Longterm Fellow der Research Group "Ethics of Copying" am Zentrum für interdisziplinäre Forschung (ZiF) Bielefeld
Third party funded individual grant
Start date : 01.10.2015
End date : 31.07.2016
Website: https://www.uni-bielefeld.de/(en)/ZIF/FG/2015Copying/
Project details
Scientific Abstract
Copying has always been a widespread human practice. It is crucial in
many ways for the cultural development of any society as well as for
economic success, and it supports democratization processes by providing
access to important cultural goods and information.
But it is often controversial, in which cases and to what degree it
might or might not be legitimate to copy an artefact or certain aspects
of somebody's physical appearance, or imitate patterns of someone's
behaviour, and who should be entitled to raise normative claims that
restrict other people's copying activities. Beliefs about the legitimacy
and moral permissibility of various types of copying processes,
individual acts of copying and ways of handling copies differ profoundly
across different cultures, and they are subject to historical changes -
due to technological developments as well as religious, political and
economic factors.
In modern societies, the most important medium for normatively
restricting copying processes is the law - not only copyright law, but
also patent and trademark law and laws regulating unfair competition,
among others. However, there seems to be a growing discrepancy between
the existing legal situation and common morality. Major parts of the
existing intellectual property law are not regarded as normatively
appropriate by a growing number of people. This discrepancy tends to
become even greater given the current shift from owning and copying
physical things to merely having access to electronic data.
So far, there is no ethics of copying that could present a just balance
of interests for those affected by copying practices. The overarching
aim of this research group, a collaboration between legal scholars,
philosophers and scholars from art history, art sciences, book studies,
comparative literature, German literature, media studies, popular music
and sociology, is to develop proposals concerning such a balance which
might influence future legislation and facilitate the formation of
inter-subjective moral standards for distinguishing between legitimate
and illegitimate forms of copying.
In order to develop the foundations of an ethics of copying, the group
will work on questions like: What kinds of copies should be allowed to
be produced by whom and for which purposes? Which forms of copying
activities should be restricted from a moral point of view? And how can
different interests with regard to property rights and copying
permissions be weighed against each other?
