logical bob wrote:I'm not trying to construct a philosophical argument for the removal of copyright law. All I said was that I struggle to see how copyright infringement is morally equivalent to theft or to corporate cartel practices, mainly on the basis of its lack of undesirable consequences.

Sure, but the reason you gave applies equally to other situations where it ostensibly carries no weight whatsoever (or at least debatably so), which suggests it's at least somewhat dubious. Surely consistency is a standard that can be applied to any discussion of morals, not just to philosophical arguments for the removal of copyright law?

Ultimately whether there's harm comes down to whether one believes that piracy results in any net reduction in sales or not (since those sales generate dividends for shareholders - which are individual people and taxes which go to government spending and benefit individual people at the end of the line), something that is ultimately going to be impossible to prove. I suppose we could try and see whether single sales, video rentals, movie sales and so on have changed appreciably since the digital revolution and widespread internet access, although I doubt anyone would be convinced whether or not there's a clear trend.

logical bob wrote:Two important differences with benefit fraud. (a) It consumes actual money from a finite supply whereas film piracy leaves the copyright holder with exactly what it had before. (b) The victim is everyone who pays tax rather than a company (assuming it makes sense to call the company a victim).

Sure, I agree it's not the same thing. (a) Is a good distinction, (b) isn't though, because the shareholders are every bit as much people with a stake as tax payers are. Let's not forget that governments are people in the same way companies are - able to enter into contracts, to sue, to be sued and so on. Obviously one could say that someone committing tax evasion is more similar in some ways than someone committing benefits fraud anyway.

logical bob wrote:Is corporate personhood something forced onto protesting companies or something companies fought long and hard to acquire? That should tell you what you need to know on that score.

It's neither of those things.

There are particular extensions of the concept in rather odd areas that have been made recently in the US that have nothing to do with this conversation (rights to freedom of religion, rights to spend money in the political sphere - which honestly is pretty bad at the personal level as well and so on) that they fought hard for, but the basic concept, particularly as it relates to intellectual property and contract law go back hundreds of years and are very much a mixture, protecting shareholders (including pension funds), customers, inventors and employees in a wide variety of different ways. All of those are individuals, rather than companies benefiting.

Of course if you said there were missteps and areas in need of reform I'd absolutely agree.

How, exactly, did these Martians actually copy our movies?


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Thommo wrote:

Chrisw wrote:I don't think the ownership metaphor works when we are talking about the rest of copyright law. Copying certainly isn't theft as it doesn't directly deprive the "owner" of anything.

It's only certain if one assumes that theft requires deprivation of the owner of property. In terms of word use and concept this has never been the case historically and still isn't today.

Really? Can you give me an example of theft where no one is being deprived of any property?

The_Metatron wrote:How, exactly, did these Martians actually copy our movies?


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Superior technology, of course.

igorfrankensteen wrote:If you insist on ignoring what I write, why ask me questions? I said, no, it's not a moral issue.

Ask something that doesn't include directly telling me what I already think, and I will try to answer.

Sorry, I'm having trouble understanding your position.
Do you think that copying a work without the permission of the author is theft, irrespective of law, custom, etc.?
Do you think that theft is a violation of people's moral rights?
Do you think that it follows from the above that copying a work without the permission of the author is a violation of people's moral rights?

The_Metatron wrote:How, exactly, did these Martians actually copy our movies?

That's a fair question. I was thinking with radio telescopes (or in other words, big satellite dishes). Originally I intended a longer question, with "copying our broadcasts" in it, but I had to shorten it.

Thommo wrote:...
Ultimately whether there's harm comes down to whether one believes that piracy results in any net reduction in sales or not ...

I think this needs a bit of unpacking. I'd guess that "reduction" here doesn't mean fewer than what there was previously, but rather fewer than what there would have been had copying not occurred? I think that for reduction in this sense to be considered harm it may also be necessary to consider the situation in which copying occurs to to be a violation of a right. e.g. If someone stopped to listen to a busker, and didn't pay them, the busker may have less than they would have had if people always paid buskers when they stopped and listened (because that person may have decided to pay rather than not stop and listen), but I think we probably wouldn't consider the busker to be harmed, unless we considered buskers to have a right to be paid when people stopped and listened?

james_gnz wrote:

The_Metatron wrote:How, exactly, did these Martians actually copy our movies?

That's a fair question. I was thinking with radio telescopes (or in other words, big satellite dishes). Originally I intended a longer question, with "copying our broadcasts" in it, but I had to shorten it.

