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German Court Says GPL is Valid
Axel Metzger writes "The Munich District Court has ruled on May 19, 2004 that the main clauses of the GNU General Public License are valid under German copyright and contract law. This seems to be the first judgment worldwide proofing the validity of the most popular free software license. The ruling is a confirmation of the preliminary injunction of April 2, 2004. The new judgment gives on 20 pages the reasons for the ruling. It states explicitly that the terms of section 2, 3 and 4 of the GPL are valid under German copyright and contract law. Here is the German text of the judgment; an English translation will be available soon. The judgment comes at the right time to fight those (SCO and others) who challenge the legal validity of the GPL in Europe and elsewhere. The lawyer of the plaintiffs, Till Jaeger from Munich should be granted the Free Software Award."
Please note that the German copyright law (Urheberrecht, as it is called) is quite different from the US copyright.
(as in beer!)
Shades of Grayden
but that won't help us in the United States. Unfortunately, our government doesn't take heed from European countries anymore. Sad. We won't take counsel in our closest allies.
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
Rough translation pasted from my Groklaw posting,
/ralph -- that is all of the heise article!
sorry for the messed up formating:
The open source project netfilter/iptables has won a huge success in the legal
battle against the router manufacturer Sitecom: With the decision of May 19,
2004 (Az. 21 O 6123/03) the Landgericht München [something like a district
court? R.] has confirmed the temporary injuction. Acording to this the
manufacturer Sitecom is prohibited to sell its WLAN routers until further
notice. Also the comparatively high amount of the dispute of Euro 100000 was
confirmed in the decision.
In the written opinion which was published on friday, it is clearly stated that
the judge considers the GPL valid for principal reasons. It says: "The
chamber shares the opionion that the conditions of the GPL can under no
circumstances be seen as an abandonment of copyrights and legal positions linked
to copyright." The sueing developer was legitimized to demand the rights
linked to the sourcecode
This makes it finally clear that the GPL model also works according to
German law", rejoiced Lawyer Till Jaeger, who represents the
netfilter/iptables project, in an interview with heise online. After this
"probably worldwide first decision on the validity and enforcability"
it was assured that the open source community defends itself. On the other hand
the Court has made it clear, that nobody has anything to fear if he plays by the
rules of the GPL
It is unknown if the router manufacturer plans furter legal steps. Jaeger's
client in the mean time found out that Sitecom offers one additional router
model (WL-111) with a firmware that infringes the GPL. A fine of 10000 Euro
because of infringement against the temporary injunction has already been
demanded, declared Jaeger
Truly a reason to rejoice, for Jaeger and for us!
Considering that the Supreme Court ruled that the Texas sodomy law was invalid based on European court's rulings perhaps IBM can use this and that case as part of their defense.
Prosecutor: Mr. McBride, isn't it true that you have a tattoo on your chest that says "DIE, GPL DIE"?
Darl McBride: No no! That's German for "The GPL, the".
Jury mumblings: Well, no one that speaks German can be evil! NOT GUILTY!
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." - John Lennon.
While I personally prefer the BSD license, GPL has it's uses, and I think it's great that it's gotten some official recognition.
The CB App. What's your 20?
But it is not a surprise to anyone with even basic knowledge of copyright law.
The GPL is probably one of the least controversial copyright licences out there, and I would say it is totally watertight.
The only places where there might be problems are in countries like Iran which don't recognise copyrights from countries like the US. - if there is no copyright, there is no need to agree to the terms of the GPL to be allowed to use the software.
In terms of the SCO lawsuits this is great. It will allow IBM and others to just point to this ruling as proof of support for the GPL.
This is also a victory for good old RMS who has stated for years that the GPL is legally valid and binding.
This brings up an interesting question in my mind. Lets hypothesize for a moment that SCO loses all it's lawsuits and the GPL is proven in a US court to be valid and legally binding. How will future lawsuits dealing with violations of the GPL handled?
Are violators of the GPL going to have to pay fines or be forced to open source the code they designed in conjunction with GPL'd code. Add to this the possible stances the FSF could take on this issue.
This definitly makes things more interesting in my opinion.
Push harder towards Open Media/Content
Because some people might not know them by heart... from the gnu.org website:
1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's
source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you
conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate
copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the
notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty;
and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License
along with the Program.
You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.
2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion
of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and
distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1
above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices
stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
parties under the terms of this License.
c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively
when run, you must cause it, when started running for such
interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an
announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a
notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide
a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under
these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this
License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but
does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on
the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you
distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based
on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of
this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the
entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest
your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to
exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or
collective works based on the Program.
In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program
with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of
a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under
the scope of this License.
3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it,
under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of
Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
a) Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable
source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections
1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three
years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your
cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete
machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be
distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium
customarily
I submitted this story last night, and it didn't get posted.
... Germany is just ambitious and misunderstood ...
Now we must hope that, as usual, everyone wants to be like Germany!
Which means the US courts are almost certainly going to have to say "no". Could lead to an interesting case where in Europe Microsoft is a monopoly that has to change its trading rules, Linux is perfectly okay and SCO is a joke. Meanwhile in the US its Microsoft the good corporate citizen, Linux is illegal and SCO is Unix.
Start an orderly queue at the borders please gentlemen and start boarding those boats.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
I'm not sure about german law, but I think it's not a common lnaw system like the british/american system. That is, the decisions of judges don't have much impact on future judicial decisions. There is no 'quoting the xxx vs xxx trial of 19xx' in most legal systems. Since brazilian law students read a lot of german philosophy of law, I would guess they're in the same tradition we are.
There is really no way for the GPL to be invalid under US copyright law, and any company to still be able to use the code. If the GPL is invalid, that means the companies lack a license to distribute the code, so it's copyright infringement, pure and simple.
