As to "objectively true statement whose subject is an expression", that does not include a word that is in the expression, because there is no objective truth to the word. In English, adjectives usually appear immediately before the noun which they modify. Thus, the phrase "objectively true statement" indicates that there is objective truth to the statement itself -- which, I remind you, you've admitted previously -- not to the word which is described by the statement.
You are asked, "what are the facts that the author uses to make his argument?" Now, if you turn around with a mere list of words and their order, have you completed the assignment in good faith or are you just being a giant pain in the ass? As we both agree, words themselves are not facts, so I wouldn't have done that in the first place.
I would also not have listed facts like "the first word of his argument is 'the'" because, although they are facts, they aren't the facts that support the argument, and thus they don't answer the question. "The capital of Nebraska is Lincoln" doesn't answer the question either, but of course that doesn't mean it isn't a fact.
Then so would be "you have HIV" under your definition. As soon as I say it, it is fact, after all. Nope. It's a fact that you've said something, but the thing you said may or may not be a fact itself. "You have HIV" is only a fact if your test comes back positive. "Billy told me you have HIV", however, is a fact as long as he really said that, even if he was lying when he said it.
If 'you' is a fact to share, 'have' is a fact to share, and 'HIV' is a fact to share, then the sum of those facts must be a fact. 'You have HIV' is thus inevitably a fact under your base definition. Nice try, but since we both agree that words on their own aren't facts, your conclusion doesn't follow.
If you want to make those into facts, here's how you'd do it:
"Billy told me three words" = fact; "The first word was 'you'" = fact; "The second word was 'have'" = fact; "The third word was 'HIV'" = fact;
Therefore: "Billy told me 'you have HIV'" = the sum of those facts.
Notice that those statements have to be about something to even have the potential to be facts. You know, a subject and a verb, describing something that either happened or did not happen. "You" by itself is not a statement, has no truth value, and cannot possibly be a fact. On the other hand, "The first word Billy told me was 'you'" is a statement about Billy's actions, its truth value can be determined by listening to what actually came out of his mouth, and if it's true then it's a fact.
A proposition cannot simultaneously be fact and opinion, or the distinction is meaningless. If each element of a statement is a fact, the entire statement must be a fact. Truth values can't magically switch. I completely agree.
Some propositions are facts, and others are opinions. There are also facts about those propositions, but the existence of those related facts doesn't affect whether the proposition they describe is a fact or an opinion.
Facts about expressions are indeed facts. They cease to be facts and become "facts" when their character and purpose is nothing more than the reconstruction of an expression. Fascinating. I wasn't aware that the purpose of a true statement could affect whether it was a fact or not, so please educate me: what do you call an objectively true statement whose subject is an expression, and which is uttered in order to provide someone else with knowledge that they can use to reconstruct that expression? A "flapjack", maybe?
This is pretty clear: if the product begins as an expression, is deconstructed by sophistry to a lengthy tired of "facts", and the end result is that expression again, it's still merely the expression. The end result after combining those facts is an expression, yes, but the intermediate facts don't magically stop being facts the moment someone reconstructs that expression. They aren't destroyed, and they don't change form. They will always be facts, no matter what happens later.
Again, "it is fact that the law is x" does not make a legal issue a factual one. That's because "legal issue" and "factual issue" have specific meanings in a courtroom: a factual issue is a question of what the defendant actually did, and a legal issue is a question of whether that action violated the law.
Here, however, "fact" just refers to an objectively true statement.
[Then perhaps you could point to the proposition you feel is untrue.] That an expression is a mere collection of facts. Duh. Each word isn't a fact. Ah, I see the problem: you've hallucinated a proposition that wasn't actually there.
I didn't say an expression was a mere collection of facts; I said that if you have enough facts whose subjects are a particular expression, you can reconstruct that expression. Just like, oh, if you had enough facts about a house -- if you knew the exact placement of each beam and shingle and so on -- you could reconstruct that house.
[anything can be the subject of a true statement] Can be != is. It is the subject of a true statement as soon as someone says that statement. For example, the first word of that last sentence is not yet the subject of a true statement, but I'll tell you "the first word of that sentence was 'it'", and now it is.
Words are not facts just like songs are not facts. "It is a fact that you have HIV" is not a fact simply because someone said so, I observed it, and now I'm repeating it. Correct. However, "Billy told me that you have HIV" is a fact. "Billy wrote 'you have HIV' on this piece of paper" is also a fact, and so is "Billy wrote three words and the first one was 'you'".
An opinion isn't fact because someone said it. The ONLY fact is that someone said it, and except through fallacious manipulation of homonyms 'fact', you can't get anywhere with it. The fact remains that someone said it, and the content of the opinion remains an opinion. This is true of the entire subsequent list of orthogonal pairs. Yes, that's exactly what I've been saying. I guess we're in agreement, then, that the common definition of fact which I've been using works just fine for distinguishing opinions from facts, theories, and expressions.
"Dogs are animals" is a fact, "dogs are fun to pet" is an opinion, and "some people think dogs are fun to pet" is a fact about an opinion. See? No problem.
This discussion has run its course long ago because you are highly confused about language. The fantasy-world language you're speaking, yes. You could have avoided all that confusion, however, simply by speaking in English and interpreting my posts as English, instead of going off about how objectively true statements are only "facts" when you want them to be and other such nonsense.
No, because an expression isn't a fact any more than an opinion is a fact or a value is a fact or a theory is a fact. Aww, you were doing so well. You had it. You understood, for one fleeting moment, that things can be related even without being identical... and then you lost it. What a shame.
A collection of "facts" that merely reconstruct an expression aren't facts at all, because they have no value apart from the expression. That's funny, because earlier you admitted that facts about expressions are, indeed, facts.
But now you're saying that's not the case. Perhaps, then, you could tell me what they are. What do they call an objectively true statement on your planet when the subject of that statement is an expression, if they don't call it a "fact"? A "sandwich", maybe, or a "ball-peen hammer"?
There are certainly facts in expressions, but not every element is a fact, or the expression would just be a fact. Again, what a shame it is that you lost the ability to distinguish between "related" and "identical". Nearly everyone else in the world manages to wrap their minds around the idea that a fact can be about something without being that thing, but that simple distinction still eludes you. Such a tragic waste of human potential.
Your statement is contrapositive to its negative, but that says nothing of your argument, because guess what? That's a tautology! Indeed, and that just makes it all the more hilarious that you're arguing against it. It's no more than a simple restatement of an accepted and obvious premise, but somehow it blows your mind.
The formal logic we're still waiting for is establishing the truth values of your proposition. Then perhaps you could point to the proposition you feel is untrue. They're all pretty self-explanatory to those of us who aren't trolling:
1. There are facts about expressions. (From the definition of fact: anything can be the subject of a true statement. You admitted this yourself in the post I linked above, so I assume this isn't the one you disagree with.)
2. Knowing enough of those facts is sufficient to reconstruct the expression. (A simple observation about the ability of humans to put things together. If you know the expression is 4 words long, and you know what those 4 words are, in order, then you can put them back together.)
3. To prevent someone from reconstructing the expression, you must prevent them from knowing the facts. (This follows from #2.)
It must be frustrating to try so hard and yet come up so terribly short. Well, you're the expert on that, so I'll take your word for it. (At least I assume you're trying, although your unblemished record of failure suggests that that assumption might be mistaken.)
Your definition is inadequate for any scope of argument in fact/opinion, fact/law, fact/theory, fact/value, fact/perspective, and yes, fact/expression. That's funny, because everyone else considers it quite adequate for fact/opinion, fact/theory, and fact/expression, at least. Once again, you're speaking your own little language.
