically anything else. Everything is energy. Everything that is energy exists in the physical realm, therefore everything is physical. Thus said, everything is, in a sense, World 1.
World 2
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World 2 is a world of subjective realities. World 2 is the main argument why people think that people should have the right to possess their ideas. In a way they are right. The “supposedly new idea” (will soon explain that) has been born inside their heads by “skilful matching” (will also get there in next paragraph). The idea is an information in form of energy, therefore it of course is physical and therefore people should have right to own it right? The fruits of their brain processes is after all their property right? Well…yes and no at the same time.
World 3
![](https://steemitimages.com/640x0/https://www.stevenaitchison.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/the-projection-cameron-gray.jpg)
World 3 is a world of intercommunicable information. What does that mean and how is it connected to property of mental stuff you might ask? Now is the time when it gets complicated.
Intercommunicable information
World 3 basically is one big “commons” of all the information that has been created up until now. Imagine it as random bits and pieces of information that have been emitted into the world from the subjective realities (world 2).
Additions to the world 3
Crucial thing is the matter of adding new information into the world 3. This matters tackles the very creation of ideas. Coming up with “purely new” ideas/information is totally impossible. It is impossible because of the fact that the world 2 BY NATURE connects to the world 3 when “thinking” about stuff. It is impossible to cut oneself off the “ether of information”. Thus said “new ideas” are born by CONNECTING the individual entities of world 3.
Is it morally correct to possess those creations?
Yes and no! That is the complicated part. After dissolving the matter into individual steps, this is what happens.
- Someone has come up with new idea by combining previous ideas and information from world 3, thus creating a “new idea”.
- As soon as such an idea is communicated, it leaves world 2 and joins the rest of the information and ideas in the world 3.
- New ideas would NOT BE EVER CREATED if people could not connect to the world 3 (libraries, internet, other people with the knowledge of part of the world 3 and so on). Only something that has already been discovered would be re-discovered (we would be like any other organism that loses all its ”knowledge” with every new generation.
- That means that our “new idea” is only partly ours. It is a combined effort of all the ancestors that have contributed to the world 3.
- If we wanted to have a right to possess such an information – call it our property, we would need to pay to ALL THE PREVIOUS CONTRIBUTORS of the world 3 that have created the ideas or information that we personally have used.
- I do agree that this would be a correct way how to do it, but it is impossible to connect all the information that have already been created to its creators and find out which specific information has been used in order to create ANY GIVEN ADDITION. Otherwise it is unethical, because we would want people to pay for an idea that has only been born because of hundreds of ideas that preceded it, without rewarding their creators.
- It is unethical and ignorant to support patents and to demand payment for IDEAS ALONE, for the ideas are only partly yours and you are not paying to those (let alone admitting that the idea is not only yours) that have allowed you to “create the new idea” by their effort of doing the very same thing as you have right now.
- As soon as we discover how exactly our brain works, we can start measuring its functions effectively. We might be able to realize, which information has been used in order to create our ideas. It all would become measurable world 1. We have all agreed how property works in world 1.
- There is still the problem of finding out which “old ideas” were formed by which “older ideas”. In order for you to charge for ideas alone we need a system that has complete information of which information led to creation of another information and a Blockchain with smart contract that would execute accordingly and reward ALL THE CONTRIBUTORS OF THE CHAIN.
- We are good to go and mental processes have been successfully merged with world 1. We know how property works there.
Conclusion
![](https://steemitimages.com/640x0/https://logicalgal.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/soundness-venn-diagram.jpeg)
I do admit that people deserve to be rewarded even for mental processes alone, as long as others contribute from their ideas. Creation of system that would FAIRLY reward ALL THE CONTRIBUTORS OF THE CHAIN is though pure Sci-Fi as of now. Until such a Sci-Fi becomes reality, World 3 can only be understood as one big “commons”, where everyone has right to use the accessible information for his purposes, but as soon as his new creations becomes part of the world 3, everyone can freely use it too, the same way you have done it before. That is the only reason why humanity has ever prospered.
What do you think? Do you agree, disagree, or just want to contemplate a bit more? I’m up for it!
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wow. i love the way steemit touches on issues like these, and the reactions from people.
difference between here and other platforms is, the people on hERE actually seem educated, and there is no where near as much hate.
i love that people become more accountable for their words / actions when there is a risk at being punished financially for it ;)
Yes so do I. But Steemit is still just formed by humans and humans are often times biased stubborn and only want to prove their right regardless of arguments.