That's really why it works so well. If I make a work, it is copyright to me. By default no one other than myself has any right to distribute it at all. To do so, you need a license. The GPL is that license, but has provisions. You don't have to accept it, that's fine, but then you don't have a license to distribute. In no way are your rights infringed on, or copyright cricumvented.
Same thing applies to overall vailidity. If it's not valid, as SCO would like, that's fine, but then they, and anyone else, distributing GPL code are infringing on copyright since they have no license to do so. So if it's ruled invalid, it's a loss for them, espically since I imagine many bitter OSS people would go after them for copyright infringement as retribution.
This ruling is just a formal legal statement on that fact. A court has formally analyzed the GPL and come to the quite obvious conclusion: It's a legit license that obeys both the letter and spirit of copyright law.
Supposing it does go to court, I bet the ruling is the same in the US.
BTW, IANAL.
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
The GPL v2 has been around for 13 years and this is the first time it's been proven valid, even though it's in such widespead use.
I guess it's a testament to the plain english and common sense language of the licence.
Why *wouldn't* it be valid?
Congrats to everyone involved, and RMS for writing it.
Damien
gut
Rhymes that keep their secrets will unfold behind the clouds.There upon the rainbow is the answer to a neverending story
...or are you a shark? Sharks have no necks! ;-)
With a a bag of marzipan Joy Joys(mit Iodine)
Knowing what I like to think I know about the GNU GPL, I suspect that if the GPL was considered invalid, then, so would any other software license- including, for example, any from MS.
Therefore, it might appear to be in many more peoples' and entities' interests that the GPL is ruled valid.
the mods must be drunk for rating this one funny
Microsoft speaks against the GPL for this very reason - now the developers must reveal their source code, because it was based on GPL'ed code. But what they conveniently neglect to mention is that according to the EULA, a Windows developer cannot distribute, or even build, a derivative of Windows, under any terms . The license for GPL code covers only distribution of derivative products, whereas the MS EULA covers merely using the product. In fact, to even view the source code for an MS product requires that a developer agree to never develop a competing product!
Merely posting the source will allow these guys to continue to ship their product, but if they'd chosen the Microsoft development model, they'd owe royalties for every single product shipped!
Even though these guys might not like divulging their source code, they are still in a much better position than had they used Microsoft's code as a basis for their product.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
On a somewhat related question, how does SuSE, a German company, justify their '30 day evaluation' download under the terms of the GPL?
I downloaded it, right? Even if it is just a '30 day eval'. Shouldn't they give me the source code?
isn't this '30 day eval' against the premise of the PGL anyway, that I should be able to redistribute the software I use?
I agree. Just because europe does it doesn't mean it's the correct way. Like wise, the methods in the US aren't the correct way for Europe.
;)
Though, communication with our closest allies is always a good thing. Make no mistake about that
Life is not for the lazy.
In other news, the sky has been verified to be blue, and independant study shows SCO sux. ...Duh.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Pretty much all of mainland Europe follows the civil law tradition. Generally, only those countries having roots in the British Empire follow the common law tradition. The state of Louisiana still carries some remaining vestiges of the civil law tradition, which it inherits via its history as a French territory.
It's quite conceivable that one judge would rule "against" one of the provisions of GPL for a very specific case, without invalidating the whole license. For instance: what if NVidia gets sued for not publishing their drivers under the GPL, and the judge does not consider their kernel module to be derived off the kernel ? Does that mean the GPL is invalid/unenforceable and NVidia used the linux kernel without a license? Hardly.
The Raven
When did people start doubting the GPL? Who started saying such things? I don't understand why it would be deemed invalid by anyone! IANAL but it seems to me that the licence is quite clear and there is no reason most civilized countries shouldn't find it valid with their laws.
Related: BayStar -- the major investor in SCO -- will take SCO to court!
Lawsuits for EVERYONE!
Germany is part of the EU, correct? If so, does this decision essentially span across all member countries of the EU (much like environmental laws, etc.)?
nt
seriously, the ruling was 2+ months ago...
Sieg heil.
I believe the source just has to be made publicly available and it is on: their site.
Get over it, this is slashdot. Love it, or hate it.
Life is not for the lazy.
You're right, I'm bit drunk. Though I did not moderate grandparent, although I've got mod points.
And we can trust the Germans.
Surely no one from Germany could be evil. Right?
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
I'm not sure if this is a GPL is legally valid president, more like a copyright infringement case, where the defendants are claiming the GPL allows them to carry on infringing, where in reality, it does not.
Its a bit like a Credit Card company providing a licence to someone that grants them the permission take anything they like they find in a shop without paying, on the condition that they deposit monies equaling that value into an account at some point later. Now, when some thief ends up in court for common theft, after nicking a load of stock, The thief claiming the Credit card companies licencing agreements with him are invalid, and can't be held up in court!.....
The GPL will be proven in a case of law when:
Person A , receives some software under the GPL, makes amendments to suit their needs, releases these changes to the world, as required by the GPL.
Person B, who makes software that competes with Person A (but this software also happens to be GPL'ed), Finds that there's this really neat piece of code done by person A, That will do wonders for his 'competing' GPL'd software, and so copies this code, line by line, into his product.... This product then becomes the market leader, no one wants to know A's product anymore!
Person A, isn't to happy with person B, and so sues A for copyright infringement. person B, then will have to rely on the GPL, to get themselves off the hook. At this point, if A can claim the GPL is invalid, then A has a case, however, by winning that particular case, they then leave themselves open to as similar copyright case by person C, who's software they original ripped off in the first place.
Seriously. How tough does "Till" really sound in court. It's almost worse than "Anonymous Coward" like me!
I hope Darl McBride is looking at the Help Wanted section... under "Toilet Bowl Cleaners".