I'll say again, the preservation of fact does not include pseudo-facts collected for the sole sake of subverting expression. Oh, I see, they're pseudo-facts. I guess a pseudo-fact is a special kind of fact that scares trolls into an irrational frenzy, then?
Relation and linking do not make one thing something else, they relate to it and link to it. Exactly! I'm proud of you. I didn't think you could get this far.
So, now that you understand things can be related without being identical, you should be able to understand how facts and expressions are related. The relation between them is such that for every expression, there's at least one set of facts which is sufficient to fully describe it; anyone who knows those facts can fully reconstruct the expression.
I am dealing with it head on. You've posited a "logical" argument; if it is so, then clearly you can support it with formal logic. Hint: the way to deal with an argument head on, especially one stated as plainly as mine was, is not to demand to see its formal underpinnings.
The logic there is a simple contrapositive; as you know, "if you learn these facts then you can reconstruct the expression" is logically equivalent to "if you must not reconstruct the expression then you must not learn these facts". Go ahead and replace the clauses with P's and Q's if that's the only way you can understand it, but surely a man with your impressive credentials didn't need someone to spoon-feed that to him.
Demanding to see the formal underpinnings is, however, a great way to implicitly concede the point. Thank you. Now that you've conceded it, let's move on to the cut 'n' pasting session you have lined up for us.
An expression isn't a fact. As we have both agreed many times over.
Reporting facts doesn't include "facts" of the elements of an expression for no other purpose than the subversion of that expression. In other words, "a fact is only a fact when I say it is". Sure.
You continually refer to a base definition of "fact" in a desperate and wholly unconvincing effort to make the distinction meaningless. Apparently "base definition" means "the common one found in the dictionary and used in everyday speech by everyone except trolls".
There's no difference in your unsupportable, moronic, and utterly inutile assessment than were you to enter a child's discussion of fact and opinion You're right - even a child could stomp your ridiculous arguments into the ground. Even a child has a better grasp of logic, definitions, and reading comprehension than you've shown. It's good that you can admit that; that's the first step toward recovery.
The 360 won't play DivX 3 files, though, and there are plenty of those remaining out in the wild. I had to install TVersity to get my 360 to play all my AVIs, and it's still not as good as Xbox Media Center. XBMC on the Wii would be a killer.
It's the cheap shots about mental illness and Alzheimer's, and the weak attempts to distract from a vaporous case. Hey, it's not my fault that you've acted exactly like a person who is either mentally ill or trolling. I can't control that: only you can.
What promise? You were hypothesizing that I told you something "in confidence". That means you promised to keep it a secret, implicitly or explicitly. If you hadn't, then it wouldn't have been confidential.
According to your theory, I have an undeniable right to report to the world your bank account or that your nephew was recently diagnosed with HIV. I'm simply reporting facts. Actually, I've never said you have an undeniable right to report facts. It seems that you believe you do, though; otherwise, you could've just said "Yeah, copyright means you can't report certain facts. So what?" and short-circuited this whole thread.
No, it doesn't. Expressions are not facts. You seem to think that things can't be related or linked unless they're identical. What a silly way to view the world.
To what end? The expression isn't a fact, so there's no fundamental reason it needs to be reconstructed. Who says it needs to be? Point is, once someone has learned those facts, they can reconstruct the original expression. If you want to prevent that, which seems to be the purpose of copyright, then you have to prevent them from learning those facts in the first place.
Compare it to an actual fact, like that the speed of sound at sea level is ~750mph. That's something of meaning, of value, and of significance. Facts about the words written in books have meaning, value, and significance as well. If they didn't, no one would want to know or share them.
Explain the formal logical structure of your argument. Classic troll behavior: instead of dealing with the argument head on, you try to veer off into the bushes.
Sorry, I'm not going to fall for it. The argument is there. The structure is simple enough for anyone to grasp, even you. You can either (1) disprove it, (2) concede it, or (3) implicitly concede it by continuing to avoid dealing with it directly.
So far it looks like you're going for #3, which is fine with me. Your Honor, let the record show that the troll declined to refute my argument.
You've lost the linguistic argument, the legal argument, the semantic argument, the formalistic argument, the historical argument, the ethical argument, and the organic argument. Oh, you're doing the Black Knight bit from Holy Grail now? Nice. Not quite as good as the original, but it's good that you haven't lost your sense of humor.
An expression isn't a fact. As we have both agreed many times over.
Reporting facts doesn't include "facts" of the elements of an expression for no other purpose than the subversion of that expression. In other words, "a fact is only a fact when I say it is". Sure.
You continually refer to a base definition of "fact" in a desperate and wholly unconvincing effort to make the distinction meaningless. Apparently "base definition" means "the common one found in the dictionary and used in everyday speech by everyone except trolls".
There's no difference in your unsupportable, moronic, and utterly inutile assessment than were you to enter a child's discussion of fact and opinion You're right - even a child could stomp your ridiculous arguments into the ground. Even a child has a better grasp of logic, definitions, and reading comprehension than you've shown. It's good that you can admit that; that's the first step toward recovery.
More glib, cute remarks and failed distractions. Nah, there's nothing glib about pointing out your logical fallacies. "Strawman" might be a cute name, but it's also a commonly used term to describe the attribution of a silly, made-up, argument to one's opponent in order to avoid dealing with his actual argument. You know, just like you've been doing.
Repeating an expression doesn't make it a fact, because it would be impossible for anything not to be a fact at that point. I didn't say repeating an expression makes it a fact. See, that's another strawman.
You don't have a right to know what Jane thinks, or what James said to Austin. Those can, however, be described by facts: it is a fact that Jane thinks ___, and it is a fact that James told Austin about ___. "Cindy is hot" is an opinion, not a fact, but "James told Austin that Cindy is hot" is a fact (if he did indeed say that).
I don't think we've touched on the issue of whether I have a right to know facts. If you want to argue that I don't, then go ahead. Right now what we're stuck on is getting you to face the reality that suppressing the spread of expressions also requires suppressing the spread of facts. (No, genius, that doesn't mean the expressions are the facts.)
You pretend to believe in privacy, but you don't, because I have a natural right to tell your boss your latest rant which was told to me in confidence. You mean breaking a promise? No, I've never condoned that. Yet another strawman.
Repeating any number of facts about an expression will never replace that expression except in a hollow, meaningless, desperate broadening of fact to include the universe. Another transparent lie, easily shot down by even the most basic application of logic. I will now demonstrate this logic for you, not because I think it'll convince you (you're obviously too deep in your mental illness, or having too much fun trolling, for that), but to provide one more easily bookmarked example of how dishonest and/or deluded you really are:
"Every man for himself" is an expression, not a fact.
"I'm thinking of a four word expression" is a fact. "The first word of that expression is 'every'" is a fact. "The second word of that expression is 'man'" is a fact. "The third word of that expression is 'for'" is a fact. "The fourth word of that expression is 'himself'" is a fact.
By conveying those five facts, I've provided enough information for anyone to reconstruct the whole expression. Ergo, if you want to prevent me from sharing that expression with anyone else, you also have to prevent me from sharing some of those facts. The logic above is trivially extensible to expressions of any length; thus if you want to prevent me from sharing any particular expression, you also must prevent me from sharing some facts. QED.
I'm a little confused How is it hypocritical? I don't think it really is hypocritical - but neither is it hypocritical for a copyright opponent to accept payment from a business that uses copyright. Just because you believe the system sucks, and needs to be abolished, doesn't mean you can't still work within it as long as it exists.
Copyright law says the author of a work can decide how much freedom to grant users. The GPL does that. Well, right. Copyright law takes freedom away from the users and gives it to the authors. The GPL gives it back to the users.
