对别人的感觉

文:张文光

今天在预备讲章时,看到一个旧的PowerPoint,里面记录了耶鲁大学前任校长布鲁斯特(Kingman Brewster)的墓志铭的一句话:

“认为所有的人都纯正无邪,不只是法学上的概念,它是一种精神上慷慨大度,假设所有的陌生人都是最好的,而不是最坏的。”

原来这段话是从南方朔2010年的书《有光的所在》抄出来到的,连页数也记录下来。但记忆模糊了,不知道南方朔是在什么情况下写了这段文字。印象中这本书是在放在办公室的书架上,果然轻易找到。欣喜得很(每次轻易找到要看的书都有这种感觉)。翻到有关的页数,原来文章叫做《散步在墓园》。南方朔说他喜欢逛墓园,每次到外地,都会叫朋友带他去墓园。

南方朔照片

顺手翻翻,看到序言《也是励志》。南方朔说,他写着这些文章,绝没有丝毫“励志”的打算。但回头看这些文章,的确有许多正面健康的思想。他认为可能是受母亲的影响。母亲没有什么受教育,但是教他必须一生善良,不怨恨,不自弃。但是母亲的耳提命面,他听进去的少,遗忘的多。因此他认为让他变得那么“励志”的,是在于后来的摸索。尤其近十余年来,他接触西方神学及伦理学,“经由这些方面的思想,终于能体会到人类由野蛮到文明的不易”。

然而,让我觉得有趣的是,南方朔说:推动人类进步文明的,其实不是什么“公平”,“正义” 之类的抽象慨念,而是比这些慨念还要基本的感情因素。他把它称为“对别人的感觉”。 第一是体会别人对自己的感觉,他说,当人们能体会到别人对自己的感觉,他就会产生愈来愈高的羞耻感。二是面对别人,能越来越体会别人遭遇到某些事情的感觉,这样他就会越来越提高“不安”的门坎。以前对别人做了某事会无动无衷,但随着“不安” 的门坎提高,这种事情就会逐渐不再敢做。愈来愈高的不安标准,会诞生诸如不忍,勇敢,公平,正义等外向的品质。

因此对“别人的感觉”才是文明的根本。他说如果一个社会,每个人心中只有自己,面对别人别事失去了感觉的能力和意愿,纵然大家都有高的教育,知识水平,最后只是落得互相聪明的折磨,聪明的谩骂。看看台湾政坛的吵闹,再看看去年本国14届大选期间,社交媒体中一些种族,党性言论,谩骂,我可以理解南方朔的感受。

南方朔所提倡“对别人的感觉” ,使我想起孟子所说的恻隐之心是善端。也想到耶稣曾说的:最大的诫命就是爱神,而第二大诫命是爱人如己;他也说,“人为朋友舍命,人的爱心没有比这个大的“。又说:“你们想要人怎样待你们,你们也要怎样待人,因为这就是律法和先知一切的道理”。

往往我们对跟与我们不同的人怀有成见,甚至怒气填胸。我们喜欢带着有色眼镜看世界,看人。

文章开始,耶鲁大学前任校长布鲁斯特刻在墓志铭的那番话,对政党,对各个种族相互散播敌视,怀疑的马来西亚当前社会情况,是相当贴确的。

注:本文首次发表于《e南洋》之《牧羊人》版,2019年3月10日刊

 

Rembrandts in the Attic – the Forgotten Value of Patent

 

By Teo Bong Kwang*

0n 26 September 2010, Jimi Heselden, a British businessman who recently bought the Segway company was happily riding the famed “Segway” scooter in his huge Yorkshire estate. In a tragic turn, the Segway scooter ran over the cliff and into a river and Heselden was immediately killed. At that time, Segway scooter was a much touted invention of US inventor Dean Kamen.

A Segway Scooter with driver

Surely not every invention has tragic consequence. On the contrary, many inventions brought much happiness, fame and fortune to their inventors or owners. Take the example of the “One Click” patent of Amazon which was granted by the US Patent Office in 1999. It has reportedly generated billions for Amazon.