For all of you who are wanting to post into this topic, I give you some "IANAL" so you won't have to bother yourself:
IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL IANAL
Just copy and paste 'em wherever needed, you are encouraged to actively put one of them into each paragraph of your posts.
Thank you for your cooperation.
This brings up an interesting question in my mind... How will future lawsuits dealing with violations of the GPL handled?
It doesn't "bring up" an interesting question, it *begs* an interesting question, dumbass.
[/stupid joke]
How ironic!
Lets say, a particually ruthless company (Hello M$) copy some GPL software into there own product that they market and make loadsass out of (eg Windows). Now, at some point, the source code is leaked, and it is found that GPL code is in there. Does this mean that, Legally, for Windows to have been distibuted, it must have been under the terms of the GPL, and in which case, it would be perfectly leagal for anyone, from that point forward, to make 'pirate' copies of that software and distribute it without fear of the copyright courts?.... Hmm, Have to go through that source code I downloaded a few months back with a fine tooth combe!
http://www.sitecom.com/WL-122_gpl.zip. sitecom.com/WL-111_gpl.tgz
http://www
All it means is they are guilty of Copyright Violation, and would have to pay damages based on that (which, depending on how long it's been in there could be fairly significant).
Going forward they would have to either remove the offending code from their products, comply with the GPL, or risk facing another Copyright Infringement case.
...amaze me.
It's like complaining that abolition of slavery restricts the rights of slave traders and owners. Jesus H. Christ on a stuffed platypus.
That's rich. What do you think a license is? It's a contract between parties about the permissions granted by one party (licensor) to the other (licensee).
-truth
I had a steady B+ in my AI class until I failed the Turing test...
From your sig: "Standing up to an evil system is exhilarating." --Richard M. Stallman
The one thing I've never understood about RMS is that he claims to both be an atheist and believe in evil. While I can see how a pantheist can believe in evil, I have trouble seeing how atheism and the belief in evil mesh.
Engineering and the Ultimate
an English translation will be available soon
Translation: 4 free karma points for the first translation!
The shareholder is always right.
Well some of us atheists use 'evil' as a term of judgement, meaning 'immoral', even though we don't believe in a spiritual evil. Osama Bin Laden is evil because he's murdered thousands of innocent people for his political/religious aims, not because some satanic demon has infiltrated his soul or any such superstitious nonsense.
Oh, and atheists do often believe that some things are right and other things are wrong - even though we don't have the promise of heaven or threat of fire and brimstone hanging over our heads to keep us straight. I've found the odd Christian who simply can't get to grips with that fact, so I felt I had to point that out in case you were one of them!
Hope this helps.
Is that an "Omen", Damian?
("Damien Omen")
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
" Well some of us atheists use 'evil' as a term of judgement, meaning 'immoral'"
"Oh, and atheists do often believe that some things are right and other things are wrong"
But I don't see where such concepts such as "right" and "wrong" can come from in a pure atheistic mentality. Why would something be "right" or "wrong" if everything is _only_ a sophisticated collection of atoms. Why are the atoms of a carbon-based form of more worth than silicon?
Engineering and the Ultimate
you better recompile everything from scratch so you are sure their is nothing in the binaries that you don't have rights to redistribute
No - if it's compiled as part of the binary, then it's covered under the GPL as well, and you thus *do* have the rights to distribute it.
I'm neither a philosopher nor an atheist, but the most primitive justification of what is right and what is wrong for an atheist would be: "don't to other what you would like being done to you".
"Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead." (John Maynard Keynes)
It states explicitly that the terms of section 2, 3 and 4 of the GPL are valid under German copyright and contract law.
The GPL has more sections than 2 3 and 4... what about the other sections? If those are invalid, the GPL as a whole doesn't mean anything, right?
Should have been "don't do to others what you would not like being done to you".
"Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead." (John Maynard Keynes)
"everything is _only_ a sophisticated collection of atoms"
You're confusing atheism with some sort of nihilism methinks.
Atheism is a belief that there is no god. It says absolutely nothing about whether or not you believe that people or living creatures are special or not.
Eventually morality all boils down to a few axioms to determine whether an action is right or wrong, and that can't be proved or disproved. Some have the categorical imperative, some believe people should be as free as possible, some want the greatest happiness for the greatest number, and some just believe in a few old laws carved on a rock by a mad old dude halfway up a mountain three thousand years ago. Take your pick!
That the owner of a copyright on a work does not get to dictate the terms and conditions that one must fulfill in order to copy and distribute the work. Whether what is being demanded or not is improper or not is irellevant, under copyright law, you do NOT have permission to distribute a work without a license to do so from the copyright holder.
For what it's worth. I could be a copyright holder on a work and demand that in order to obtain the rights to copy it, you must name your first born child after me (even if it's a girl). That my demands are enitrely unreasonable is irrellevant to the subject of the ownership of copyright. Without complying to the terms, you still won't have permission to distribute it under plain and simple copyright law.
If the GPL is even PARTIALLY invalid, a person will have no right to distribute the work unless or until the copyright holder conceeds to the weaker version. The courts cannot force him to change his terms.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
They can deduce whatever they like from the clauses of the GPL, it has no effect. That's just their view, how they'd like the GPL to be applied.
They retreat to technical arguments like static vs. dynamic linking because they also cannot clearly define "derived". They say that linking a closed source application against a GPLed library is prohibited. What if I say that just using a programming interface, be it formally defined or not, is automatically non-derivative work, because I do not change, thus do not derive from the "other" software. I just use it the way it's supposed to be used.
And on the other hand, if I glue together a bunch of GPL programs using <insert your favorite skripting language> to form an enterprise class ERP system, isn't that composed work clearly derived from all the parts, even if I don't change a single line of GPLed code?