If there were no copyright law in the first place, users would have that freedom by default. And if you believe there should be no copyright law, that all users should have those freedoms, then you might achieve that goal in regard to your own software by using the GPL - even though the GPL relies on the very same copyright law that you oppose.
to take money from a system that you so vehemently disagree with would seem kinda hypocritical... No more hypocritical than the GPL, which relies on copyright law to give back the freedoms that copyright law took away in the first place (plus a little more).
You can try to wriggle out of it, but it doesn't change the reality that according to your definition, nothing can be not a fact. The more you say that, the more unhinged you look, because anyone can go back to my posts (including that last one) and see that my definition simply isn't what you claim it is. You're beating the stuffing out of that poor strawman, and at this point, there are only two likely causes of that behavior: either you're trolling or you suffer from a mental illness.
Your bizarre insistence that expressions are facts is the only vehicle for continuing your vaporous and ultimately worthless argument. As I said, that isn't my insistence at all. You've fabricated it yourself and, through either dishonesty or delusion, attempted to attribute it to me. What's truly bizarre is that you've chosen to do so on a public, archived forum where this desperate lie will be immediately apparent to anyone who cares to look.
An expression is not a fact. Since facts are not protected and expressions are the result of proprietary labor, there is no valid claim to the expression of another. It remains true, however, that by stating enough facts, you can fully describe an expression to another person, allowing them to reproduce it for themselves. And thus it remains true that if you want to prohibit people from sharing certain expressions, you must also prohibit them from sharing certain facts.
It occurs to me that maybe you have an ideological opposition to the idea of making it illegal to state certain facts, which is why you display such cognitive dissonance when faced with the reality that doing so is a necessary part of enforcing copyright. Perhaps you'd have an easier time if you accepted that reality instead of continuing down this path of denial, and simply reevaluated the importance of enforcing copyright in the first place.
You just don't get it. If you broaden "fact" to be a tautology, it becomes meaningless. You posit a definition that isn't falsifiable. It's impossible for anything not to be fact, which excludes the possibility of an alternative. It's totally unworkable and utterly asinine. Well, you keep saying that, but it just isn't true. The tautological definition you're describing is a strawman you invented out of thin air so you could beat up on it, not something I've ever actually proposed or used.
I'm just going by the common dictionary definition of "fact". By that definition, it's quite possible for something not to be a fact. For example, a dog is not a fact; a fact is a concept, and a dog is an animal, not a concept. There are facts about dogs: for example, "George W. Bush's dog is named Barney" is a fact about a dog. But that fact is not a dog, and Barney the dog is not a fact. Similarly, a song is not a fact, even though there are plenty of facts about songs.
[There are facts about words, thoughts, and theories, but those things aren't necessarily facts themselves] Then what are they? A word is a word, a thought is a thought, and a theory is a theory. That's not much of an answer, of course, but I don't know what else you expect me to say. You and I both agree that words, thoughts, and theories aren't facts themselves, and you've even admitted that there are facts about those things, so I'm not sure where the disconnect is coming from.
Sharing, in order to be permissible, like anything else, needs to be something you're entitled to share. You said earlier, "The issue of choosing to share was never once on the table, nor is there anything to evidence my thoughts on the subject". Obviously, that wasn't true: you are saying that this type of sharing isn't permissible, while I'm saying it is.
Amazingly, they were writing to distinguish fact and expression, something you've still to learn. Well, except for all those posts where I did distinguish them, including this one. Hard to forget about those, since there have been so many of them, but somehow you've done it anyway. Have you considered the possibility that you might have Alzheimer's?
So, your argument is then that pirates are not immoral, but instead are like SUV drivers, selfish and sort of a dick? Not a great defense there, fyi. Well, it's funny that you describe the holdout in my scenario as a selfish dick. I don't think most people would agree with that assessment. There's nothing dickish about looking at what the paving is going to cost, comparing that against the benefit he'll receive, and deciding that it isn't worth it. What do you expect him to do, pay for something he doesn't want or else move away?
In any case, people are free to be dicks as long as they're not trampling on anyone else's rights.
If nobody was watching the movies (and paying for them), those actors would be out of business pretty fast, so it does matter a lot to the actors whether people actually pay for seeing the movie. But that wasn't the scenario, remember? The scenario was that you already have a theater full of paying customers, and some more people sneak in for free.
As I said, that's an immoral trespass against the theater owner. But to the actors, as long as there are enough paying customers to compensate them for their work, it doesn't matter how many other people see the show for free.
Suppose piracy was legalized, and nobody had to pay to watch any movie. How many people would choose not to pay? Half, more than half? How many movies would that mean couldn't make it into the black and therefore weren't produced? The only reason they wouldn't be produced is if no one cared enough about them to pay for their production. Are you suggesting that if copyright were abolished, no one would want movies to be made anymore? Because as long as there's demand for new movies, there'll be money for making them - people will just be paying for the production directly instead of buying tickets.
Where did you fabricate this? Well, it was you doing the fabricating, but perhaps you remember this comment.
For the umpteenth time, there is a clear distinction between fact and expression in this context. Yes, and for the umpteenth + 1 time, the facts I'm referring to are about expression. Some facts are about baseball, like how many home runs Babe Ruth hit; others are about dinosaurs, like how tall the brontosaurus was; and others are about books, like what sequence of words is printed in a particular one.
That doesn't mean facts are baseball, or dinosaurs, or books. I know it's easier for you to pretend that I've equated facts and expressions, but anyone reading my posts can see that I haven't (and I certainly remember it myself, as I assume you do also), so you're not accomplishing much by doing that.
Ignoring it 10 times in a row won't make it go away, nor will substituting a generic definition in order to make a case that isn't falsifiable. Huh, I guess you don't know what "falsifiable" means either. That's a shame. You can look this stuff up online for free, you know.
But goodness, how important the word 'fact' is, since it encompasses every word ever uttered, every though ever expressed, and every theory disproved! Does it? I sure haven't said that. There are facts about words, thoughts, and theories, but those things aren't necessarily facts themselves. Leave your strawman at home, pal.
How quickly you forget your own words: "...simply can't understand why anyone would choose to share something with other people." That is a bogus ad hominem meant to distract from an utterly vaporous case. The issue of choosing to share was never once on the table, nor is there anything to evidence my thoughts on the subject. Of course it was. File sharing, remember? In case you've forgotten about this popular new technology, it's where people use their own internet connections to transmit files to other people (whether they produced those files themselves or obtained them somewhere else), usually for no personal benefit other than the knowledge that they're helping someone else get the files they want.
Are you trying to redefine "sharing" to include the requirement that the thing shared must be the sharer's own creation? Sorry, not gonna happen. We speak English here.
As we've seen time and again, you're the only one being dishonest in your approach, utterly failing to produce a sound argument in any context that doesn't rely on tautological definitions and selective manipulation to the exclusion of the contrary. Hmm, I think I see where you got that impression. Let me straighten you out: the dishonest posts that rely on phony definitions are yours. You can tell because they say "by mr_matticus" at the top.
I'm happy to put forth the "bankrupt" argument of Framers and philosophers in place from the time of the birth of our nation, You mean like the one who said these intangible things cannot, in nature, be the subject of property?
and demonstrably expressive of the collective will. Wha-- oh, I get it! You're saying the laws paid for by Big Content represent the "collective will". Irony, right? Or is that sarcasm? You tell me, you're the one with all the credentials. Anyway, that's a good one... I thought you were done making jokes, but this zinger is my new favorite.
That would be accurate if you were able to establish a lie. But you can't. Sure I can. You lied about the meaning of "fact", remember? Surely you can't have forgotten about that already. You said it didn't mean what it obviously and provably does mean.
So, either you knew that what you said was false, which makes you a liar, or you didn't, which makes you ignorant. I find it hard to believe that someone with your credible background in semantics could be so ignorant about the meaning of such a common everyday word, but if you'd like to go with that option, I guess I'll take your word for it.