Until a few years ago, television broadcasts were analog. It turns out that digital television receivers are more sensitive.

Some back of the envelope calculations:

Path loss from earth to mars varies from 215 to 230 db. That's a big problem.

Television transmitters (at least in the US) were limited to 90 dbm effective radiated power. The transmit antennas are designed to radiate most of their energy below the plane of a tangent to the earth's surface passing through the antenna's location. That is, their usable radiation was directed downward, which is where all of the intended receivers are, of course. However, some of this radiation will escape earth.

Figuring that path loss and transmitter effective power, we can expect to receive a typical VHF television signal from Earth on Mars at signal strengths of from -140 to -125 dbm. That's some weak fucking signal.

A typical analog television receiver's minimum usable signal strength is -68 dbm. A digital receiver will work with a receive signal strength of -83 dbm.

So, to get minimum performance, an analog television receiver on Mars will need an antenna that provides between 55 and 70 db of gain. A digital receiver antenna would need between 42 and 57 db of gain.

Arecibo, with a dish diameter of 305 meters, has a gain of 61 dbi at 432 Mhz. That frequency is well above the VHF television bands, but it's gain figures are published, so that's what I used. At half that frequency, its gain would be roughly 55 dbi.

So, a 300 meter dish antenna on mars would do to receive digital terrestrial television broadcasts from earth. Maybe. The problem now is distinguishing between the thousands of television transmitters that would be within the martian antenna's beamwidth.

I call bullshit.

However, assume super-duper martian receivers that are recording crap we broadcast.

So what?

Royalties paid by broadcasters for intellectual properties are based on estimated audience of the broadcast station. Mars isn't in that estimate.

Unless copyright holders want to renegotiate how broadcasters pay royalties, they aren't out shit.

james_gnz wrote:

Thommo wrote:...
Ultimately whether there's harm comes down to whether one believes that piracy results in any net reduction in sales or not ...

I think this needs a bit of unpacking. I'd guess that "reduction" here doesn't mean fewer than what there was previously, but rather fewer than what there would have been had copying not occurred? I think that for reduction in this sense to be considered harm it may also be necessary to consider the situation in which copying occurs to to be a violation of a right. e.g. If someone stopped to listen to a busker, and didn't pay them, the busker may have less than they would have had if people always paid buskers when they stopped and listened (because that person may have decided to pay rather than not stop and listen), but I think we probably wouldn't consider the busker to be harmed, unless we considered buskers to have a right to be paid when people stopped and listened?

Yes, exactly. Harm is a rather judgemental term which implies that we have improperly deprived them of revenue. But we then need a further basis on which to say which cases are improper. For example, people shopping around for the best deal lowers retailers earnings but we wouldn't want to say that it improperly does this.

Chrisw wrote:

Thommo wrote:

Chrisw wrote:I don't think the ownership metaphor works when we are talking about the rest of copyright law. Copying certainly isn't theft as it doesn't directly deprive the "owner" of anything.

It's only certain if one assumes that theft requires deprivation of the owner of property. In terms of word use and concept this has never been the case historically and still isn't today.

Really? Can you give me an example of theft where no one is being deprived of any property?

Sure, like I say, this is what the words mean if you look them up and it's not a recent change in language.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theft

: the act or crime of stealing

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stealing

: to take (something that does not belong to you) in a way that is wrong or illegal

: to take (something that you are not supposed to have) without asking for permission

: to wrongly take and use (another person's idea, words, etc.)

The current legal code subdivides the concept depending further on such things as intent, home invasion and indeed intent to permanently deprive someone of their property. So that to be charged under a particular criminal code with "theft" would carry that implication (in most cases that I'm aware of), although the word and concept do not. This is in very much the same vein as discussion over whether a woman can rape a man, a man can marry a man, and so on. The legal position can change and can be informed by the broader concept and moral concerns.

Whether something like tax evasion is charged under a different section of the penal code certainly won't stop people considering tax evaders like thieves (although some people will support their position, believing such things as "taxation is theft" in the first place) and the motivation for penalising the crime is almost identical.

james_gnz wrote:

Thommo wrote:...
Ultimately whether there's harm comes down to whether one believes that piracy results in any net reduction in sales or not ...

I think this needs a bit of unpacking. I'd guess that "reduction" here doesn't mean fewer than what there was previously, but rather fewer than what there would have been had copying not occurred? I think that for reduction in this sense to be considered harm it may also be necessary to consider the situation in which copying occurs to to be a violation of a right.