FSF might say, "if you link statically, it's not verifiable if you actually used the software unchanged, because we cannot exchange the "other" software and see if your program still runs. So we will assume that you violate the GPL", and I say, "then sue me!"
And right there it all becomes law tactics. I suppose it's just the threat of being sued that keeps most people from daring. Pretty obvious, it seems.
But what if I don't care, cause I'm big freakin' evil monopoly...
"" Well some of us atheists use 'evil' as a term of judgement, meaning 'immoral'""
""Oh, and atheists do often believe that some things are right and other things are wrong""
"But I don't see where such concepts such as "right" and "wrong" can come from in a pure atheistic mentality. Why would something be "right" or "wrong" if everything is _only_ a sophisticated collection of atoms. Why are the atoms of a carbon-based form of more worth than silicon?"
Right and wrong are not physical things, they are mental things. How we got here doesn't matter. Just because I don't believe in any gods does not mean that I believe that it is O.K. to kill murder or maim. An athiest is not necessarily an anarchist.
No matter where you go, there you are. So Enjoy it.
...JFK got whacked by a conspiracy of insiders in the US government and business. There were military, tranational business people, and civilian police agencies and bureaucrats involved. It went right to the top. It was not a bloodless coup, it involved blood and brains all over the place, then a whitewash commission to pin the blame on the designated patsy, and the controlled media helped with the brainwashing and legitimizing. The US government has been run in actuality ever since by a shadow government of those people giving orders to legions of "useful idiots" who follow orders, and supported by more of the same who just don't care enough to do anything about it, because of incrementalism. as long as the police state isn't sprung to fullness overnight, they don't care, they will suck up the step by step aspects of it..
The goof script readers we have had as "president" since then have all been puppets.
9-11-2001 is another example of their handiwork, again, using patsys and cutouts. You may wish to stay dumbed down over these things, but a lot of other people are well beyond that point now, and their numbers arte growing, and all I can say is thank God for the internet, because it's making it easier to get the word out.
We currently live inside a dictatorship-a police state-that although is in full bloom yet, is heading towarss that goal, that is daily getting worse and worse, and neither electing millionaire globalist script reading bonesman A or B is going to automagically "solve" any of those problems or make the police state get any better,on the contrary, it will continue on it's course of getting worse.
The legitimate old US experiment in an actual peoples government is OVER, and no dictatorship ever voted itself "clean" again, and it is not going to happen now, either, and black box voting proves what they are up to.
The GPL is great and all but it still doesn't change the fact that we need some major copyright reform in the law books. The current stance makes no sense, and allows things like the DMCA. Possibly the copyright laws should be rearranged so that GPL style protection is de facto under the law and when you release something you have to specify that you dont want that to be free. Its nice to have some legality but ultimately a license doesn't change the fact that we need reform so that the benefits of GPL can be accepted as the standard.
But I don't see where such concepts such as "right" and "wrong" can come from in a pure atheistic mentality.
The reasons are the same regardless of religous views or lack thereof. Human nature is subjective, and so is "good" and "bad". Religeon is an attempt to objectify these subjective age-old concepts.
But I don't see where one who is an atheist would get such concepts. From your statement it seems that they appear out of thin air. How would someone who is an atheist determine what is right or wrong?
Engineering and the Ultimate
A license, by definition, is not a contract.
IANAL, but there was a long discussion on this very topic on groklaw.
IIRC, the basic difference between the two is in the penalties for failing to comply with the license or contract. If you fail to comply with a license the only real penalty is loss of the privleges granted by the license. If you fail to comply with a contract, there are various penalties (usually defined within the contract itself.)
So, to put it simply, you're not the truth.
-- If it weren't for the voices in my head, I'd go insane from loneliness. -Me, Myself and I
I'm neither a philosopher nor an atheist, but the most primitive justification of what is right and what is wrong for an atheist would be: "don't do to others what you would not like being done to you". [with author's correction]
This statement is only the negative way of restating the famous Golden Rule, spoken by that great atheist, Jesus.
Err... hmmm.
If I needed a book or a person as an authority to tell me what right and wrong are, then I could just ask another atheist. Why do Christians believe that their book is better than the others or that their priests are better authorities than anyone else? Personally, my soul tells me what right and wrong are.
"Atheism is a belief that there is no god. It says absolutely nothing about whether or not you believe that people or living creatures are special or not."
Isn't that pantheism?
"Some have the categorical imperative, some believe people should be as free as possible, some want the greatest happiness for the greatest number, and some just believe in a few old laws carved on a rock by a mad old dude halfway up a mountain three thousand years ago. Take your pick!"
That's kind of what I'm asking, how would an atheist pick?
Engineering and the Ultimate
'Human nature is subjective, and so is "good" and "bad".'
The problem is that a given person must decide what is good and bad. I don't see how the fundamentals of atheism fits with any other morality than "do what comes naturally to me". I'm not saying that atheists don't have morals, but that atheistic philosophy isn't what is producing them or even necessarily fully compatible with them (obviously, atheism isn't a complete rampart against them - after all, if there's nothing to it, then going with it and against it have the same values - on the other hand, why would someone bother to control themselves, if, fundamentally by nature, it does not matter?).
Engineering and the Ultimate
Nothing in our culture appears "out of thin air". The way you think, the things you belive, they are all influenced by the people who raised you. Sure, if you were raised by rabbits in the forest, you may not belive in "right" or "wrong", but if you are raised in a society with other people, you will have these concepts. Religion did not invent right and wrong, they just codified it for so people in power (the Priest, or Shamen, or Witchdoctor) could use right and wrong to gain personal power. So, to a large extent, I believe in the same things as people who I was raised with when it comes to what is right and what is wrong, I just don't happen to belive that I need to be a good boy because if I don't, I will burn in some mythical hell for all eternity. I do it because for me, it is the "right" thing to do.