I don't deny that that is the case. But if you extend that sentence for the next 400 pages, you're no longer reporting fact. Now that's a fascinating theory. How many facts do you need to report before they magically stop being facts, then? A hundred? A thousand? Exactly 400 pages' worth?
As I've said many times, you're absolutely free to share your work as you desire. This isn't about that, though, and unless you're totally unhinged, you know that. Indeed, we both know it isn't about that, and yet you've just brought it up out of nowhere. I guess that makes you unhinged.
But clearly, common use is inadequate for a specific, technical situation in a thread about semantics and formalism. Inadequate for your dishonest argument, you mean. As if your intellectually bankrupt position is any less bankrupt when described in your made-up definitions.
I know very well what they mean in common use. Ah, I see. So you're not ignorant after all, just a lying troll. Got it.
So what bizarre definition of "wrong" are you using if (a)legality and (b) belief don't determine this for people? If "wrong" is moral, it's based purely on belief. Yes, and you haven't shown that most people believe file sharing is wrong - only that you do.
You're dodging the issue again. Nah, just catching you in a lie. Surely you're used to that by now.
Reporting an expression as fact is a cheap, intellectually dishonest, and lazy way to get around the functional distinction between fact and expression as it relates to the context of intellectual work. I didn't "report an expression as fact" - I described facts about an expression that can be known and shared.
Now go ahead, tell me those are really elephants, not facts.
The fact that your house is blue is of independent significance. Yours is the blue house. Moby Dick is the book about the ill-fated hunt for a white whale. That's a fact, too. The expression isn't an independent fact; it's not an objective reality. Moby Dick is also the book that starts out "Call me Ishmael." That's a fact and an objective reality. Denying it only proves how detached from reality you are, because anyone can look in the book and verify that fact to be objectively true.
There is zero value and zero need for your desire to repeat it--to do so is not out of an interest to convey fact, but simply to coopt the original expression of another for your own gain (including the petulant spite of another). Ah yes, spite. That must be what it's about, because a jealous, angry hoarder like you simply can't understand why anyone would choose to share something with other people. Amusing but sad.
"Desperate semantic wankery" coming from someone who clearly has no credible background in semantics is pretty rich. Not nearly as rich as the fact that despite knowing all about semantic maps and lexemes, you still somehow manage to remain hopelessly ignorant of what words like "say", "speech", and "fact" mean in common use. It's like watching someone who's studied books about bicycles for years, but still falls down the first time he tries to ride one. All that blustering about your "credible background" doesn't do a thing to hide the fact that you've just fallen flat on your ass.
It's a world where 'objectively' means that studies have shown people do things they would believe to be wrong given the right circumstances, and that it doesn't mean they don't think it's wrong. Read your post again; you described the act as being objectively wrong. A study showing that people will do things they believe to be wrong doesn't prove that any particular act is wrong.
But, what about services with a lopsided value, where the "cost" (in time, training, materials) to the provider is way in excess of the value of the service to an individual? Those type of services will then generally not be available in the general market, because there are no customers. Unless the service can be performed once, and be sold to many customers. In those cases, a group of people split the cost among themselves. Indeed, this is quite common. Consider a private road where a dozen neighbors decide to split the cost of having it paved, a cost which would be too much for any one of them to afford on his own.
But suppose one of the neighbors decides he doesn't want to pay. Maybe he doesn't care about having a paved road because he drives a 4x4, or maybe he's just a cheapskate. The other neighbors can go ahead and pay for the road to be paved, splitting the cost 11 ways instead of 12.
Now, is the cheap neighbor doing anything wrong by continuing to drive on that road once it's paved? I say no. The people who paid chose to pay, and the pavers chose to do the work, knowing full well that it's impractical to prevent other people from driving on the road once the work is done. (Preventing copyrighted work from being shared is even less practical.)
But what about the person who sneaks in. Assume there are a few unsold seats. That individual isn't depriving the theater of money from a paying customer, since there are still seats available. But I would still say that individual is committing a theft of service, even if there is no way that he would have paid for a ticket even if he wasn't able to sneak in. I wouldn't. He's trespassing against the theater owner, because the space inside the theater is a limited resource. But he isn't committing any harm against the actors themselves; they're working exactly as hard no matter how many people are watching them. You're right that the legal term in that scenario isn't "theft of service" - because the service (the actors' labor) isn't what's taken.
he is still enjoying the fruit of someone else's labor without paying his fair share There's nothing wrong with that: we all enjoy the fruits of other people's labor without paying for it. Payment isn't something you're obligated to give whenever you benefit from someone else's labor; it's something you choose to give in order to convince them to perform that labor.
For instance, you don't pay the barber for your haircut because there's some moral law that says money has to change hands whenever hair is cut. You pay him because he's free to spend his time however he wants, and he's decided that he'd rather be doing something other than cutting hair unless he's going to be paid for it. (Typically you pay after the service is performed, which means the promise of being paid is what convinces him, but by making that promise you're entering into a contract, which is what actually obligates you to pay later.)
No. You're pushing a vacuous definition of 'fact' that has no place in the discussion. A fact is separate from the collected expression of thoughts, facts, and information. Actually, no, it's a standard definition. As Merriam-Webster puts it, a fact is "a piece of information presented as having objective reality". It is objectively true that the first word of that song is "yesterday", and that is a piece of information - it tells you something you might not know about that song if you've never heard it before.
For someone who's flinging as many accusations about definitions as you are, you sure seem to have a shoddy grasp of what words actually mean.
The act of choosing the word is the labor, and so the "fact" that the first word of Yesterday is 'yesterday' is only a "fact" because of that labor. Thus, it is not a fact. Uh-huh. Let me try one: the act of painting my house blue is the labor, and so the "fact" that my house is blue is only a "fact" because of that labor. Thus, it is not a fact. (What is it, then? Is it just an opinion that my house is blue? Is it a musing, a side note, an anecdote? Maybe it's a mackerel, or a brooch, or a squad car!)
That was amusing but pointless. Let's stick with the normal definition of "fact", shall we? For brevity's sake, I'll skip responding to the other inane ramblings of yours that are predicated on your bizarre, opposite-day definition of "fact", since my response in each case would be "No, that's not what 'fact' means; look it up or ask someone who's a native speaker of English."
The printing press enriched society because it opened access to a new class of individuals who could not afford it. Which, of course, is exactly what file sharing has also done: opened access to a class of individuals who otherwise couldn't afford it. You don't think those college students with iPods full of music can afford to spend $10,000+ on CDs, do you?
File sharing does nothing more than wrest self-determination and control over one's own expressions from the person to which it is organically and legally vested. Funny how you call it organic when, in the absence of copyright law, there is no control over one's own expressions - as Thomas Jefferson so famously pointed out, such things cannot, in nature, be the subject of property.
Show me one instance of knowledge being locked up by copyright that isn't some bullshit "fact" like "this is the text of the latest Tom Clancy:". I'm sorry you think facts are bullshit. On the other hand, that revelation goes a long way toward explaining the content of your posts.
What is a free speech right? It's one that fundamentally prohibits the government from stopping you from expressing yourself. Another made-up definition, eh? You should publish your own dictionary; at least that way, you'll have a source to point to the next time someone calls you out on your desperate semantic wankery.
You have not been barred from expressing your thoughts or information you know. And now I see you've made up a new definition for "information", or maybe "know", or hell, maybe the magic fantasy word in that sentence is "barred". What an ingenious puzzle! Clearly the work of a brilliant mind that knows it's trapped in a corner with no leg to stand on.
It's clearly and objectively wrong. Man, this fantasy world of yours is starting to sound like an interesting place. A world where "objectively" means "in my opinion"? Does it rain ice cream, too?
