Some years ago a U.S. judge ruled that "business methods" could be patented, perhaps he wanted to create a legacy for himself, anyway then he kicked the bucket. Rulings and case law have proliferated since then. (Testing out a new legal principle on that old "case-by-case" basis, ka-ching, ka-ching.) Congress still hasn't cleaned the mess up.
So, if business methods can be patented, then why not "intellectual methods"? That's an even more terrible idea. Maybe I should patent or copyright it in order to prevent anybody from carrying it out. Of course Penrose in Britain was granted a copyright (which I hear has expired) for the concept of the Penrose Tile -- the ability to create an acyclic pattern using only two tiles. He started proceedings against somebody for that (they settled out of court). ----- Original Message ----- From: "Johnathan Corgan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <everything-list@eskimo.com> Sent: Wednesday, October 05, 2005 2:01 PM Subject: Re: ROSS MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE - The Simplest Yet Theory of Everything ohn M wrote: > Seriously: there are countries where a patent can be > granted only if a working model can be produced (this > is against the perpetuum mobile deluge of patents). It > may be valid for a TOE as well. The patent process is designed to provide an inventor with certain legal rights regarding the use of his invention by others. To attempt to patent a scientific theory (regardless of its scientific merits or lack thereof) in the guise of a "model process" is both frivolous and bizarre. I am at a loss to understand the motivations of the original poster in doing this. On the other hand, I did not intend to "shut down" discussion of the actual hypotheses presented. -Johnathan
