Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!njin!princeton!phoenix!roger
From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Newsgroups: alt.individualism
Subject: Re: Phil Ronzone's stereo
Message-ID: <13024@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 17 Jan 90 21:58:37 GMT
References: <2310@odin.SGI.COM> <12569@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <2356@odin.SGI.COM> <1990Jan13.090428.25775@agate.berkeley.edu> <2818@odin.SGI.COM> <21643@unix.cis.pitt.edu> <2904@odin.SGI.COM>
Reply-To: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Distribution: usa
Organization: Princeton University, NJ
Lines: 65

In article <2904@odin.SGI.COM> pkr@maddog.sgi.com (Phil Ronzone) writes:
>In article <21643@unix.cis.pitt.edu> rhg2@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Rich  Graham) writes:
>>This is all well and good, but I'm still waiting for your basis of the
>>concept of ownership.

>>If there is some basis of a concept of ownership that is more basic and
>>more substantial, I'd like to hear it.

>I own all my property. There are three kinds:

>p0 = my own life

Fair enough.  What does this mean?  To what extent may you defend your
ownership?  May you violate somebody's property rights (steal his food)
to protect your right to your own life?

May you restrict another's actions to lessen a THREAT to your own life?

Life-as-property is tricky.

>p1 = my ideas and thoughts (i.e., Einstein owns E=MC**2)

In what sense does/did he own it?  Did he have the right to control the
use of it to derive other products of thought, e.g., further work in
physics?

Could this ownership be transferred?

What happens when two people have the same idea independently.  One
idea, two "owners."  What does p1 get you, and how does it differ from
p0 and p2?

Suppose we said that Einstein did NOT own that idea.  How would the
world be different?  How would E's life have been different?

>p2 = my tangible derivatives (farm the ground, I own the
>     corn)

Would that be YOUR ground you're farming?  How did you get it?  From
whom?  How did the original owner get it?

>In many cases of p2, ownership is immediately transferred
>upon production via prior agreement as per most blue and
>white collar jobs.

Hmmm, doesn't seem to work for p1 -- or does the ETH (or wherever) own
that formula after all?  

Now, let's think about coerced transfer of ownership (it happens!) and
how to remedy it.

Then, let's consider the conditions that make it realistic even to TALK
about ownership: you can own something according to the above under any
conditions, but it may be a pretty useless concept unless certain other
things obtain as well.  What are they?  

Good first step, Phil.  Keep going.

Roger
>
>
>------Me and my dyslexic keyboard----------------------------------------------
>Phil Ronzone   Manager Secure UNIX           pkr@sgi.COM   {decwrl,sun}!sgi!pkr
>Silicon Graphics, Inc.               "I never vote, it only encourages 'em ..."
>-----In honor of Minas, no spell checker was run on this posting---------------