Philosophy
So TheWife and I were in our favorite Persian restaurant yesterday, having a little late celebration of her birthday (if you're in the Baltimore area and have never tried the Orchard Market Cafe, you're in for a treat). We were enjoying our usual appetizers -- her an eggplant and artichoke dish and me haleem bedemajune, an eggplant and lentil dip -- when she looks up and asks, "So, if somehow, illicitly, I was able to photocopy the recipe, would there be anything wrong with that? I would not open a competing restaurant or make money off of it, but I could make it for myself at home." I asked whether it would mean she would come to the restaurant any less frequently? She said no, the salmon would bring her back, so they would suffer no loss of business. the idea then is that they would endure absolutely no harm as a result of her acquiring the recipe without permission, but was there still something wrong with taking it?
We shared the intuition that there would be something wrong here. I find the concept of intellectual property a bit problematic -- trying to patch a 17th century concept onto 20th century issues in a way that doesn't dovetail quite right in many cases -- but it seems appropriate here. A recipe, assuming it is novel, is a creative work and that seems to endow the creator with certain rights to it. Acquiring it on the sly would seem like stealing here and thereby wrong.
But then suppose by enjoying the dish, you were able to figure out what is in it -- clearly eggplant, artichoke heart, olive and a mustard-based cream sauce, but what else? If you tasted carefully and figured out what seasonings to add and tried a couple times until you got the proportions just right, would that be different? You've ended up with the respire that isn't yours, so it's the same end result, but it does seem a bit different. Why?
Is it because by tasting and recreating, I am adding my own labor? Is it now my creative act? But why would that little bit of effort entitle me to the creative work of someone else? Is it because the tasting is public -- the dish is offered for anyone who will purchase a serving and that act of giving me the dish makes it no longer private property? But I wouldn't have the right to ask for the recipe just because I ordered it. I may have the right to ask whether there is, say, peanut or wheat in it because of allergies, but that is not asking to be able to make it myself. Or is the intuition wrong and it remains wrong to try to "reverse engineer" a dish you've eaten somewhere and loved?
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Philosophy
Recipes as Intellectual Property
So TheWife and I were in our favorite Persian restaurant yesterday, having a little late celebration of her birthday (if you're in the Baltimore area and have never tried the Orchard Market Cafe, you're in for a treat). We were enjoying our usual appetizers -- her an eggplant and artichoke dish and me haleem bedemajune, an eggplant and lentil dip -- when she looks up and asks, "So, if somehow, illicitly, I was able to photocopy the recipe, would there be anything wrong with that? I would not open a competing restaurant or make money off of it, but I could make it for myself at home." I asked whether it would mean she would come to the restaurant any less frequently? She said no, the salmon would bring her back, so they would suffer no loss of business. the idea then is that they would endure absolutely no harm as a result of her acquiring the recipe without permission, but was there still something wrong with taking it?
We shared the intuition that there would be something wrong here. I find the concept of intellectual property a bit problematic -- trying to patch a 17th century concept onto 20th century issues in a way that doesn't dovetail quite right in many cases -- but it seems appropriate here. A recipe, assuming it is novel, is a creative work and that seems to endow the creator with certain rights to it. Acquiring it on the sly would seem like stealing here and thereby wrong.
But then suppose by enjoying the dish, you were able to figure out what is in it -- clearly eggplant, artichoke heart, olive and a mustard-based cream sauce, but what else? If you tasted carefully and figured out what seasonings to add and tried a couple times until you got the proportions just right, would that be different? You've ended up with the respire that isn't yours, so it's the same end result, but it does seem a bit different. Why?
Is it because by tasting and recreating, I am adding my own labor? Is it now my creative act? But why would that little bit of effort entitle me to the creative work of someone else? Is it because the tasting is public -- the dish is offered for anyone who will purchase a serving and that act of giving me the dish makes it no longer private property? But I wouldn't have the right to ask for the recipe just because I ordered it. I may have the right to ask whether there is, say, peanut or wheat in it because of allergies, but that is not asking to be able to make it myself. Or is the intuition wrong and it remains wrong to try to "reverse engineer" a dish you've eaten somewhere and loved?
- Are Recipes Intellectual Property?
The Food Network has dropped dessert chef Anne Thornton when it was discovered that recipes in her cookbook were, but for small alterations, the same as those in cookbooks by others. The word "plagiarism" is being used for the case. It is,...
- Intellectual Property And Empathy
Vince asks, "I'm reading Richard Posner's "The Economic Structure of Intellectual Property Law" right now and I am interested in the tension I see between the economic approach and the moral Approach to intellectual property. Economically, Posner...
- Intuition And Truth
Had lunch with Jeff Maynes yesterday and we got to talking about his research in experimental philosophy. In philosophy, topics we deal with are often not open to empirical investigation. Therefore, we often use intuitions as data. This is frequently...
- Piracy And The Writers' Strike
R. Porter asks, Steve, this is really late, but I was wondering if you could address the interesting ethical questions raised by this suggestion regarding piracy during the WGA strike.Where this suggestion refers to Kay makes this point about piracy in...
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St. Patrick's day... today is a great day to bust out the Guinness, the Jameson and the Baileys, and make a delicious car bomb. Man, I loves me that drink :) Today is also a great day to celebrate our Irish friends' heritage and have some shepherd's...