Despite that though I have to agree with you. People here really do engage in much more civilized conversations and that was the main reason why I joined the platform 9 months ago:)
That makes total sense. In a way I look at ideas not as our own property to begin with. If an idea is truly good (say it benefits humanity) and leads to a discovery that changes the world, why would the person hold it back? Of course, most want personal compensation. But what if it wasn't even "our" idea to begin with.. this is harkening back to some earlier philosophers who believe in personal daemons, inspiring entities that would actually give you ideas. We know that around the world similar discoveries will pop up at the same time. To me it seems the ideas are "coming through us" and popping up. We take things far too personally this day in age!
I see where you are going.
Well you answered it yourself right :D. All the people are selfish and egoistic. They want their "share of contribution". We can’t blame the people for succumbing to human nature right?
I only see one option when this might be true - It already is a part of world 3 (the person just missed it).
Daemos were good for 3k years old philosophy, but nowadays they just don’t cut it. The reason why similar discoveries happen around the world is that most of the times it is not so hard to connect individual parts of the world 3 in order to make up an idea. People just like to think of it as something special. Or simply the "new idea" is not so new...as i said people could have just missed it and in that case it’s even more natural that someone has come to that conclusion once again.
I couldnt agree more :D.
i agree with you here:
But still think that sometimes people receive ideas from some supernatural inspiration ;) personal opinion there, call it a hunch as you can't get "proof" for that kind of thing! agreed that speed of transfer of information does lead to a lot of "new ideas" connecting at different spots around the globe.
who knows buddy:) maybe humans to absorb information from "supernatural sources"(I wouldn’t call it supernatural, but something that we don’t understand and maybe never will...anyway it very much is natural if it exists...human are just noobs in terms of understanding the universe:P) or maybe they don’t...in any case proof can’t be found for neither side of the coin right:P
Fascinating insights! A lot to mull over here. The idea that we will ever learn to deconstruct the creative contributions to, say, the smart phone, back to all of its fundamental contributers, even in theory, is simply mind numbing and truly courageous thinking!
Upvoted, Resteemed, Facebooked and Twittered.
:P Glad you liked it! SPREAD IT FAR AND WIDE:D
didnt find this post till day 9, so have a comment upvote, as i cant upvote ure OP XD
Im glad that you have found different way:P
Thanks for bringing up this interesting topic!
There are two existing and working systems relevant to this topic which you didn't mention (or have I missed them?).
Citations / references in science
Tracking the origin of ideas is a norm in science. When you publish a scientific article it must be clear what novelty your work brings and on which existing ideas it is built (and cite their authors). Of course you can't reference everything and thus you have to rely on some shared knowledge, but generally the tracking is possible.
Licences
Licences are a more general agreement than patents, which you mentioned. It's a standard to include one in any open-source project, because there are various ways how free your project can be. One common setup of open-source licenses is that you allow anybody to build on your work if they reference your project.
One last thing - I find it interesting you don't question the property rights the same way you are questioning IP. Imo the similarity is striking. I'll write a followup post about it when I find some time for it.
anticipates eagerly
@hr1 yes thanks for sharing
Well..."working"...
You are right that "citation method" does exist...but is it truly fulfilling its purpose? As you have yourself said, it only is part of scientific environment, which represents only small portion of "though creation territory". And even in such a small territory people are already gaming the system for their purpose (citing themselves and boosting their visibility, only citing the already cited articles for they already gained visibility, etc.) which from my point of view destroys its purpose (which would be dealing with the matters i outlined in the article) and therefore is not really working system.
You are right about licenses. They truly are a working system. Licenses are tough mainly connected to projects, programs, platforms, etc. They are connected to a "physical output" of the mental processes if you see where I aim. That is completely different topic than what I tackled in this article.
Excellent authority advice ..
Thank you for your free time, because you have visited my post I say to you thousands of thanks :)
Have a good day always and always healthy in the protection of god
@fingersik articles are very good
keep on working and looking for other sources of resources
"Sources of resources" made my day! :D
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Theory 3 of the world
In one of my previous articles from the Information Science series, I described epistemology. What is the 3rd world theory and how does it relate to property?
I am very interested in this third thing.
I think you really want to elevate the abstract value in the life of tiori.
very much to bring out the fact that sometimes we ourselves are confused to interpret it.
but I think you are very clever in terms of expressing it thoroughly.
thank you upvote that you give.
You are giving this hope that it can push me forward to go to the next level and I am proud to have a friend like you.
salute me @amarjuanda12345.
Really interesting article.
Need to think on it though
i concur. i bookmarked it, so i can come back and read it more thoroughly when im not sleep deprived / read the new input on the subject
Let it flow through you:P
This is im soon