No matter where you go, there you are. So Enjoy it.
+1 Insulting someone who isn't aware that they are being insulted.
"Personally, my soul tells me what right and wrong are."
That's the problem. Some people's souls say nothing. Does that mean that nothing is right or wrong? The term "evil" signifies that it should be publicly obvious or at least discoverable when someone is doing an evil act. But if good/evil right/wrong are personal decisions, then really "fighting evil" makes no sense, it's actually just "fighting _them_" (whoever 'them' is - because for them, you are evil).
"Why do Christians believe that their book is better than the others or that their priests are better authorities than anyone else?"
That's simple - they believe that it was given by God. It's a historical, not really a theological/philosophical reason. They (or we, more specifically) believe that, for whatever reason, God started moving in the lives of people through Abraham and those after him. If this is a true historical happening, Christianity and its doctrines are in fact true. If this event did not occur, Christianity is a lie.
The question for Christians is simply, "did it happen" (also "does it happen" because we believe that God still works today). If the answer is "no", then we are fools. If it is "yes", then thank the Lord for working in us for whatever His strange reasons are.
Engineering and the Ultimate
If it weren't for the weather (and the language...) I would move there now =:-D
realkiwi
Is Sitecom. The product they provide is: http://www.sitecom.com/products_info.php?product_i d=237&grp_id=6
Recursive (adj.): see 'Recursive'
"Just because I don't believe in any gods does not mean that I believe that it is O.K. to kill murder or maim.An athiest is not necessarily an anarchist."
Oh, not you too! Anarchists don't usually (or even frequently) believe that it's OK to kill murder or maim!
Anarchism is just a belief in no government - usually that's because anarchists don't usually subscribe to the theory of human nature that says people are all mass-murdering savages who need the threat of a police force to stop us slaughtering each other for no reason, given half a chance.
Or sometimes anarchists think that the community can police itself without having a government do it for them.
You can probably find some anarchists who'll happily point out that it's governments that do most of the killing, murdering and maiming, and so getting rid of it is a good thing even at the cost of a few privatised murders here and there. And I imagine there are other theories of anarchist "crime prevention" (oxymoronic, but I figure you know what I mean) if you care to look, too.
Anarchists have had a bad press, mostly since the days of the Russian nihilist anarchists who were prone to throwing bombs at monarchs in the 19th century, but nowadays we're a nice bunch, really!
Empathy is hardly a concept/emotion that requires divinity.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Empathy is hardly a concept/emotion that requires divinity.
Yeah, but wouldn't it be a whole lot cooler if some regular atheistic non-deity-type guy had come up with it?
"Isn't that pantheism?"
No. Believing that it would be a good plan if society was rigged so that people don't murder each other might just be a pragmatic doctrine to do with self-preservation of you and your family, not because there's some form of god in everything, which is what I understand the term "pantheism" to mean. That's one example, there could be many.
"That's kind of what I'm asking, how would an atheist pick?"
Who knows? How does a religious fanatic decide that one book filled full of superstitious mumbo-jumbo is more true than another?
What possesses any of us to adhere to whatever load of balls we happen to believe in? Just psychological happenstance really!
Licenses are contracts according to the court.
-truth
I had a steady B+ in my AI class until I failed the Turing test...
How do you check closed source propietary software for violations, to see if they have in fact taken GPL code and used it? Is this easily done, or do you have to guess, or get a leak from inside the company, or what? I admit I don't know enough about coding to understand this.
I've gotta say, I don't see what the problem is here. The concept of morality does not need to be based in religion, or would you argue that atheists can't have a system of morality?
Just in case somebody is wondering what company this injunction was targeting: According to heise it is Sitecom.
An immediate consequence of this judgment will be that Sitecome will not be able to market their offending router products in Germany unless they start complying to the GPL. There is an interesting twist to this case. The company that has been sued in Germany is named on Sitecome's website as distributor for Germany - they also happen to be a wholly owned subsidiary. They argued that since they do not produce but only sell and support the products that the issue should be brought up with there parent company and that they are in essence not responsible for sitecome.com's actions. This argument was dismissed by the court because they were the only one's listed for Germany on the website. This brings up the interesting questions would this judgment also apply to independent distributors of Sitecome's product who happen to be listed on their site? The way this judgment is worded I tend to believe the answer is yes - alas I am not a lawyer.
"What possesses any of us to adhere to whatever load of balls we happen to believe in? Just psychological happenstance really!"
But that's precisely my problem with such an atheistic outlook. It's hard to call something "morality" that is just "psychological happenstance". If you believe that X is "psychological happenstance" it's hard to say that someone _else_ is evil just because they happened to have a different psychological happenstance than you do, since it's just environmental anyway.
Engineering and the Ultimate
No concept of "should" is based in fact (although you can use facts to get from one 'should' to another). It seems to me that atheism says that there is nothing to get "shoulds" from, there are only physiological wants. Therefore, I don't see how a classification of morality works when there is nothing but phyisiology at play. Wouldn't morality be akin to racism, since it is a born-in, or environmentally conditioned condition which each of us has no control over? If so, how can one person's environmentally conditioned / born in set of morals tell another person's environmentally conditioned / born in set of morals that they are evil or wrong?
Engineering and the Ultimate
Sebastian
"Empathy is hardly a concept/emotion that requires divinity."
It does require viewing people/animals as having something to empathize with that the purely physical world does not.
Engineering and the Ultimate
"I just don't happen to belive that I need to be a good boy because if I don't, I will burn in some mythical hell for all eternity."