But, your right in that some children aren't handicapped by this. It is more of a generalization like the Sky is blue. Well, I'd say it's more of a stereotype along the lines of "Mexicans are lazy" or "white people can't dance", but close enough...
Well, it is pretty obvious from observational experience. Then you should be able to explain those observations, right? What is it that you observe about a person that tells you he's unable to "reason accurately"? What would you need to observe in order to conclude that someone can reason?
Now lets say that on a whole, you can say that children don't posses the ability on a reliable enough scale to claim they can accurately calculate floating point operations (reason), so they would be a poor choice for doing that job all the time. The difference here is that you are attempting to look at a specific individual while I am looking at the mass of units as a whole. In a society that cares about human rights, we have an obligation to treat people as individuals. Even if a whopping 85% of minors are unable to "reason accurately", we must respect the reasoning of the other 15%.
To do otherwise is no better than to lock up all criminal defendants who fit a certain profile, based only on the statistical likelihood that they might have committed the crime. "You're between ages 18 and 35, male, and live on the north side of town: 85% of past suspects who fit that description have been found guilty of the crime you're charged with, so we're just going to skip the trial and send you directly to prison."
I mean the part of the brain that reasoned though is associated isn't fully developed until the late teens early 20's. How can you expect someone who to make a decision accuratly when they have to use an underdeveloped part of their brain. Well, let me answer with a tech analogy since we're on Slashdot: how can you expect a computer to perform arithmetic with non-integer numbers when it doesn't have a floating-point unit?
The answer is that performing floating point arithmetic is not the same as using an FPU. Floating point arithmetic is a process that can be done independently of the underlying hardware. A computer with no FPU can still perform that process; it just has to use a different algorithm.
You have to test the system as a whole: type in two floating point numbers, and if the computer adds them and produces the correct result, you can conclude that it does floating-point math without even knowing whether it has an FPU.
Concluding that a person is incapable of "accurately reasoning", based only on the development of his brain, is as flawed as concluding that a computer can't add floating point numbers, based only on the lack of an FPU. If you really want to know, you have to test the person, not just look inside his skull.
After all, if you can't come up with a test to measure whether someone possesses the ability to reason, then how can you even know which area of the brain is associated with that ability?
No, I'm saying that facts aren't work; words aren't work. Okrand absolutely can claim ownership over that which he created. [...] He can't control the application of elements, because the fact that some Klingon word means 'potato' isn't his labor. Well, by that logic, the fact that the first word of "Yesterday" is "yesterday" isn't the Beatles' labor, right? It's just a fact, even though the Beatles did put labor into deciding which word should come first, just like Okrand put labor into deciding what the Klingon translation of "potato" should be.
And the fact that the second word of that song is "all" isn't the Beatles' labor either, right? And so on for the third word, fourth word, and all the way to the end. There's a fact about each one of those words, and those facts aren't anyone's labor. Right?
So then, since those are all just facts and not anyone's labor, why is it that I shouldn't be allowed to share all those facts with someone else? Or have I got that wrong: are you saying I should be able to share all those facts?
No. For fuck's sake, INFORMATION IS NOT AN EXPRESSIVE WORK. FACTS ARE NOT WORK. Work -- that is, labor -- went into discovering them. You don't think calculus, the light bulb, the theory of relativity, and the speed of light all just popped into someone's head overnight, do you?
People had to work to discover that stuff, and you've told me that people own the fruits of their labor, so I don't know why you still insist on taking their work away from them without their consent.
Lyrics aren't facts. Lyrics can be described with facts: it is a fact that the first word of that song is "yesterday". If you prohibit someone from sharing the lyrics, you also prohibit them from sharing the facts that describe them.
You're pushing an empty definition which results in nothing more than trolling. There's another one of those dishonest accusations, but don't let me stop you. By all means, keep showing your true colors.
There's no intellectual work in that product ["The 1st byte of this file is 'd5'"]. I didn't say there was, but so what - are we only allowed to speak in "intellectual works" now? We can't just state facts?
I must say, you're putting on quite an impressive dance to avoid admitting that copyright makes it illegal to share information. I mean, I can still see right through it, but kudos for trying.
What exactly do you stand to gain from duplicating existing knowledge? Sometimes it feels good to share. I understand that you've probably never tried it, but maybe, just once, you should. You might learn something.
How does that enrich culture, expand understanding, or push society forward? It doesn't. On the contrary, society benefits from greater access to all sorts of information (or "works", if you insist on drawing a distinction). The printing press enriched society, not by making it possible to express things that couldn't be expressed before, but by making it possible for those things to reach a wider audience. File sharing does the same thing.
You can say the same thing; but if you're not investing any intellectual labor into doing so, you're not saying anything. You're just repeating what someone else has said. Actually, when I open my mouth and words come out, I am saying those words. That's what "saying" means.
And this comes after you accuse me of "pushing an empty definition"? You're truly a comic genius, sir.
Not a programmer on earth would get paid if intellectual work had no value. Indeed, no one in any field would get paid if their work had no value.
But no one's saying that the work has no value, now are they? In fact, I'm saying the opposite: the work that goes into creating a new program, song, movie, etc. is exactly where the value is -- not in the resulting copies.
An information economy must still be managed as an economy. Most people wouldn't have jobs under your scenario. Hilarious! Somehow abolishing copyright is supposed to prevent anyone from selling their labor. You really do live in a fantasy world, don't you?
If you're saying that people don't believe that coming into possession of something that isn't yours to take isn't wrong, you're off the map. It's pretty obvious that they don't: just look at how popular file sharing is. I'm not the one who's "off the map" here.
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I would also not have listed facts like "the first word of his argument is 'the'" because, although they are facts, they aren't the facts that support the argument, and thus they don't answer the question. "The capital of Nebraska is Lincoln" doesn't answer the question either, but of course that doesn't mean it isn't a fact. Then so would be "you have HIV" under your definition. As soon as I say it, it is fact, after all. Nope. It's a fact that you've said something, but the thing you said may or may not be a fact itself. "You have HIV" is only a fact if your test comes back positive. "Billy told me you have HIV", however, is a fact as long as he really said that, even if he was lying when he said it. If 'you' is a fact to share, 'have' is a fact to share, and 'HIV' is a fact to share, then the sum of those facts must be a fact. 'You have HIV' is thus inevitably a fact under your base definition. Nice try, but since we both agree that words on their own aren't facts, your conclusion doesn't follow.
If you want to make those into facts, here's how you'd do it:
"Billy told me three words" = fact;
"The first word was 'you'" = fact;
"The second word was 'have'" = fact;
"The third word was 'HIV'" = fact;
Therefore: "Billy told me 'you have HIV'" = the sum of those facts.
Notice that those statements have to be about something to even have the potential to be facts. You know, a subject and a verb, describing something that either happened or did not happen. "You" by itself is not a statement, has no truth value, and cannot possibly be a fact. On the other hand, "The first word Billy told me was 'you'" is a statement about Billy's actions, its truth value can be determined by listening to what actually came out of his mouth, and if it's true then it's a fact. A proposition cannot simultaneously be fact and opinion, or the distinction is meaningless. If each element of a statement is a fact, the entire statement must be a fact. Truth values can't magically switch. I completely agree.
Some propositions are facts, and others are opinions. There are also facts about those propositions, but the existence of those related facts doesn't affect whether the proposition they describe is a fact or an opinion.
Here, however, "fact" just refers to an objectively true statement. [Then perhaps you could point to the proposition you feel is untrue.] That an expression is a mere collection of facts. Duh. Each word isn't a fact. Ah, I see the problem: you've hallucinated a proposition that wasn't actually there.
