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Authored by: macliam on Saturday, March 16 2013 @ 06:24 AM EDT |
Sometimes essential truths and interrelated ideas can be approached from a
variety of directions (e.g., the Church-Turing thesis approached through lambda
calculus, Turing machines, recursion theory etc.).
What is a
process? A process evolves in time. Indeed the word derives from the
Latin verb procedere, which, according to one dictionary, means "to
go forward, advance; to go out, come forth". The term is broad enough to
encompass both "thought processes" and "geological
processes". Giles Rich and Pasquale Federico may have supposed that they
were clarifying the meaning of the statute by replacing the word "art"
by the word "process" in Section 101 of the 1952 Patent Act, but when
one seeks to apply the statute with regard to matters concerning patent-eligible
subject matter, the change surely only sows confusion. The definition of a
"process" as being a "process, art or method" in Section 100
of the statute does not serve to clear up such confusion.
With regard to
the nature of processes in general, I suggest that one cannot clarify the notion
more than to suggest that a process involves some configuration of
entities evolving in time. But what is the nature of those
entities?
In so far as I understand the semiotic approach,
it involves categorizing the entities that evolve as the process
develops. The bits in the computer directly represent the sign-vehicles.
The process at the logical level involves the evolution of the
sign-vehicles in time. The process at the semantic level involves the
evolution of the identificants, which may entail evolution of the
referents. (I have not before now given serious consideration to
semiotics.) Thus, in the context of a computer-implemented process, one has
entities in conceptually distinct categories evolving in time in tandem with
each other. I suggest that the notion of the sign in your semiotic
approach captures the logical connections between the sign-vehicles,
interpretants and referents that relate the evolution of the entities at the
various levels. But I also suggest that this notion may not capture the logical
connection between the physical and logical processes. Years ago, when thinking
about patents in connection with the assertion by Unisys of patent rights
with respect to GIF images and the LZW compression algorithm, I tended to focus
on the fact that the logical process involved in following the steps of an
algorithm may not correlate closely with the physical movement of electrons on a
multi-user computer system switching between multiple processes.
I
suggest that my distinctions between the evolution of the computer-implemented
process at the physical, logical and semantic levels
matches to some degree the semiotic approach, as the level corresponds to
category of the evolving sign elements. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: macliam on Saturday, March 16 2013 @ 07:37 AM EDT |
Patent litigation is concerned almost entirely with patent claims. This has
been the case for decades, possible for a century-and-a-half at least. There
are millions of patents out there whose scope is legally determined by the
patent claims. I suggest that the Groklaw community cannot expect the PTO or
the courts to restore the basic principles of patent law to what they were in
the early nineteenth century because of concerns about software
patents.
And I suggest that Groklaw members in general don't seem to
have an understanding of the relationships between the patent specification and
the patent claims. I do not intend this remark pejoratively. I suspect that
few people who are not patent lawyers, judges or professors with interests in
patent law have any real understanding of how the system works. Presumably, in
businesses, the inventors discuss what they have come up with with the patent
lawyers, and the patent lawyers then draft patent applications that, to the
uninitiated, appear to be incomprehensible legalese if not pure gibberish. But
the patent lawyers, if they are doing their job, are putting forward the
application in the required format if there are to succeed in prosecuting the
patent application and in defending the issued patent.
I would suggest
that, if the Groklaw community expects to influence the Patent and Trademarks
Office and the courts, those who concern themselves seriously with issues
surrounding software principles need to achieve an understanding of how the
patent system actually works, how the PTO processes patent applications, and how
the appelate courts that interpret the law approach patent law. I suggest that
it is not sufficient to form some impression as to how the patent system ought
to work, and then seek to influence the courts and the intellectual property
community without a realistic understanding of how the system works and how
verdicts of patent invalidity and patent infringement are arrived
at.
For myself, I am only at the early stages of such a process of
learning. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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