I thought that corporations were legal individuals, at least for the purposes of Free Speech. If the corporate copyright laws are changed, but individual copyright laws left alone (or if changed, then made more protective) then I suspect the corporations would just use their rights as legal individuals to claim individual copyrights, because somehow whatever it is they're doing constitutes Free Speech.
They are given a goal, often with no direction of how to get there and they must reach that goal while always satisfying very tight constraints. This type of creativity is very hard.
I think that's the point, or part of it anyway. Engineering creativity and innovating creativity* are two different things, and they're suited for different tasks. And you are absolutely right, it's not fair to raise children and artists above engineers in terms of creativity, without qualification. With regard to children, you are correct, much of what they create is completely unaffordable, impractical and otherwise impossible. Even after they are told that something is utterly impossible, most children--or at least I--still continue to create in that same vein, inventing solutions for the impracticality and impossibility of their ideas. This often continues into adulthood, although with a different focus... rather than dreaming of flying cars and humanoid robots, they dream of racial and social equality, of free and open government, of peace and tolerance. These things have all been called unaffordable, impractical and impossible, but they are important nonetheless, and so are the intellectual contributions of those who work for them.
On some level, these ideas of social justice are all innovative creativity, simply because they flatly ignore the constraints imposed on them. When the discussion moves from "what needs to happen" to "how to make this happen," then it becomes engineering creativity, and the problem becomes one that must be solved "often with no direction of how to get there [...] while always satisfying very tight constraints." I think without that first innovative, non-engineering intellectual push, though, the issues of practicality and possibility would keep the discussion from ever materializing. So while you are completely right that engineering creativity is valuable, and often under-appreciated, I think you are incorrect in implying that engineering creativity is more valuable than other kinds of creativity. And if I'm misinterpreting what you said, I apologize.
*When I talk about "innovative" and "engineering" creativity, I don't mean to say that engineers aren't innovative. Rather, by "engineering" I mean creativity with a pragmatic, problem-solving orientation, and by "innovative" I mean idealized, non-problem-solving creativity. Think right brain vs. left brain kind of thing.
...that my hearing aid batteries are zinc-based, not lithium based. What is this about "most" laptop batteries are within the limits, though? If you happen to have a laptop battery that is over the threshold, is TSA going to confiscate it and give you the privilege of paying to ship it to yourself?
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Is it really software? I thought that things like ringer volume/vibration-ness were determined by the hardware...
I thought that corporations were legal individuals, at least for the purposes of Free Speech. If the corporate copyright laws are changed, but individual copyright laws left alone (or if changed, then made more protective) then I suspect the corporations would just use their rights as legal individuals to claim individual copyrights, because somehow whatever it is they're doing constitutes Free Speech.
On some level, these ideas of social justice are all innovative creativity, simply because they flatly ignore the constraints imposed on them. When the discussion moves from "what needs to happen" to "how to make this happen," then it becomes engineering creativity, and the problem becomes one that must be solved "often with no direction of how to get there [...] while always satisfying very tight constraints." I think without that first innovative, non-engineering intellectual push, though, the issues of practicality and possibility would keep the discussion from ever materializing. So while you are completely right that engineering creativity is valuable, and often under-appreciated, I think you are incorrect in implying that engineering creativity is more valuable than other kinds of creativity. And if I'm misinterpreting what you said, I apologize.
*When I talk about "innovative" and "engineering" creativity, I don't mean to say that engineers aren't innovative. Rather, by "engineering" I mean creativity with a pragmatic, problem-solving orientation, and by "innovative" I mean idealized, non-problem-solving creativity. Think right brain vs. left brain kind of thing.
...that my hearing aid batteries are zinc-based, not lithium based. What is this about "most" laptop batteries are within the limits, though? If you happen to have a laptop battery that is over the threshold, is TSA going to confiscate it and give you the privilege of paying to ship it to yourself?