That's actually a side-issue for what I'm discussing. I'm not talking about doing X for fear of punishment, but deciding right/wrong that is transferrable to others. The Christian reason for right/wrong is that God sets the standard (this is the case whether or not punishments/rewards stem from it), and we follow that standard. What you seem to be saying is that right/wrong stems from the environment. That seems to indicate to me that what I believe is right or wrong is based on my environment. If that is the case, then I can't see why anyone would call someone else or someone else's actions "evil". I don't call a computer "evil" just because someone else programmed it - it's just a computer working off of its instruction set. Likewise I don't consider electricity to be evil, even when someone get fried from lightning, because the electricity was just following it's physical path. I don't see how, if morality is simply a cause/effect relationship, how an individual could be blamed for their actions, much less derided as "evil".
Engineering and the Ultimate
So you define immoral behaviour as that behaviour which has undesirable social consequences (almost everyone has an idea of what a desirable society is like, although it may differ from person to person, according to whatever load of balls they happen to believe) and define evil as a person performing immoral actions.
Even if an 'evil' person is doing it for some enviromental or genetic reason, you've still got to find some way of curbing evil behaviour.
Perhaps it's cops and jails that are needed, perhaps it's changing society so as not to create 'evil' people in the first place. Where exactly is your conceptual difficulty? Putting someone in jail for doing wrong things is much the same act, whether you did it because they sold their soul to satan, or whether they had a lousy childhood.
Well... you see, this is what irks me about religious people (of ALL religions).
.... ah, yes, i see. You are a religious person. You persue a basic, material truth that has yet to be proven: you think you have good enough proof to know that your theology is RIGHT!
They tend to think that the principles embeded in their body of knowledge/book/heresay (henceforth, theology) are a universal thing.
They need their religion so they can impose, on themselves (if said religious people is smart) and/or on others (if said religious people are Evil...!)....!!!
See what i did just now?
Would you agree with me that imposing a way of thought through whichever mean is an inherently evil act?
No?
Why not?
We also call this blind belief in unproven facts "FAITH".
So thats what irks me. No religion that i know of has anywhere in its books a clause that says: "Let other people think what they want, it is not your place to judge them. To separate yourself from others based on what this book says is sacrilege. Defend the different."
Islam maybe is the only one that includes other religions as acceptable... but it hasnt helped all religious islamist people cause they were manipulated by later, apocriphal writings (the Omar scripts and other modifications).
And that, in general, is why im not religious.
NO SIG
But why? What's the justification?
If atheism believes that your monitor is of the same substance/worth as a carbon lifeform, why would we have the statement about people but not about computer monitors?
Engineering and the Ultimate
No, no, don't worry, I'm fine most days, its just once in a while, usually Fridays... oh! ;-)
Damien
Das Kopyreit Law ist geliegal. A Licenz gibt echstra Gerights tu der Juser unter zome Konditioner. Der Juser ist total frei to nicht taken diese Gerights, in which Kase Standart Kopyreit Law appleitz. Ende of die Storien.
"And that, in general, is why im not religious."
I would hope that it would take more than a resolution of that issue to make you religious. Christianity is a historical, not a philosophical, proposition. It shouldn't be examined true/false based on whether you agree with the doctrine or if you like the teaching, it should only be examined with the question "did it happen?" The apostle Paul agrees wholeheartedly that if Jesus's resurrection is not part of history, then Christians should be pitied most of all people.
It's not about want you want or how you want morality to be handled, it's whether or not you believe in the historicity of the Bible. If you do, I can't imagine an argument for not serving God. If you do not believe in the historicity, I can't imagine an argument for why you would believe in God.
For most believers, trust in God comes about initially by experiencing God in our own lives. Sometimes other evidence comes up. For example, my son was healed from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (see here) after much prayer (confirmed by multiple echocardiograms).
Also, at variance with what you think, most Christians do not follow Christianity because they already agree with it, but rather because they have become convinced that Christ truly did die for our sins. This causes a change in belief, not a continuation of existing belief.
Engineering and the Ultimate
No, this *is* a 'GPL is valid' "president" (at least in Germany). The GPL *requires* copyright law in order to work.
The theoretical case you presented *has already happened*. That's exactly what this was about, and the judge ruled that the GPL is valid.
Sweet jebus, maybe you'll understand it when you finish second grade.
Because it is better when everybody does so. Anyway, I don't defend atheism. IMHO true atheism is very rare.
"Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead." (John Maynard Keynes)
would this judgment also apply to independent distributors of Sitecome's product who happen to be listed on their site?
Logically, it would apply to *anyone* distributing the product, whether they were listed on the website or not.
Think of it this way: The product contains pirated firmware (by not complying with the terms of the GPL, the manufacturer is engaged in large-scale copyright infringement for profit - aka piracy.)
Now that there's a ruling barring distribution, any company distributing the product would be just as guilty - whether they are listed on the website or not.
"IMHO true atheism is very rare."
I agree. I have just never understood people who were both true atheists and moralists, which is why the post.
Engineering and the Ultimate
It's hard to call something "morality" that is just "psychological happenstance".
No harder than calling something "morality" that is just religion. If you're discussing what is right or wrong, then it's morality, whatever system you use to come to your conclusions.
If you believe that X is "psychological happenstance" it's hard to say that someone _else_ is evil just because they happened to have a different psychological happenstance than you do, since it's just environmental anyway.
Except it's not just environment - many atheists believe in free will.
My reason for right/wrong is based on the effects on people. So for example, if I see someone causing harm to someone else, I may view that as wrong, and perhaps even view them as 'evil'.
Read this post again - you still seem to be under the mistaken impression that atheism is about believing that people are unthinking machines that do what they're programmed to do.
That's the problem. Some people's souls say nothing. Does that mean that nothing is right or wrong? The term "evil" signifies that it should be publicly obvious or at least discoverable when someone is doing an evil act. But if good/evil right/wrong are personal decisions, then really "fighting evil" makes no sense, it's actually just "fighting _them_" (whoever 'them' is - because for them, you are evil).