I didn't say an expression was a mere collection of facts; I said that if you have enough facts whose subjects are a particular expression, you can reconstruct that expression. Just like, oh, if you had enough facts about a house -- if you knew the exact placement of each beam and shingle and so on -- you could reconstruct that house. [anything can be the subject of a true statement] Can be != is. It is the subject of a true statement as soon as someone says that statement. For example, the first word of that last sentence is not yet the subject of a true statement, but I'll tell you "the first word of that sentence was 'it'", and now it is. Words are not facts just like songs are not facts. "It is a fact that you have HIV" is not a fact simply because someone said so, I observed it, and now I'm repeating it. Correct. However, "Billy told me that you have HIV" is a fact. "Billy wrote 'you have HIV' on this piece of paper" is also a fact, and so is "Billy wrote three words and the first one was 'you'". An opinion isn't fact because someone said it. The ONLY fact is that someone said it, and except through fallacious manipulation of homonyms 'fact', you can't get anywhere with it. The fact remains that someone said it, and the content of the opinion remains an opinion. This is true of the entire subsequent list of orthogonal pairs. Yes, that's exactly what I've been saying. I guess we're in agreement, then, that the common definition of fact which I've been using works just fine for distinguishing opinions from facts, theories, and expressions.
"Dogs are animals" is a fact, "dogs are fun to pet" is an opinion, and "some people think dogs are fun to pet" is a fact about an opinion. See? No problem. This discussion has run its course long ago because you are highly confused about language. The fantasy-world language you're speaking, yes. You could have avoided all that confusion, however, simply by speaking in English and interpreting my posts as English, instead of going off about how objectively true statements are only "facts" when you want them to be and other such nonsense.
But now you're saying that's not the case. Perhaps, then, you could tell me what they are. What do they call an objectively true statement on your planet when the subject of that statement is an expression, if they don't call it a "fact"? A "sandwich", maybe, or a "ball-peen hammer"? There are certainly facts in expressions, but not every element is a fact, or the expression would just be a fact. Again, what a shame it is that you lost the ability to distinguish between "related" and "identical". Nearly everyone else in the world manages to wrap their minds around the idea that a fact can be about something without being that thing, but that simple distinction still eludes you. Such a tragic waste of human potential. Your statement is contrapositive to its negative, but that says nothing of your argument, because guess what? That's a tautology! Indeed, and that just makes it all the more hilarious that you're arguing against it. It's no more than a simple restatement of an accepted and obvious premise, but somehow it blows your mind. The formal logic we're still waiting for is establishing the truth values of your proposition. Then perhaps you could point to the proposition you feel is untrue. They're all pretty self-explanatory to those of us who aren't trolling:
1. There are facts about expressions. (From the definition of fact: anything can be the subject of a true statement. You admitted this yourself in the post I linked above, so I assume this isn't the one you disagree with.)
2. Knowing enough of those facts is sufficient to reconstruct the expression. (A simple observation about the ability of humans to put things together. If you know the expression is 4 words long, and you know what those 4 words are, in order, then you can put them back together.)
3. To prevent someone from reconstructing the expression, you must prevent them from knowing the facts. (This follows from #2.) It must be frustrating to try so hard and yet come up so terribly short. Well, you're the expert on that, so I'll take your word for it. (At least I assume you're trying, although your unblemished record of failure suggests that that assumption might be mistaken.) Your definition is inadequate for any scope of argument in fact/opinion, fact/law, fact/theory, fact/value, fact/perspective, and yes, fact/expression. That's funny, because everyone else considers it quite adequate for fact/opinion, fact/theory, and fact/expression, at least. Once again, you're speaking your own little language. I'll say again, the preservation of fact does not include pseudo-facts collected for the sole sake of subverting expression. Oh, I see, they're pseudo-facts. I guess a pseudo-fact is a special kind of fact that scares trolls into an irrational frenzy, then?
So, now that you understand things can be related without being identical, you should be able to understand how facts and expressions are related. The relation between them is such that for every expression, there's at least one set of facts which is sufficient to fully describe it; anyone who knows those facts can fully reconstruct the expression. I am dealing with it head on. You've posited a "logical" argument; if it is so, then clearly you can support it with formal logic. Hint: the way to deal with an argument head on, especially one stated as plainly as mine was, is not to demand to see its formal underpinnings.
The logic there is a simple contrapositive; as you know, "if you learn these facts then you can reconstruct the expression" is logically equivalent to "if you must not reconstruct the expression then you must not learn these facts". Go ahead and replace the clauses with P's and Q's if that's the only way you can understand it, but surely a man with your impressive credentials didn't need someone to spoon-feed that to him.
Demanding to see the formal underpinnings is, however, a great way to implicitly concede the point. Thank you. Now that you've conceded it, let's move on to the cut 'n' pasting session you have lined up for us. An expression isn't a fact. As we have both agreed many times over. Reporting facts doesn't include "facts" of the elements of an expression for no other purpose than the subversion of that expression. In other words, "a fact is only a fact when I say it is". Sure. You continually refer to a base definition of "fact" in a desperate and wholly unconvincing effort to make the distinction meaningless. Apparently "base definition" means "the common one found in the dictionary and used in everyday speech by everyone except trolls". There's no difference in your unsupportable, moronic, and utterly inutile assessment than were you to enter a child's discussion of fact and opinion You're right - even a child could stomp your ridiculous arguments into the ground. Even a child has a better grasp of logic, definitions, and reading comprehension than you've shown. It's good that you can admit that; that's the first step toward recovery.
The 360 won't play DivX 3 files, though, and there are plenty of those remaining out in the wild. I had to install TVersity to get my 360 to play all my AVIs, and it's still not as good as Xbox Media Center. XBMC on the Wii would be a killer.
Sorry, I'm not going to fall for it. The argument is there. The structure is simple enough for anyone to grasp, even you. You can either (1) disprove it, (2) concede it, or (3) implicitly concede it by continuing to avoid dealing with it directly.
So far it looks like you're going for #3, which is fine with me. Your Honor, let the record show that the troll declined to refute my argument. You've lost the linguistic argument, the legal argument, the semantic argument, the formalistic argument, the historical argument, the ethical argument, and the organic argument. Oh, you're doing the Black Knight bit from Holy Grail now? Nice. Not quite as good as the original, but it's good that you haven't lost your sense of humor. An expression isn't a fact. As we have both agreed many times over. Reporting facts doesn't include "facts" of the elements of an expression for no other purpose than the subversion of that expression. In other words, "a fact is only a fact when I say it is". Sure. You continually refer to a base definition of "fact" in a desperate and wholly unconvincing effort to make the distinction meaningless. Apparently "base definition" means "the common one found in the dictionary and used in everyday speech by everyone except trolls". There's no difference in your unsupportable, moronic, and utterly inutile assessment than were you to enter a child's discussion of fact and opinion You're right - even a child could stomp your ridiculous arguments into the ground. Even a child has a better grasp of logic, definitions, and reading comprehension than you've shown. It's good that you can admit that; that's the first step toward recovery.
I don't think we've touched on the issue of whether I have a right to know facts. If you want to argue that I don't, then go ahead. Right now what we're stuck on is getting you to face the reality that suppressing the spread of expressions also requires suppressing the spread of facts. (No, genius, that doesn't mean the expressions are the facts.) You pretend to believe in privacy, but you don't, because I have a natural right to tell your boss your latest rant which was told to me in confidence. You mean breaking a promise? No, I've never condoned that. Yet another strawman. Repeating any number of facts about an expression will never replace that expression except in a hollow, meaningless, desperate broadening of fact to include the universe. Another transparent lie, easily shot down by even the most basic application of logic. I will now demonstrate this logic for you, not because I think it'll convince you (you're obviously too deep in your mental illness, or having too much fun trolling, for that), but to provide one more easily bookmarked example of how dishonest and/or deluded you really are:
"Every man for himself" is an expression, not a fact.