The Hidden Value of Patent

Many of us are totally oblivious to the immense commercial value of an invention or for that matter, the importance of an intellectual capital in the form of a patent in any business enterprise.  The vast majority of companies are simply unaware of the often-enormous economic and competitive values that lie untapped within their patent portfolios.  To borrow the euphemism popularized by Kevin Rivette and David Kline, it is like you have Rembrandt paintings lying dustily in the attic.

Balancing Market Monopoly and Public Interest  

The modern history of protecting one’s invention started in Venice in 1474. In the UK, the first piece of legislation which attempted to protect invention was The Statute of Monopolies, 1623. In its own archaic language, it allowed “patent monopolies” for 14 years upon “any manner of new manufacture”. Stripped of legal niceties, it merely meant that the State would grant a monopolistic right in the form of “letters patent” to the inventors.  As a trade-off, the inventors must disclose their inventions in a clear manner so that it can be used by a ‘person ordinarily skilled in the art’. The philosophy of protecting patent is pretty simple:  the State will grant a limited protection for any invention for a period of between 15 to 20 years in exchange of the full technical information related to it. Once the protection period has expired, the inventions are free to be exploited by anyone.  It is believed that with the required statutory protection given by the Government, inventors would be encouraged to engage in more inventive activities and come out with more novel inventions.  This will ultimately benefit the society at large as the innovative ideas as disclosed in the patents will add to the pool of existing technological knowledge in a particular field.  In this manner, society will progress in innovation and it will enjoy the fruits of the inventive members within it.

 

Photo by Lam Been Koon

Flash of Genius can be Present in Mundane Objects 

The image Thomas Edison or Albert Einstein or a mad scientist with fuzzy hair will immediately come to mind when we talk about invention.  This is of course a myth.  The reality is that not every invention needs to be Einstein-que or earth-shattering like the atomic bomb. On the contrary, a cursory search at Google Patent will show that many mundane objects have been or are still protected by patents. For instance, a gadget to boil eggs, the yellow “post-it” note and the ubiquitous paper clip are subject matters of granted patents. Indeed flash of genius can be present in many mundane objects.

Patent drawings for safety pins

The Requirements for Patenting a New Invention

In 1983, Malaysia has its own national patent legislation.  It is called the Patents Act, 1983.  It came into force on 1 October 1986. Before the passage of this legislation, we could only obtain patent protection by first registering a patent in the United Kingdom and then re-register it in the three component regions of Malaysia. With the passage of the 1983 Act, we could obtain a national patent by filing an application with our local patent office.

The most frequently asked question which an intellectual property law practitioner like me has encountered is: how do I get a patent?

The answer is to first get your invention written down clearly in a document which is commonly called “patent specification”.  However, before this is done, it is imperative that the invention must possess the following requirements:

  • the invention must be “new” in the sense that it has not been disclosed to the public anywhere in the world. The disclosure can be in the form of written publication, actual usage, actual article or even oral presentation or even sample shown in an exhibition;
  • the invention must involve “an inventive step”. The question whether an invention involves an “inventive step” can be asked in another manner: whether the so-called “inventive step” (i.e. the “inventive feature or element”) of the invention is obvious to a person who has ordinary skill or experience in the subject matter; and
  • the invention must be “industrially applicable”. This last requirement is normally easily satisfied as long as the invention can be commercially or industrially exploited. The rationale of this requirement clear, that is it is to prevent granting of patent for some theoretical invention which cannot be put into practical use.

In order for a patent to be valid, all the above three requirements must be present.  Anyone who has some experiences in patent litigation will inform you that most patent litigation are fought on the above three issues.  If a patent is proved to have been lacking in any of the above requirements, it can be cancelled or invalidated. Thus as a prudent measure, before an eager inventor spend enormous money in getting its patent specification drafted, it is advisable to ask the patent drafter to conduct the necessary “searches” to ensure that there are no other prior publications or disclosure which will nullify the invention.

Once the patent specification is properly drafted, the other steps of getting a patent granted are relatively straight-forward. The first step is to fill up the prescribed forms and then file them with the patent office.  You should of course consult a patent lawyer or agent for this important step.

The obtaining of a patent for any innovative breakthrough is an indispensable step to secure a cutting edge for achieving continuous growth of a business in this competitive environment.

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* This article first appeared in “Focus” Magazine in 2018.