The sort of person who has no opinion on what is right or wrong is probably not the sort of person to use the word "evil", or if he did, he'd be wrong to do so.
But this is irrelevant unless you have evidence that RMS is one such person. People in general, atheists included, do have an opinion on right and wrong.
The should also be drunk for rating your post Informative. :-)
I'm sorry, the number you have dialed is an imaginary number. Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and dial again.
"many atheists believe in free will."
I'm not sure that qualifies as total atheism or a moderate form of pantheism (what is will, where do you get it, and what gives "living things" will and not computer chips).
Engineering and the Ultimate
You're missing my point here. If what is right/wrong is a personal choice, then even if you have an opinion on the matter it is only that - opinion. "evil" doesn't come into play because really you only have a difference of opinion. It would be on the same plane as me calling you evil because I don't like the color of shirt that you are wearing.
Engineering and the Ultimate
They do. It's called a brain. A highly organised chunk of matter that exhibits, in some animals and humans, sentience.
I'm confused - atheism is to do with belief in God (ie, not having any), and nothing to do with belief in free will.
I don't know enough on pantheism to comment - if pantheists don't believe in god either, then I'd say that makes panstheism a subset of atheism. If pantheists do believe in god, then an atheism isn't going to be a pantheist.
I don't know what causes consciousness, but I believe whatever it is can be answered without saying "God did it", just as I believe is the case with every other thing in this Universe.
Read Hume sometime, people.
When I say "opinion", I don't mean "a matter of opinion in the same sense as your favourite colour", I mean in the sense that they have thought about the issue.
An atheist using the term "evil" because he feels certain that a particular deed is wrong is no different from a theist doing so. After all, there are many different religions with different opinions on what God supposedly says, so why do they use the term "evil", when they only have a different opinion?
... ideally from someone who IAL: Who owns the copyright in a derivative work based on a GPLed work?
Let's say Linus writes a kernel and releases it under the GPL. I modify it and relase it under the GPL, including my own and leaving Linus's original copyright note in there. Some company M$OFT comes along, takes the kernel code and incorporates it into its Unicked operating system, which it sells for $$$ and without publishing the source code.
Who gets to sue M$OFT for copyright infringement?
Some collections of atoms can suffer and experience pleasure, others can't. That's the only relevant difference. Anything that unnecessarily causes collections of atoms to suffer is wrong. (The last statement is not a deep insight, just a possible atheist's definition of "wrong"). It is observed that attributing certain "rights" to certain collections of atoms minimizes suffering. So violating those rights is also wrong.
No.
In the case you described, M$ would be guilty of copyright violation. They would have to cease distributing the infringing material. This may mean they would be unable to distribute Windows, at least until they clean-room engineer a replacement for the GPL part.
In no way would it affect the copyright on other parts of Windows. It would not affect existing copies, since that would only punish the end users, who are not guilty of copyright violations.
M$ would also be legally liable as a copyright violator and may be forced to pay damages. There is no precedence for copyright violators being forced to give up IP, and the fact that the copyrighted information allowed infringement throught the GPL license does not change this. In fact even if they at that point willingly GPL'd the entire source code for Windows, it would not remove the copyright violation or their liability for the past behavior.
Now it is possible that Microsoft could offer to release all the source code, and the original copyright holder would consider this a reasonable settlement and would sign an agreement to not sue them further. However it is also possible that Bill Gates could agree to be the author's personal servant for life, and this would be considered the reasonable settlement. Neither of these results are any more legally likely than the other.
I have physiological wants, and I realize that you do to. I also understand that we're both better off if there's a general rule against hurting others. So I will advocate said rule, and call it "good".
Jesus didn't come up with the "Golden Rule". It was promulgated hundreds of years BC by Confucius, Socrates, and half-a-dozen non-Christian religions.
Now, true, it was not originally promulgated by atheists, but true atheism is a relatively recent development, downright uncommon until the last few centuries. Its history does clearly show it reflects a rather universal view of morality that's independent of the teachings of any religion or family of religions.
German copyright law has a much stronger concept of "moral rights" than US law does. The defence was that the GPL is invalid because it requires you to waive certain moral rights (i.e. the right to object to modifications of your work).
Moral rights, unlike commercial rights cannot be transferred, though they can be waived. The court apparently held that the requirement of the GPL to waive these rights under certain circumstances (redistributing programs under the GPL) was not in conflict with the law.
This is good news in the US because I think that there is a much better chance of a court in a place like Germany invalidating the GPL on this grounds than in the US. The US does not have a strong law regarding "moral rights" and in US law, they don't apply to software anyway, so this defence is moot.
IANAL, though.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Miss the point or what. Being an atheist (not believing in a sentient creator) does not rule out a sence of morality - an atheist can be wronged, experience empathy and know not to wrong others.
Just because Jesus (IMHO a man not a demigod) quoted some no brainers from the Bhuddists (3 wise men anyone?) it does not make such judgements of right and wrong an exclusively religios concept.
I dont know where you get the 'collection of atoms' stuff from I believe that the rainforests need mahogany more than the dash of an SUV - Because the forest is alive and supports other life.
Same atoms - different intrinsic value. 'God' does not come into it.
This perpetual motion machine Lisa made is a joke, it just keeps getting faster and faster. - Homer
'After all, there are many different religions with different opinions on what God supposedly says, so why do they use the term "evil", when they only have a different opinion?'
Because the claim of theism is that there _is_ a true evil. The claim of atheism is that there's nothing but matter, and we just happen to be interesting clumps of matter. You can go from theism "I believe in God" to "I believe God has these mandates", but I don't see how you go from believing that we are just interesting clumps of matter to believing that it actually matters which side of the fence you are on in dealing w/ these different clumps of matter.