Yes (that it refers to the counterfactual number that would have occurred) and yes (that it may be necessary for the violation of a right to have occured*).

james_gnz wrote:If someone stopped to listen to a busker, and didn't pay them, the busker may have less than they would have had if people always paid buskers when they stopped and listened (because that person may have decided to pay rather than not stop and listen), but I think we probably wouldn't consider the busker to be harmed, unless we considered buskers to have a right to be paid when people stopped and listened?

Probably. I think I'd agree although I imagine there'd be dissent.

If I was unambiguously sure that buskers were "a good thing" from a general or societal point of view I think I'd be more concerned there might be harm, since if everybody behaved the same way towards them (those that listened did not pay) then there'd be far fewer buskers, so such behaviour is a small contribution towards a less desireable state of affairs. Even then there's the implied consent of the busker for people to listen for free, much like shareware/freeware software or music.

However I'm not really sure buskers don't irritate as much as entertain, so I think I agree.

*Although many would consider things like infidelity or divorce to be a harm even though no right has been violated. So I suspect this point is defeasible as well.

Chrisw wrote:Yes, exactly. Harm is a rather judgemental term which implies that we have improperly deprived them of revenue. But we then need a further basis on which to say which cases are improper. For example, people shopping around for the best deal lowers retailers earnings but we wouldn't want to say that it improperly does this.

Not really. We regularly say that people are harmed by being bullied, or by being treated poorly in a relationship. I'm not sure where this more restricted definition of harm comes from. We generally regard corruption, nepotism and tax evasion as harms against society.

The_Metatron wrote:...
So, a 300 meter dish antenna on mars would do to receive digital terrestrial television broadcasts from earth. Maybe. The problem now is distinguishing between the thousands of television transmitters that would be within the martian antenna's beamwidth.

I call bullshit.

Alan B's answer it is then. Superior technology.

Chrisw wrote:Really? Can you give me an example of theft where no one is being deprived of any property?

Thommo wrote:Sure, like I say, this is what the words mean if you look them up and it's not a recent change in language.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theft

: the act or crime of stealing

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stealing

: to take (something that does not belong to you) in a way that is wrong or illegal
: to take (something that you are not supposed to have) without asking for permission
: to wrongly take and use (another person's idea, words, etc.)

I'm not sure about this.

As an aside, I recall the following from a debate on abortion, although I'll hasten to add that by no means do I think it's really a fair comparison.

The word "birth" has many meanings.
The word "birth" has many meanings that are relevant in the abortion debate. For most people, the word "birth" only applies to the moment that a child emerges from or is surgically removed from the womb. The more specific word for that event is "parturition." It is worth noting that the root meanings of the word "birth" include Origin, Beginning, Any Coming into Existence and indeed "Conception." So, with those meanings in mind, when is a human organism actually "born?"
...
DebateGraph > The word "birth" has many meanings.

Looking at the references, we find that the above follows a rather torturous route, starting with "birth", going to the 6th definition and picking "origin", suffixing that to make "origination", and then from the list of synonyms picking "conception".

As I said, it's not a fair comparison, so I'm not going to try to make an argument out of it. I'll just leave it there to imply guilt by association, because you also referred to a dictionary.

On a more serious note, if we look at the full definition of "theft" from your quoted source, rather than the simple one (assuming the full definition is intended to be more authoritative?), the way I read it "theft" is given a more specific meaning than what is covered by "stealing". "Steal" is a bit more nebulous, and I'd guess the phrase "stole my idea", for instance, has been in use for quite some time. I'll add though that I think when a word is used without context suggesting a particular meaning, it may be taken in a narrower sense to refer to a primary meaning. I'd guess that the simple definition of "theft" was intended to be read in this way.

james_gnz wrote:

The_Metatron wrote:...
So, a 300 meter dish antenna on mars would do to receive digital terrestrial television broadcasts from earth. Maybe. The problem now is distinguishing between the thousands of television transmitters that would be within the martian antenna's beamwidth.

I call bullshit.

Alan B's answer it is then. Superior technology.

Exactly. If they can confuse us by placing objects in front of the 'toy' we sent them, then they can do anything!

james_gnz wrote:

Chrisw wrote:Really? Can you give me an example of theft where no one is being deprived of any property?