"I'm thinking of a four word expression" is a fact.
"The first word of that expression is 'every'" is a fact.
"The second word of that expression is 'man'" is a fact.
"The third word of that expression is 'for'" is a fact.
"The fourth word of that expression is 'himself'" is a fact.
By conveying those five facts, I've provided enough information for anyone to reconstruct the whole expression. Ergo, if you want to prevent me from sharing that expression with anyone else, you also have to prevent me from sharing some of those facts. The logic above is trivially extensible to expressions of any length; thus if you want to prevent me from sharing any particular expression, you also must prevent me from sharing some facts. QED.
If there were no copyright law in the first place, users would have that freedom by default. And if you believe there should be no copyright law, that all users should have those freedoms, then you might achieve that goal in regard to your own software by using the GPL - even though the GPL relies on the very same copyright law that you oppose.
It occurs to me that maybe you have an ideological opposition to the idea of making it illegal to state certain facts, which is why you display such cognitive dissonance when faced with the reality that doing so is a necessary part of enforcing copyright. Perhaps you'd have an easier time if you accepted that reality instead of continuing down this path of denial, and simply reevaluated the importance of enforcing copyright in the first place.
I'm just going by the common dictionary definition of "fact". By that definition, it's quite possible for something not to be a fact. For example, a dog is not a fact; a fact is a concept, and a dog is an animal, not a concept. There are facts about dogs: for example, "George W. Bush's dog is named Barney" is a fact about a dog. But that fact is not a dog, and Barney the dog is not a fact. Similarly, a song is not a fact, even though there are plenty of facts about songs. [There are facts about words, thoughts, and theories, but those things aren't necessarily facts themselves] Then what are they? A word is a word, a thought is a thought, and a theory is a theory. That's not much of an answer, of course, but I don't know what else you expect me to say. You and I both agree that words, thoughts, and theories aren't facts themselves, and you've even admitted that there are facts about those things, so I'm not sure where the disconnect is coming from. Sharing, in order to be permissible, like anything else, needs to be something you're entitled to share. You said earlier, "The issue of choosing to share was never once on the table, nor is there anything to evidence my thoughts on the subject". Obviously, that wasn't true: you are saying that this type of sharing isn't permissible, while I'm saying it is. Amazingly, they were writing to distinguish fact and expression, something you've still to learn. Well, except for all those posts where I did distinguish them, including this one. Hard to forget about those, since there have been so many of them, but somehow you've done it anyway. Have you considered the possibility that you might have Alzheimer's?
In any case, people are free to be dicks as long as they're not trampling on anyone else's rights. If nobody was watching the movies (and paying for them), those actors would be out of business pretty fast, so it does matter a lot to the actors whether people actually pay for seeing the movie. But that wasn't the scenario, remember? The scenario was that you already have a theater full of paying customers, and some more people sneak in for free.
As I said, that's an immoral trespass against the theater owner. But to the actors, as long as there are enough paying customers to compensate them for their work, it doesn't matter how many other people see the show for free. Suppose piracy was legalized, and nobody had to pay to watch any movie. How many people would choose not to pay? Half, more than half? How many movies would that mean couldn't make it into the black and therefore weren't produced? The only reason they wouldn't be produced is if no one cared enough about them to pay for their production. Are you suggesting that if copyright were abolished, no one would want movies to be made anymore? Because as long as there's demand for new movies, there'll be money for making them - people will just be paying for the production directly instead of buying tickets.
That doesn't mean facts are baseball, or dinosaurs, or books. I know it's easier for you to pretend that I've equated facts and expressions, but anyone reading my posts can see that I haven't (and I certainly remember it myself, as I assume you do also), so you're not accomplishing much by doing that. Ignoring it 10 times in a row won't make it go away, nor will substituting a generic definition in order to make a case that isn't falsifiable. Huh, I guess you don't know what "falsifiable" means either. That's a shame. You can look this stuff up online for free, you know. But goodness, how important the word 'fact' is, since it encompasses every word ever uttered, every though ever expressed, and every theory disproved! Does it? I sure haven't said that. There are facts about words, thoughts, and theories, but those things aren't necessarily facts themselves. Leave your strawman at home, pal. How quickly you forget your own words: "...simply can't understand why anyone would choose to share something with other people." That is a bogus ad hominem meant to distract from an utterly vaporous case. The issue of choosing to share was never once on the table, nor is there anything to evidence my thoughts on the subject. Of course it was. File sharing, remember? In case you've forgotten about this popular new technology, it's where people use their own internet connections to transmit files to other people (whether they produced those files themselves or obtained them somewhere else), usually for no personal benefit other than the knowledge that they're helping someone else get the files they want.
Are you trying to redefine "sharing" to include the requirement that the thing shared must be the sharer's own creation? Sorry, not gonna happen. We speak English here. As we've seen time and again, you're the only one being dishonest in your approach, utterly failing to produce a sound argument in any context that doesn't rely on tautological definitions and selective manipulation to the exclusion of the contrary. Hmm, I think I see where you got that impression. Let me straighten you out: the dishonest posts that rely on phony definitions are yours. You can tell because they say "by mr_matticus" at the top. I'm happy to put forth the "bankrupt" argument of Framers and philosophers in place from the time of the birth of our nation, You mean like the one who said these intangible things cannot, in nature, be the subject of property? and demonstrably expressive of the collective will. Wha-- oh, I get it! You're saying the laws paid for by Big Content represent the "collective will". Irony, right? Or is that sarcasm? You tell me, you're the one with all the credentials. Anyway, that's a good one... I thought you were done making jokes, but this zinger is my new favorite.
So, either you knew that what you said was false, which makes you a liar, or you didn't, which makes you ignorant. I find it hard to believe that someone with your credible background in semantics could be so ignorant about the meaning of such a common everyday word, but if you'd like to go with that option, I guess I'll take your word for it. I don't deny that that is the case. But if you extend that sentence for the next 400 pages, you're no longer reporting fact. Now that's a fascinating theory. How many facts do you need to report before they magically stop being facts, then? A hundred? A thousand? Exactly 400 pages' worth? As I've said many times, you're absolutely free to share your work as you desire. This isn't about that, though, and unless you're totally unhinged, you know that. Indeed, we both know it isn't about that, and yet you've just brought it up out of nowhere. I guess that makes you unhinged. But clearly, common use is inadequate for a specific, technical situation in a thread about semantics and formalism. Inadequate for your dishonest argument, you mean. As if your intellectually bankrupt position is any less bankrupt when described in your made-up definitions. I know very well what they mean in common use. Ah, I see. So you're not ignorant after all, just a lying troll. Got it.
Now go ahead, tell me those are really elephants, not facts. The fact that your house is blue is of independent significance. Yours is the blue house. Moby Dick is the book about the ill-fated hunt for a white whale. That's a fact, too. The expression isn't an independent fact; it's not an objective reality. Moby Dick is also the book that starts out "Call me Ishmael." That's a fact and an objective reality. Denying it only proves how detached from reality you are, because anyone can look in the book and verify that fact to be objectively true. There is zero value and zero need for your desire to repeat it--to do so is not out of an interest to convey fact, but simply to coopt the original expression of another for your own gain (including the petulant spite of another). Ah yes, spite. That must be what it's about, because a jealous, angry hoarder like you simply can't understand why anyone would choose to share something with other people. Amusing but sad. "Desperate semantic wankery" coming from someone who clearly has no credible background in semantics is pretty rich. Not nearly as rich as the fact that despite knowing all about semantic maps and lexemes, you still somehow manage to remain hopelessly ignorant of what words like "say", "speech", and "fact" mean in common use. It's like watching someone who's studied books about bicycles for years, but still falls down the first time he tries to ride one. All that blustering about your "credible background" doesn't do a thing to hide the fact that you've just fallen flat on your ass.
