ALL PROPERTY IS INTELLECTUAL II

The argument is simple and straightforward:

1. Humans possess rational, conceptual-level consciousness.

2. Humans possess free-will/volition.

3. Because of the nature of human intellect and volition, humans require morality.

4. Morality is possible only where alternatives exist and a choice can be made.

5. Social interactions require rights; a way to implement morality in a social context.

6. Property rights are how individual morality is implemented in a social context.

7. Self-ownership is the foundation of property rights; an individual is his own property.

8. Property rights establish spheres of personal autonomy and control.

9. People are only responsible when they have alternatives from which they can select.

10. People are responsible only when they can exercise control and are able to make choices.

11. Property rights define the limits of personal control and choices and thus responsibility.

12. Property and the individual rights associated with property are moral concepts arising solely from the special intellectual qualities and requirements of the human mind and life.

13. Neither property nor the concept “property” can exist apart or separately from the human intellect that make either possible; they are (metaphysically and epistemologically) genetically subsequent to and dependent upon the unique nature and exercise of the human mind.

14. Physical property (ownership) does not arise or occur from mere possession of “X.”

15. Human intellect and creativity are integral components necessary to transform “X” from its raw state into property.

16. Intellectual (non-physical) property arises from human intellect and creativity and are necessary to transform idea “X” from its raw state into property.

17. No one has a right to another person’s physical property without his permission. Coercive appropriation of such property creates a situation of involuntary servitude/slavery. Property “X” would not exist without human intellectual and creative input.

18. No one has a right to another person’s intellectual property without his permission. Coercive appropriation of such property creates a situation of involuntary servitude/slavery. Property “X” would not exist without human intellectual and creative input.

19. Fraud (misrepresenting ownership of physical or intellectual property) is (metaphysically and epistemologically) genetically subsequent to and dependent upon the real-world possibility of legitimate ownership of physical and/or intellectual property.

20. Fraud is a moral concept and can only occur in type of action “A” in which control and responsibility is possible.

21. Control and responsibility (morality) are possible only when intellectual input and property exist.

22. One cannot be responsible for that which is not under one’s control.

23. Legitimate control can occur only when dealing with one’s own property.

24. Fraud involving intellectual property (a particularized expression of idea/information “X”) can exist if and only if one can be held responsible for a particularized expression of an idea.

25. A person is responsible only for that over which one has control.

26. One can only have legitimate control over that which is one’s property.

27. Fraud involving a particularized expression of idea/information “X” that is a deliberate misrepresentation of reality cannot exist in the absence of intellectual property since the concept (intellectual) “fraud” is (metaphysically and epistemologically) genetically subsequent to and dependent upon the concept “intellectual property.” Even fraud involving physical property cannot exist without an intellectual component since such physical property “X” only becomes property upon the application of human intellect and creativity to raw materials.

28. One can engage in legitimate (economic or non-economic) exchange of “X” only when one has ownership of “X”; when “X” is one’s property (whether transformed physically and/or intellectually) over which one has control and responsibility.

29. Plagiarism is a subtype of (intellectual) fraud. Plagiarism cannot exist in the absence of personal responsibility/control/property.

30. “Scarcity” is a characteristic of (physical and/or intellectual) property but is not an essential defining trait.

31. An essential, defining trait of (physical and/or intellectual) property is the existence and involvement of human intellect and creativity; without the latter, the former would not exist.

32. Denying the truth and validity of intellectual property denies the essential and inescapable involvement of the human intellect in both physical and intellectual property.

33. Denying the legitimacy of intellectual property invalidates the concept and legitimacy of physical property.

33. Denying the fundamental role of human intellect in property denies the essential nature and requirements of human intellect in life.

34. Without the recognition and legitimacy of property, the exercise of morality becomes impossible in a social context.

35. Without the recognition and legitimacy of property, the exercise of rights becomes impossible.

36. Without the recognition and legitimacy of rights, freedom becomes impossible.

37. Divorcing human intellect from property removes the essential role of the individual and his life.

38. Without human intellect as the foundation for morality, rights, and freedom –– as central to social interactions as delineated by property –– only physical force and coercion remain as means of social interaction.

39. The supremacy of force and coercion in social life is the essence of statism.

40. Denying the intellect and life of the individual is the essence of collectivism.

41. Statism and collectivism are incompatible with morality, rights, property, freedom, and the individual.

42. Denying the existence and legitimacy of intellectual property undermines the foundation of morality, rights, property, freedom, and the individual; such denial supports and is integral to statism and collectivism.

Q.E.D.

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For an earlier treatment of this topic, see my “All Property Is Intellectual.”

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ADDENDUM

The anti-intellectual property people are guilty of “definition by nonessentials.” A proper definition focuses on those traits that explains the most about “X” and how “X” operates. Without human intellect, there is no such thing as property of any kind, physical or intellectual. Anti-intellectual property people equate property with mere physicality, thus evading what is most fundamental about property and necessary for its very existence: the human intellect.

The anti-intellectual property people are also aligned with economic materialism: the notion that the external, the physical determines human intellect; that those external factors are what is most important about people: that “it is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but, on the contrary, their social existence that determines their consciousness.” (Karl Marx, in the Preface to a Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy.) This is a reversal of cause-and-effect.

The anti-intellectual property people also implicitly endorse the mind/body dichotomy by illogical maintaining that the mind (intellect) is irrelevant to property rights; that mind is, in essence, divorced from the body (the physical) (the material) rather than being integral to human existence and property.

The anti-intellectual property people also deny cause-and-effect when they divorce the creation from the creator, i.e., separate property from the intellect of an individual that is required for any and all creation. They focus only on the result (the effect) (the intellectual property) as though such a result magically comes into being and would exist without the cause (human intellect). This view is consonant with how statists view creators and producers: they are magical beings who will continue to function and provide goods regardless of what chains are placed upon them and regardless of how their rights are violated.