Thommo wrote:Sure, like I say, this is what the words mean if you look them up and it's not a recent change in language.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theft

: the act or crime of stealing

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stealing

: to take (something that does not belong to you) in a way that is wrong or illegal
: to take (something that you are not supposed to have) without asking for permission
: to wrongly take and use (another person's idea, words, etc.)

I'm not sure about this.

As an aside, I recall the following from a debate on abortion, although I'll hasten to add that by no means do I think it's really a fair comparison.

The word "birth" has many meanings.
The word "birth" has many meanings that are relevant in the abortion debate. For most people, the word "birth" only applies to the moment that a child emerges from or is surgically removed from the womb. The more specific word for that event is "parturition." It is worth noting that the root meanings of the word "birth" include Origin, Beginning, Any Coming into Existence and indeed "Conception." So, with those meanings in mind, when is a human organism actually "born?"
...
DebateGraph > The word "birth" has many meanings.

Looking at the references, we find that the above follows a rather torturous route, starting with "birth", going to the 6th definition and picking "origin", suffixing that to make "origination", and then from the list of synonyms picking "conception".

As I said, it's not a fair comparison, so I'm not going to try to make an argument out of it. I'll just leave it there to imply guilt by association, because you also referred to a dictionary.

On a more serious note, if we look at the full definition of "theft" from your quoted source, rather than the simple one (assuming the full definition is intended to be more authoritative?), the way I read it "theft" is given a more specific meaning than what is covered by "stealing". "Steal" is a bit more nebulous, and I'd guess the phrase "stole my idea", for instance, has been in use for quite some time. I'll add though that I think when a word is used without context suggesting a particular meaning, it may be taken in a narrower sense to refer to a primary meaning. I'd guess that the simple definition of "theft" was intended to be read in this way.

Ok. But what I posted is the primary meaning*.

What about the crime of identity theft (part of a wider family of crimes that are potentially relevant to discussion of copyright, including passing off and counterfeiting) then, how exactly does one suppose the word is being used there? Does it denote a crime where something is taken illicitly without permission - but without necessarily depriving the victim of the thing taken?

The whole point of he "stole my idea" is exactly the one that underpins patents, copyrights and intellectual property and it does indeed predate the times when theft classified those certain types of crime (until fairly modern history they were mostly classified as larceny I believe).

Should we be saying something is not theft bacause it is robbery? Or not theft because it is fraud? In general to say A is not B means to reject the widest definitions of B, otherwise we have some area of the venn diagram where we start describing things as both B and not B. This, I think, is the trouble with Chris's original statement that copying certainly isn't theft. By basic definitions it can be, by a number of more refined definitions it can be, and certain crimes are called theft that consist only of copying, or not paying for a service (such as sneaking in and sitting in an unoccupied seat in a half empty theatre) where no additional resources are consumed and nobody is deprived.

Incidentally, if someone said "life begins at birth", then I can't see what's "guilty" about clarifying what they mean - it's a pretty crappy argument by itself, and someone seeking clarification should be applauded rather than blamed. If someone were talking about a birth in the wider sense (e.g. the birth of a new nation in 1776 or something) and someone exclaimed "that certainly isn't a birth!" it should be clear who is right and who is wrong - it is a perfectly legitimate use of the word and concept.

*That was literally the first entry from the first dictionary that comes up in google. Here are the 2nd and 3rd:-
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/theft

noun
1.
the act of stealing; the wrongful taking and carrying away of the personal goods or property of another; larceny.

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/diction ... lish/theft

B2 (the ​act of) ​dishonestly taking something that ​belongs to someone ​else and ​keeping it:

james_gnz wrote:If someone stopped to listen to a busker, and didn't pay them, the busker may have less than they would have had if people always paid buskers when they stopped and listened (because that person may have decided to pay rather than not stop and listen), but I think we probably wouldn't consider the busker to be harmed, unless we considered buskers to have a right to be paid when people stopped and listened?

Thommo wrote:If I was unambiguously sure that buskers were "a good thing" from a general or societal point of view I think I'd be more concerned there might be harm, since if everybody behaved the same way towards them (those that listened did not pay) then there'd be far fewer buskers, so such behaviour is a small contribution towards a less desireable state of affairs.

Even then there's the implied consent of the busker for people to listen for free, much like shareware/freeware software or music.

Okay, so you're talking about harm to society? I notice you mention tax evasion in a later post, and I think there's something in this comparison. Regarding implied consent, I guess that's related to social contract? Appealing to law, and social contract to abide by it, and the position that we are better off for it, makes a plausible case that copyright infringement harms society, I think. I do have some issues with it though.

