JUSTIFICATIONS FOR IP Four main arguments: First argument: A man has a natural property right in his own ideas. Their appropriation by others must be condemnded as stealing. Society is morally obligated to recognize and protect this property right. Property is an essence exclusive. Hence enforcement of exclusivity in the use of a patented invention is the only appropriate way for society to recognize this property right. Second argument: Justice requires that man receive and therefore that society secure to him, reward for his services in proportion as these services are useful to society. Inventors render useful services. The most appropriate way to secure to inventors rewards commensurate with their services is by means of exclusive patent rights in their inventions. Third argument: Industrial progress is desirable to society. Inventions and their exploitation are necessary to secure industrial progress. Neither invention nor exploitation of invention will be obtained to any adequate extent unless inventors and capitalists have hopes that successful ventures with yield profits which make it worth their while to make their efforts and risk the money. The simplest, cheapest, and most effective way for society to hold out these incentives is to grant exclusive patent rights in inventions. Fourth argument: Industrial progress is desirable to society. To secure it at a sustained rate it is necessary that new inventions become generally known as parts of the technology of society. In the absence of protection against immediate imitation of novel technological ideas, an inventor will keep his invention secret. The secret will die with him, and society will thereby lose the new art. Hence it is in the interest of society to induce the inventor to disclose his secret for the use of future generations. This can be best done by granting exclusive patent rights to the inventor in return for public disclosure of his invention. In relation to the first argument, the natural property right in ideas : FOR: - Many writers insisted that IP was not different in logical nature from material property and others said that a man's property in his ideas was more sacred than his property in things material. - Rodriquez > a man's natural right to the fruits of his labor. Labor results in property when it results in an exclusive appropriation. - Chevalier-> "an idea can belong to an unlimited number of persons, it is indeed the essence of an idea that, once published it belongs to all the world" - Rudolf Klostermann > manual labor created property in things while intellectual labor created property in ideas. - Henry Macleod > "that the productions of a man's mind are now recognized to be
as truly his own property and the fruits of his industry as the production of material wealth" and that "it is hard to see on what grounds he can be denied the same tenure in one as in the other" AGAINST: - A man has exclusive control of his new idea, before he communicates it to others, but once