Early during the Industrial Revolution, Thomas Malthus and others postulated "The Law of Diminishing Returns" which states: "When increasing amounts of one factor of production are employed in production along with a fixed amount of some other production factor, after some point, the resulting increases in output of product become smaller and smaller."

The theory has been critiqued as a simplistic approach that works only in the "short run." But when there exists two big factors, one fixed and one variable, the connection does seem strong. For example, when washing one's hair, the fixed factor is its "dirtiness" and the variable factor is shampoo. Washing once might clean, let's say, 75% of the dirt. Rinsing and repeating may further clean 75% of the remaining 25% of the dirt, or a rough total of 94%, (probably worth the effort.) Rinsing and repeating again only raises the "cleanliness" 4.5%, (probably not worth the effort.)

I'm using the concept of diminishing returns in a compression algorithm to move as close as possible to the theoretical limits as set forth by Claude E. Shannon.

Favorites: Patently Absurd * Sir Arthur C. Clarke * W. Daniel Hillis * Claude E. Shannon -2 * The New York Times * The Buckminster Fuller Institute * Chautauqua * LuLu Press * Dan Bricklin * William Dunk

As an individual inventor and the holder of one patent, my experiences with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office may or may not be typical.

But this view in the June 24th issue of Forbes ASAP, by attorney Gary L. Reback, seems to me to be close to the mark. In the article Patently Absurd he opines, "Too many patents are just as bad for society as too few. There are those who view the patent system as the seedbed of capitalism--the place where ideas and new technologies are nurtured. This is a romantic myth. In reality, patents are enormously powerful competitive weapons that are proliferating dangerously, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has all the trappings of a revenue-driven, institutionalized arms merchant."

My six year dance with the USPTO, in retrospect, touched on nearly every point made by Mr. Reback. Over that period, neither of the two examiners assigned to me nor their direct supervisor seemed to have enough knowledge of the invention field, no doubt the result of trying to achieve patent overproduction.

Only upon taking my application up to the more knowledgeable three judge Board of Appeals was my patent finally granted. What if "big player" patents filed long after my filing date, but granted before mine was awarded, eventually are found to infringe? Certainly the resources necessary to play the litigation game could be utilized more efficiently if applied to continuing development.

Favorites: Sir Arthur C. Clarke * W. Daniel Hillis * Claude E. Shannon -2 * The New York Times * The Buckminster Fuller Institute * Chautauqua * LuLu Press * Dan Bricklin * William Dunk

Best known for his "2001: A Space Odyssey," Sir Arthur C. Clarke conceptualized telecommunications via geosynchronous satellites. He also formulated one of the creative world's favorite quotes: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." -- Clarke's Third Law.

As magicians know, humans have a focus threshold that can be demarcated and "played with." That doesn't mean that the physical "nuts and bolts" underlying the magic are any less real. It's that the physics resides just outside our experience, leaving us to wonder "how did they do that?"

It could be that magicians (in all fields) simply utilize Will Rogers' famous observation: "It isn't what people don't know that gives us trouble. It's that they know so many things that just ain't so."

Favorites: W. Daniel Hillis * Claude E. Shannon -2 * The New York Times * The Buckminster Fuller Institute * Chautauqua * LuLu Press * Dan Bricklin * William Dunk