I wonder whether we really are better off, particularly the poorest members of society. I'm not convinced arts/entertainment like blockbuster movies and video games really make us better off. I think it would be considered inappropriate to spend a large portion of tax dollars on arts/entertainment, so I'm not sure it makes sense to trade much liberty on this account. For practical works, copyright gets things released quickly, whereas free projects tend take a while to gather inertia, so often face entrenched opposition when they do. I expect there are many cases where the dominance of copyrighted works hinders the development and use of free works, so I wonder if it's a net gain in the long run.

Even if copyright produces genuine good that society wouldn't otherwise have, I think it's questionable to produce that good with a social contract that requires the poorest members to refrain from enjoying it. Can they be held to a social contract they don't benefit from?

Also in general, I think social contract shouldn't have too much to say about people's private non-commercial activities (in particular whatever people do in their own homes).

james_gnz wrote:Okay, so you're talking about harm to society? I notice you mention tax evasion in a later post, and I think there's something in this comparison. Regarding implied consent, I guess that's related to social contract? Appealing to law, and social contract to abide by it, and the position that we are better off for it, makes a plausible case that copyright infringement harms society, I think. I do have some issues with it though.

Only indirectly, society is composed of individuals, so what I'm saying is that where something is a net good for a lot of people, then it's a small good (on average) for the individuals within that group. That might be a nitpick depending on your understanding of "good for society", but of course that same label can be put on dress codes such as demanding women claim up for modesty purposes which isn't supported by what I'm actually saying.

james_gnz wrote:I wonder whether we really are better off, particularly the poorest members of society. I'm not convinced arts/entertainment like blockbuster movies and video games really make us better off.

Really? Have you ever met anyone who watches movies but doesn't derive some pleasure and relaxation from it? Perhaps we just disagree on that. I'd rather taken for granted that since you were asking about these issues you did at least one of them - listen to music, watch film or play games.

james_gnz wrote:I think it would be considered inappropriate to spend a large portion of tax dollars on arts/entertainment, so I'm not sure it makes sense to trade much liberty on this account.

But we aren't trading liberty. If we didn't fund them, then they wouldn't exist (note that this could be argued not to apply to music as live concerts are still profitable as long as restricted entry is permitted and thus can be charged for, but Hollywood movies and AAA video games the point is valid) and one wouldn't get to watch/play them anyway. And as it stands we don't spend a large portion of tax dollars on them - they are net contributors of tax. People get to opt in to watching/listening to/playing them, nobody is forcing them. Those who want to opt out have a lifetime of shareware/freeware/freemium/open source entertainment. You could spend a lot of pleasant hours listening to classical music or playing games like path of exile. Whether the average quality and diversity is as high is perhaps another question though.

james_gnz wrote:For practical works, copyright gets things released quickly, whereas free projects tend take a while to gather inertia, so often face entrenched opposition when they do. I expect there are many cases where the dominance of copyrighted works hinders the development and use of free works, so I wonder if it's a net gain in the long run.

Free works face entrenched opposition? Can you explain that, it doesn't sound like a common phenomena at all. I think the issue is that there's no such thing as a "free" work, the artists have given their time and talent in all cases, it's a question of how they fund their lives in the meantime - everyone needs to eat. We don't expect carpenters to work without pay, the fact that artists make something more desireable doesn't appear to lead in any way to the conclusion that they deserve to be paid less (or not at all).

james_gnz wrote:Even if copyright produces genuine good that society wouldn't otherwise have, I think it's questionable to produce that good with a social contract that requires the poorest members to refrain from enjoying it. Can they be held to a social contract they don't benefit from?

I'm not particularly appealing to the social contract, but it's "the" social contract and not "a" social contract anyway. So it's more than a bit of a stretch to say the poorest receive no benefits whatsoever from living in our societies. Piracy also isn't at all restricted to the poorest in any way. If you want to ask whether poor martians (with vast, expensive satellite dishes so that they can spy on earth) would be harming us if they listened to music and watched movies that's a different question.

I think saying that they are "asked to refrain from enjoying it" is a bit of a political term as well, we could use the same thing to describe robbery of luxury foods, money or housing. We "ask them to refrain from enjoying it", yet they receive no benefit from it. Or perhaps we should just let them off of tax evasion? Or speeding as long as they don't crash? This ostensibly carries no moral force in those situations, so it's applicability here seems more than dubious.

james_gnz wrote:Also in general, I think social contract shouldn't have too much to say about people's private non-commercial activities (in particular whatever people do in their own homes).