Engineering and the Ultimate
Pantheism says that "spiritual stuff" is in everything (or every living thing, depending on the pantheist). It is different from atheism which says there is nothing spiritual at all. Pantheism says everything is spiritual, but does not believe in a single supreme being.
Engineering and the Ultimate
How about common sence and experience. Humans dont need some archaic scripture to tell them right from wrong - or some imaginary post mortem bribery and coercion to keep us in check.
I am sure it is a lot easier to be spoonfed morality if you believe ibnn the agenda, but not essencial. Christians get it wrong all the time. Where is the evil in homosexuality? could the Bible have got it wrong with the medievil preconceptions and all that 'translation' by the vatican?
Those who refuse to question such texts out of blind faith despite scientific or logical contradiction (creationist teachers, suicide bombers, GWB) are moraly wrong for inflicting such extremism on those who disagree.
If someone hit me, it would hurt. I dont need god to tell me that I was wronged and to retaliate would be bad because he would probably hit me again. Also logic tells me that being hit was not much fun, therefore hitting someone else would be wrong (I didnt much like it) so I shouldnt go around hitting people.
This perpetual motion machine Lisa made is a joke, it just keeps getting faster and faster. - Homer
Ah right. Well the point probably comes down to the definition of spiritual. People can and do believe in sentience without believing it comes from anything supernatural or god-like. Other definitions of spiritual include things which aren't tangible or material - in which case, there is no reason why an atheist can't believe that some things (eg, love, sentience) are spriritual.
...move there for the really hot bavarian women ;o) Oh, and close proximity to Belgium...home of the best beers, steaks and frites in the world.
I am NaN
Because the claim of theism is that there _is_ a true evil.
"Evil" doesn't just mean in the sense of absolute true evil - it can be used to refer to anything which you view as being particularly wrong.
The claim of atheism is that there's nothing but matter, and we just happen to be interesting clumps of matter.
Rubbish. Atheists don't believe in god, end of story. Even science acknowledges there is more than "clumps of matter" - eg, space, time, gravity, all of which seem to be very strange things that require a greater explanation than simply a space filled with "clumps of matter". It may be in time that we can start to understand what causes consciousness too.
I don't see how you go from believing that we are just interesting clumps of matter to believing that it actually matters which side of the fence you are on in dealing w/ these different clumps of matter.
Well, for example:
I believe these "clumps of matter" are sentient and are capable of feeling pain and suffering. I believe that these sets of actions cause pain and suffering to these clumps of matter, so I believe that these actions are wrong.
No wonder GNU/Linux is such a big hit in Germany
It reminds me of GNU/Linux in China: http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/34952.html.
- Voice of Ambience -
Dictionaries have lots of different definitions of the word "atheist", but none of them says atheists believe there is nothing spiritual at all. At it's Greek roots, atheism means "without deity", which is to say that the atheist does not believe in a deity or deities. The only debate seems to be whether an atheist is someone who does not believe in a specific God or gods, or positively believes that there is no such thing as gods. Personally, I'm of the latter camp, but I can't rule out the possibility of the existance of some sort of natural energy or force or spirit or something that makes people, plants, and cockroaches different from rocks and computer monitors. I'm just not going to pretend that I (or any human being who has ever lived) have acquired specific of knowledge of what that thing is! A Star Wars fan would call that difference The Force, and for all I know they've got it right...
Let's say for a moment that I'm a Christian, and when I pray to God that the TN Titans will win the Superbowl they do it. If the reeason they won is that my prayers have truly been answered by God then the Titans never really had the free will to win or lose because GOD MADE THEM WIN at my request! The coaches never had a choice in the decisions they made, God made the receiver catch that 75 yard pass, the game-winning field goal had no choice but to go through the posts, etc. I can only assume that those who prayed for the Washington Redskins to win the game must be bad folks, because God took away their team's choice to win play hard and win...
Since most people pray to their various and sundry gods every day, there's really not much room left for free will if all their prayers are being answered, is there?Atheism is a-theism, the antonym of Theism. Theism is "the doctrine or belief in the existence of a God or gods", so Atheism is "an absense of doctrine of belief in the existense of a god or gods."
If you think it's anything else, or is equivalent to some other religious belief, you're simply wrong. It's just the state of not believing in gods.
As to how an athiest would pick, well, as an athiest, I tend to pick my beliefs to benefit me, and society, which ultimately benefits me. Society is a collection of people who all think of themselves as 'me' and who probably feel much like I do about many things. If I want a stable life I support the civilization I'm in, I do that by supporting those around me unless it greatly inconveniences me.
I don't think an Ant has to have a belief in god to decide to help the colony and in a similar way, I don't have to have a belief in an ultimate right and wrong to feel that my best interests lie with some form of the golden rule and "civilized" behaviour. "When in Rome", to a degree.
What I wonder is why you think you need a god to tell you this. Are you so desperate for someone to take responsibility that you'll take direction from a musty of book just to avoid being in charge of your own actions?
Customers who purchased the product with the copyright infringing code would be entitled to sue M$ upon the basis that they were denied the opportunity to download it.
The real question is not whether windows has infringing code in it but how much infriging code it has in it. Perhaps longhorn is taking so long because they have to clean out and replace code from older versions of windows that had originally be "borrowed from the community". Mabye not on purpose, but lazy bonus hungry coders would find it a vary hard temptation to resist.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
The thing looks like crap, regardless of how well it works. It looks like a science experiment kit straight out of a '60s Radio Shack catalog. All that's missing is a picture of kids and a mom on the box front.
It must be Windows. It needs half a gig of RAM and a hardware-accelerated graphics card just to run Solitaire.
*slaps forehead*
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."