But suppose one of the neighbors decides he doesn't want to pay. Maybe he doesn't care about having a paved road because he drives a 4x4, or maybe he's just a cheapskate. The other neighbors can go ahead and pay for the road to be paved, splitting the cost 11 ways instead of 12.
Now, is the cheap neighbor doing anything wrong by continuing to drive on that road once it's paved? I say no. The people who paid chose to pay, and the pavers chose to do the work, knowing full well that it's impractical to prevent other people from driving on the road once the work is done. (Preventing copyrighted work from being shared is even less practical.) But what about the person who sneaks in. Assume there are a few unsold seats. That individual isn't depriving the theater of money from a paying customer, since there are still seats available. But I would still say that individual is committing a theft of service, even if there is no way that he would have paid for a ticket even if he wasn't able to sneak in. I wouldn't. He's trespassing against the theater owner, because the space inside the theater is a limited resource. But he isn't committing any harm against the actors themselves; they're working exactly as hard no matter how many people are watching them. You're right that the legal term in that scenario isn't "theft of service" - because the service (the actors' labor) isn't what's taken. he is still enjoying the fruit of someone else's labor without paying his fair share There's nothing wrong with that: we all enjoy the fruits of other people's labor without paying for it. Payment isn't something you're obligated to give whenever you benefit from someone else's labor; it's something you choose to give in order to convince them to perform that labor.
For instance, you don't pay the barber for your haircut because there's some moral law that says money has to change hands whenever hair is cut. You pay him because he's free to spend his time however he wants, and he's decided that he'd rather be doing something other than cutting hair unless he's going to be paid for it. (Typically you pay after the service is performed, which means the promise of being paid is what convinces him, but by making that promise you're entering into a contract, which is what actually obligates you to pay later.)
For someone who's flinging as many accusations about definitions as you are, you sure seem to have a shoddy grasp of what words actually mean. The act of choosing the word is the labor, and so the "fact" that the first word of Yesterday is 'yesterday' is only a "fact" because of that labor. Thus, it is not a fact. Uh-huh. Let me try one: the act of painting my house blue is the labor, and so the "fact" that my house is blue is only a "fact" because of that labor. Thus, it is not a fact. (What is it, then? Is it just an opinion that my house is blue? Is it a musing, a side note, an anecdote? Maybe it's a mackerel, or a brooch, or a squad car!)
That was amusing but pointless. Let's stick with the normal definition of "fact", shall we? For brevity's sake, I'll skip responding to the other inane ramblings of yours that are predicated on your bizarre, opposite-day definition of "fact", since my response in each case would be "No, that's not what 'fact' means; look it up or ask someone who's a native speaker of English." The printing press enriched society because it opened access to a new class of individuals who could not afford it. Which, of course, is exactly what file sharing has also done: opened access to a class of individuals who otherwise couldn't afford it. You don't think those college students with iPods full of music can afford to spend $10,000+ on CDs, do you? File sharing does nothing more than wrest self-determination and control over one's own expressions from the person to which it is organically and legally vested. Funny how you call it organic when, in the absence of copyright law, there is no control over one's own expressions - as Thomas Jefferson so famously pointed out, such things cannot, in nature, be the subject of property. Show me one instance of knowledge being locked up by copyright that isn't some bullshit "fact" like "this is the text of the latest Tom Clancy:". I'm sorry you think facts are bullshit. On the other hand, that revelation goes a long way toward explaining the content of your posts. What is a free speech right? It's one that fundamentally prohibits the government from stopping you from expressing yourself. Another made-up definition, eh? You should publish your own dictionary; at least that way, you'll have a source to point to the next time someone calls you out on your desperate semantic wankery. You have not been barred from expressing your thoughts or information you know. And now I see you've made up a new definition for "information", or maybe "know", or hell, maybe the magic fantasy word in that sentence is "barred". What an ingenious puzzle! Clearly the work of a brilliant mind that knows it's trapped in a corner with no leg to stand on.
To do otherwise is no better than to lock up all criminal defendants who fit a certain profile, based only on the statistical likelihood that they might have committed the crime. "You're between ages 18 and 35, male, and live on the north side of town: 85% of past suspects who fit that description have been found guilty of the crime you're charged with, so we're just going to skip the trial and send you directly to prison."
The answer is that performing floating point arithmetic is not the same as using an FPU. Floating point arithmetic is a process that can be done independently of the underlying hardware. A computer with no FPU can still perform that process; it just has to use a different algorithm.
You have to test the system as a whole: type in two floating point numbers, and if the computer adds them and produces the correct result, you can conclude that it does floating-point math without even knowing whether it has an FPU.
Concluding that a person is incapable of "accurately reasoning", based only on the development of his brain, is as flawed as concluding that a computer can't add floating point numbers, based only on the lack of an FPU. If you really want to know, you have to test the person, not just look inside his skull.
After all, if you can't come up with a test to measure whether someone possesses the ability to reason, then how can you even know which area of the brain is associated with that ability?
And the fact that the second word of that song is "all" isn't the Beatles' labor either, right? And so on for the third word, fourth word, and all the way to the end. There's a fact about each one of those words, and those facts aren't anyone's labor. Right?
So then, since those are all just facts and not anyone's labor, why is it that I shouldn't be allowed to share all those facts with someone else? Or have I got that wrong: are you saying I should be able to share all those facts? No. For fuck's sake, INFORMATION IS NOT AN EXPRESSIVE WORK. FACTS ARE NOT WORK. Work -- that is, labor -- went into discovering them. You don't think calculus, the light bulb, the theory of relativity, and the speed of light all just popped into someone's head overnight, do you?
People had to work to discover that stuff, and you've told me that people own the fruits of their labor, so I don't know why you still insist on taking their work away from them without their consent. Lyrics aren't facts. Lyrics can be described with facts: it is a fact that the first word of that song is "yesterday". If you prohibit someone from sharing the lyrics, you also prohibit them from sharing the facts that describe them. You're pushing an empty definition which results in nothing more than trolling. There's another one of those dishonest accusations, but don't let me stop you. By all means, keep showing your true colors. There's no intellectual work in that product ["The 1st byte of this file is 'd5'"]. I didn't say there was, but so what - are we only allowed to speak in "intellectual works" now? We can't just state facts?
I must say, you're putting on quite an impressive dance to avoid admitting that copyright makes it illegal to share information. I mean, I can still see right through it, but kudos for trying. What exactly do you stand to gain from duplicating existing knowledge? Sometimes it feels good to share. I understand that you've probably never tried it, but maybe, just once, you should. You might learn something. How does that enrich culture, expand understanding, or push society forward? It doesn't. On the contrary, society benefits from greater access to all sorts of information (or "works", if you insist on drawing a distinction). The printing press enriched society, not by making it possible to express things that couldn't be expressed before, but by making it possible for those things to reach a wider audience. File sharing does the same thing. You can say the same thing; but if you're not investing any intellectual labor into doing so, you're not saying anything. You're just repeating what someone else has said. Actually, when I open my mouth and words come out, I am saying those words. That's what "saying" means.
And this comes after you accuse me of "pushing an empty definition"? You're truly a comic genius, sir.
But no one's saying that the work has no value, now are they? In fact, I'm saying the opposite: the work that goes into creating a new program, song, movie, etc. is exactly where the value is -- not in the resulting copies. An information economy must still be managed as an economy. Most people wouldn't have jobs under your scenario. Hilarious! Somehow abolishing copyright is supposed to prevent anyone from selling their labor. You really do live in a fantasy world, don't you?