These are commercial activities.

To be fair if you're aware of a way of pirating without downloading from outside of your own home I am well impressed though, all the pirating I know of involves complex series of telephonic or satellite exchanges with all sorts of computers around the world, or bringing in a physical disk from outside the home where the piracy has already taken place.

That said, I think the law should reach into people's homes, I'm not too happy with domestic abuse, counterfeiting or spousal rape to be honest. So I think it's important the law retain that reach, even in cases of much lesser importance.

Thommo wrote:Ok. But what I posted is the primary meaning*.

Hmmm, I guess that wasn't very clear. I'll try again. For the definition of steal you quoted:

: to take (something that does not belong to you) in a way that is wrong or illegal
: to take (something that you are not supposed to have) without asking for permission
: to wrongly take and use (another person's idea, words, etc.)

There are 3 meanings given here. I assume the first two aren't supposed to encompass the third, because otherwise there'd be no point listing the third? (Although that said, I am having some trouble telling the difference between the first two.) For the definition of theft you quoted:

: the act or crime of stealing

I don't think the context disambiguates which of the meanings of stealing are referred to. You seem to take it that all 3 are intended? I think it could as well be that just the first is intended. The full definition of theft seems, to me, to support this reading.

Thommo wrote:What about the crime of identity theft (part of a wider family of crimes that are potentially relevant to discussion of copyright, including passing off and counterfeiting) then, how exactly does one suppose the word is being used there? Does it denote a crime where something is taken illicitly without permission - but without necessarily depriving the victim of the thing taken?

I hadn't thought of "identity theft", but I think it's a misnomer, like "shooting star" or "baker's dozen". I think it's actually fraud (although it could be used to facilitate theft). Passing off and counterfeiting I would also have consider fraud. In these cases, I guess it does involve the wrongful transfer of possession. I guess the reason I would have not considered it also theft is that the person losing possession cedes it willingly (albeit under false pretences).

Thommo wrote:The whole point of he "stole my idea" is exactly the one that underpins patents, copyrights and intellectual property and it does indeed predate the times when theft classified those certain types of crime (until fairly modern history they were mostly classified as larceny I believe).

I think modern copyright law began with the Statute of Anne, with the long title: An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or Purchasers of such Copies, during the Times therein mentioned. (Not sure about patents.) In the USA, federal copyright and patent law is justified by the clause: [The Congress shall have Power] To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.
To me it seems clear that the point was "the Encouragement of Learning" and "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts".
I did a quick Internet search for "larceny", and I think it looks like it was more or less an old term for theft, but also included fraud where possession is ceded under false pretences?

Thommo wrote:Should we be saying something is not theft bacause it is robbery? Or not theft because it is fraud?

I guess perhaps I'd consider the definitions to be something along the lines of:
theft: transfer of possession without consent
robbery: theft with force, or the threat of force
fraud: deception to gain consent
So don't have a problem with considering robbery as a kind of theft, but I think fraud is something different.

Thommo wrote:In general to say A is not B means to reject the widest definitions of B, otherwise we have some area of the venn diagram where we start describing things as both B and not B. This, I think, is the trouble with Chris's original statement that copying certainly isn't theft. By basic definitions it can be, by a number of more refined definitions it can be, and certain crimes are called theft that consist only of copying, or not paying for a service (such as sneaking in and sitting in an unoccupied seat in a half empty theatre) where no additional resources are consumed and nobody is deprived.

I'd think of sneaking into a theatre as trespass. I guess different jurisdictions may have different definitions, but I think your definition of "theft" is very broad, and covers things that I think are quite different. I guess another issue I have with this definition is that I don't think it leaves a term to describe "theft" that isn't trespass, fraud, copyright infringement, or patent infringement.

Thommo wrote:Incidentally, if someone said "life begins at birth", then I can't see what's "guilty" about clarifying what they mean - it's a pretty crappy argument by itself, and someone seeking clarification should be applauded rather than blamed. If someone were talking about a birth in the wider sense (e.g. the birth of a new nation in 1776 or something) and someone exclaimed "that certainly isn't a birth!" it should be clear who is right and who is wrong - it is a perfectly legitimate use of the word and concept.

I agree it's a pretty crappy argument to start with, but I don't think any clarification would be had by replacing "birth" with "parturition". I agree that in another context "birth" could have a different meaning, but I think in the given context it was quite clear what was meant.