Sometimes, my dear friend, things are referred to with terms that can be misleading if interpreted literally. You seem to have fallen victim to one of them.
The silverfish is not a type of fish. The earwig is not a type of wig. The koala is not a type of bear, even though it’s commonly referred to as a koala bear. A hundred thousand links to pages using the phrase “koala bear” would not prove that the koala is a type of bear, just as your cites do nothing to prove that copyright is a form of property.
Note that the Wikipedia article you linked contains an entire section on criticism of the term “intellectual property”. I had no part in writing it; clearly I’m not alone.
I have never seen an example of these entitlements being “generally treated as equivalent to tangible property” or “enforced as such by the courts”. Perhaps Wikipedia is referring to the treatment of copyright in other (unspecified) countries.
Yes, you have*. You just seem to want such enforcement to consist of intellectual property thieves with mind swag bags being carted off to jail for Grand Theft Braino. You’re well aware it doesn’t; it is a milder form to correspond to the milder deleterious effects of intellectual property infringement. However, to pretend that no-one has ever been punished for infringing intellectual property is ludicrous. I draw your attention to the word “generally” in the quoted segment, and the lack of the word “exactly” in the phrase “enforced as such”. Your singleminded insistence that intellectual property rights must be protected in exactly the same way as physical property rights if they are to be referred to using the same umbrella term is laudable for its tenacity, but is unfortunately lacking in anything resembling sense. Assault is not punished as strongly as murder, yet both are still happily (or unhappily) termed “violence”.
Regarding your other argument, let me see if I have this straight: a silverfish is not a fish, therefore words don’t necessarily mean what they mean, therefore you’re going to ignore the meaning of the words in every one of my numerous cites, which go considerably further than just containing the words “intellectual” and “property” but in many cases illustrate both why the words are used and how they are used? Is Chewbacca going to feature in this line of reasoning? Are we going to abandon meaning entirely? Because if so, I think I’m going to start assuming that when you say “the”, you in fact mean “Dead Badger is completely right and incidentally has really quite good hair and suits hats uncommonly well for a man of our era.” Which is very kind of you to say so.
Here’s a hint: this entire thread is about the court system resolving an instance of copyright violation.
Now you’re begging the question. The Grokster decision was about copyright; if you want to use it an example of the court treating copyright as tangible property, you’ll have to show where they did so in this case.
I have made no such claim.
Of course people are punished for infringing copyright. That does not prove the courts treat copyrights anything like tangible property; it only proves that they enforce copyright law.
Again, that’s because every reasonable definition of “violence” undeniably includes both assault and murder. There is no controversy over the use of that term; it is, in fact, a neutral term that can be used in any debate to describe those actions without needless inflammation.
In contrast, there are widely used definitions of “theft” that do not include copyright infringement, and widely used definitions of “property” that do not include copyrights or information. They are not neutral terms; they are controversial and often inflammatory. My point is simply that neutral terms should be used when possible if we are to have a civil debate.
You started out so well, but then fell off course. Let me explain it to you once again:
A silverfish is not a fish.
Therefore, the fact that something is referred to with a certain term does not mean the literal meaning of that term should be used to categorize that thing.
Therefore, the fact that copyrights are commonly referred to as “intellectual property” does not mean copyright is, in fact, a form of property.
I have read your cites and found them lacking. While some of them describe the motivations behind the use of the term, they offer no evidence that copyright is a subset of property rights - only that some people like to think of information as property and wish it to be treated as such.
When those “some people” are the legislatures, regulatory bodies and lawyers of just about every Western nation in existence, I believe that goes really quite a long way to validating my assertion. I am not going to respond to any more posts on this point, as your level of denial is taking on Pharaonic proportions, and my willingness to cite objective reality is sinking like a tired alligator. Again, thank you for your kind remarks about my hat.