What Hacker News says

georgemcbaySep 2014

If they didn't file a patent and didn't have an invention to show and BigCo still beat them to having a working patentable invention that just means the "invention" was an obvious idea whose time had come, which is really the biggest problem with modern patents, IMO.

The self-centered egotistical notion that these ideas are something unique to one inventor as opposed to the reality where the vast majority (though certainly not all) of ideas are just obvious consequences of timing and everything that came before is really, really goofy and it is crazy that we award the first person who happens to legally file such ideas a nearly 2 decade monopoly on them.

It wasn't supposed to be like this. Read the writings of Thomas Jefferson who very clearly had a much higher bar in mind for awards of patentability than the rubber-stamping we do today:

http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-06-02-03...

http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-07-02-00...

Just a couple of examples, but pretty much whenever Jefferson writes about patentable ideas he always stresses how high the bar must be on both real novelty of the invention and high social value of the invention.

If he had any notion of what patents would turn into today I'm absolutely positive he would have violently opposed the inclusion of them to the Constitution.

thread

rayinerMar 2024

The issue is that the Establishment Clause doesn’t say anything about “separation of church and state.” It’s about regulating or creating established state churches—I.e., establishments of religion.

The concept of “separation of church and state” is much broader, and comes from the writings of Thomas Jefferson—who admired revolutionary France and its secularism. But it has nothing to do with either the Constitution or the First Amendment. If we are picking random quotes from founding fathers, you could reach the exact opposite conclusion by quoting Adams instead: “Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

It so happens that, because the Establishment Clause is a specific limit on the federal government’s ability to interfere with the state established churches that it makes no sense to incorporate the establishment clause into the states via the 14th amendment. (Just as it makes no sense to incorporate the tenth amendment against the states.)

But my point remains even if you’re just talking about the federal government. The Establishment Clause is just not getting at the “separation of church and state” concept.

thread

jivatmanxJul 2013

"A man has a right to use a saw, an axe, a plane, separately; may he not combine their uses on the same piece of wood? He has a right to use his knife to cut his meat, a fork to hold it; may a patentee take from him the right to combine their use on the same subject? Such a law, instead of enlarging our conveniences, as was intended, would most fearfully abridge them, and crowd us by monopolies out of the use of the things we have."

- Letter to Oliver Evans, (16 January 1814); published in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (1905) Vol. 13, p. 66.

thread

tokenadultJul 2011

I'm sure you know Jefferson was one of the big proponents of a well-informed citizenry in order to maintain a functioning democracy.

Yes, Jefferson generally expressed the opinion that an educated citizenry is beneficial to a country, and I have often expressed agreement with that opinion. But it is important to note that Jefferson did not support making school attendance compulsory, nor did he think that education should be provided solely by state governments. Jefferson received more nonparental schooling than the other three presidents depicted on Mount Rushmore combined, first at home with a hired tutor in Tuckahoe, where Jefferson's father moved when Jefferson was two to be guardian for his wife's late cousin's son. At age nine Thomas Jefferson was placed as a boarding student in the one-room "Latin school" kept by the Reverend William Douglas, minister of St. James Parish. Thomas Jefferson's later letters reveal Jefferson didn't think Reverend Douglas really knew the subject matter very well.

Thomas Jefferson's studies with that teacher ended at the age of fourteen, when his father died. Thomas Jefferson then was sent to the five-student school kept by the Reverend James Maury, whose son was one of the other students in the school. Jefferson spent many hours walking in the woods or practicing the violin while studying there. Jefferson then again stopped attending school briefly before traveling to Williamsburg to attend the College of William and Mary.

William Small was Thomas Jefferson's favorite member of the college's seven-man faculty. Jefferson was remembered in later years by his classmates for his diligence in independently reading books until late at night. After two years, Jefferson completed his studies at William and Mary and then studied law by working with a Williamsburg lawyer from 1762 to 1766.

Jefferson, after retiring from his rather trouble-plagued presidency, spent years planning a system of publicly subsidized schools in Virginia. He wrote extensively to other planners of that project, and many of his letters from that period survive and have been reprinted. He was convinced from his extensive observations of society in America and in Europe that parental control was vital for schools:

"But if it is believed that these elementary schools will be better managed by the Governor and Council, the commissioners of the literary fund, or any other general authority of the government, than by the parents within each ward, it is a belief against all experience. Try the principle one step further and amend the bill so as to commit to the Governor and Council the management of all our farms, our mills, and merchants' stores." Letter of Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Cabell, Feb. 2, 1816, reprinted in Political Writings of Thomas Jefferson (1955), page 98 and in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Memorial Edition 1904), volume 14, pages 420-21.

In other words, it is as ridiculous to have governments, especially governments of broad territorial units, operate schools as it is to have governments operate grocery stores or farms. But of course socialist countries around the world have tried the experiment of governments running farms and stores, always with disastrous results, and almost every country in the world today has government-operated schools. Perhaps it is time to listen again to Jefferson's advice.

Jefferson was quite consistent on this point of preferring private operation of schools, however much those schools were publicly funded and open to all members of the public. In a state of the Union address during his second term as president, Jefferson noted:

"It [should not] be proposed to take ordinary branches [of education] out of the hands of private enterprise, which manages so much better all the concerns to which it is equal." Thomas Jefferson, sixth annual message to Congress (1806), reprinted in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Memorial Edition 1907), volume 14, page 384.

Jefferson most definitely supported public funding of schools, but made clear he opposed compulsory attendance.

"Is it a right or a duty in society to take care of their infant members in opposition to the will of the parent? . . . It is better to tolerate the rare instance of a parent refusing to let his child be educated, than to shock the common feelings and ideas by the forcible asportation and education of the infant against the will of the father. What is proposed here is to remove the objection of expense, by offering education gratis . . . Letter of Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Cabell, September 9, 1817, reprinted in Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Memorial Edition 1904) volume 17, page 423.

thread

tokenadultOct 2009

Compulsory school attendance (as contrasted with tax-supported provision of schools) came later in American history. And the history of the colonies where Puritans were not the majority was also different. But Americans in general cherished literacy, and got that without much school attendance. When Horace Mann finally made school attendance compulsory in the modern sense in the 1850s in Massachusetts, he reported in his Common School Journal that more than 90 percent of the inhabitants of Massachusetts were literate. Earlier, Thomas Jefferson wrote, "Is it a right or a duty in society to take care of their infant members in opposition to the will of the parent? . . . It is better to tolerate the rare instance of a parent refusing to let his child be educated, than to shock the common feelings and ideas by the forcible asportation and education of the infant against the will of the father. What is proposed here is to remove the objection of expense, by offering education gratis . . ."

Letter of Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Cabell, September 9, 1817, reprinted in Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Memorial Edition 1904) volume 17, page 423.

http://learninfreedom.org/Founders_free.html

thread