Ideas are not property

This concept, so elusively obvious, formed out of a lengthy and heated discussion I had with a friend of mine about intellectual property. To me the notion that ideas can be treated as property, i.e. the sole possession of the one whose brain it originated from simply doesn't work.

Property within nature is something tangible, for example, Items such as shoes can only be in use by a single person at any one time. If someone was to take my shoes I could not use them, and therefore I would be shoeless. Ideas on the other hand are not like shoes. If someone was to take my idea they can use it, but it does not prevent me from also using the idea. Neither of us possess the idea solely, yet we each posses the whole thing. Therefore, I rather like the metaphor of ideas being like fire, when my idea inspires another person the fire spreads it does not make mine diminish. In fact the idea burns more brightly (god that's beautiful I'm going to have to use that line more often).

Another problem I have with intellectual property is the myth that it fosters innovation. I'm sorry but you don't encourage creativity by preventing people using 'ideas'. I mean it would be a bit counter intuitive. I think people have the stereotypical vision in their mind of the inventor/scientist bloke who creates something wonderful in complete isolation. This is ridiculous as ideas are not formed in a vacuum. For precisely this reason it is quite possible for two individuals drawing on the same pool of knowledge but working independently to invent the same thing. An example of this would be Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace both proposing similar theories of natural selection.

People who are in favour of intellectual property often use the ethical argument, saying that using some one's idea is 'theft' or 'piracy'. For reasons I mentioned earlier ideas cannot be stolen as the originator of the idea is still free to use the idea. So, I think the ethical argument is pretty much crap. I would go as far as saying that monopolisation of ideas is morally wrong. Take for example medicines that could possibly cure fatal diseases, would it be right for the government to grant a monopoly to a company who created the drug so that no other competitor could come in and compete with them. After all, without competition the drug company could charge as much as they wanted for the drug, and the very people who needed it would suffer.

I thought I would end with a list of things that would suffer if Intellectual property were enforced across the board. Keep in mind these were some one's ideas once too:

The car
The television
Penicillin
Toaster
PC
The printing press
The wheel
The Internet
Beer

I could go on people!