View source for Idea

{{Short description|Mental image or concept}}
{{Redirect|Ideas|other uses|Ideas (disambiguation)|and|Idea (disambiguation)}}
[[File:Plato-raphael.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[Plato]], one of the first philosophers to discuss ideas in detail. Aristotle claims that many of Plato's views were [[Pythagoreanism|Pythagorean]] in origin.]]
In [[philosophy]] and in [[Usage (language)|common usage]], an '''idea''' (from the Greek word: ἰδέα (idea), meaning 'a form, or a pattern') is the result of [[thought]].<ref name="Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy">{{cite book|editor1-last=Audi|editor1-first=Robert|title=Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy|year=1995|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge; New York|isbn=0-521-40224-7|page=[https://archive.org/details/cambridgediction00robe/page/355 355]|url=https://archive.org/details/cambridgediction00robe|url-access=registration}}</ref> Also in philosophy, ideas can also be [[mental representation]]al images of some [[object (philosophy)|object]]. Many [[philosopher|philosophers]] have considered ideas to be a fundamental [[ontological]] [[category of being]]. The capacity to [[creativity|create]]  and [[understanding|understand]] the meaning of ideas is considered to be an essential and defining feature of [[human|human beings]]. 

An idea arises in a reflexive, spontaneous manner, even without thinking or serious [[introspection|reflection]], for example, when we talk about the ''idea'' of a person or a place. A new or an original idea can often lead to [[innovation]]. Our actions are based upon beliefs, beliefs are patterns or organized sets of ideas.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Browne |first1=Kevin J. |title=The Power of Ideas |url=https://medium.com/@kyphilosopher/the-power-of-ideas-7e617172aa1c |website=www.medium.com|date=14 September 2022 |access-date=2024-12-18}}</ref>

==Etymology==
The word ''idea'' comes from [[Ancient Greek|Greek]] {{wikt-lang|grc|ἰδέα}}, {{small|[[Romanization of Ancient Greek|romanized]]:}} {{translit|grc|idea}}, {{gloss|form, pattern}}, from the root of {{lang|grc|ἰδεῖν}} {{translit|grc|idein}}, {{gloss|to see}}.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/idea |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130211204757/http://oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/idea |url-status=dead |archive-date=February 11, 2013 |title=Definition of ''idea'' in English |year=2014 |work=[[Oxford English Dictionary]] |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]}}</ref>

==History==
The argument over the underlying nature of ideas was opened by [[Plato]], whose exposition of his [[theory of forms]]—which recurs and accumulates over the course of his many dialogs—appropriates and adds a new sense to the Greek word for things that are "seen" (re. εἶδος) that highlights those elements of perception which are encountered without material or objective reference available to the eyes (re. [[wikt:ἰδέα|ἰδέα]]). As this argument was disseminated the word "idea" began to take on connotations that would be more familiarly associated with the term today. In the fifth book of his ''Republic'', Plato defines philosophy as the love of this formal (as opposed to visual) way of seeing.

Plato advanced the theory that perceived but immaterial objects of awareness constitute a realm of deathless forms or ideas from which the material world emanates. Aristotle challenged Plato in this area, positing that the [[Phenomenon|phenomenal]] world of ideas arises as mental composites of remembered observations. Though it is anachronistic to apply these terms to thinkers from antiquity, it clarifies the argument between Plato and Aristotle if we call Plato an [[Idealism|idealist]] thinker and Aristotle an [[Empiricism|empiricist]] thinker.

This antagonism between [[empiricism]] and [[idealism]] generally characterizes the dynamism of the argument over the theory of ideas up to the present. This schism in theory has never been resolved to the satisfaction of thinkers from both sides of the disagreement and is represented today in the split between [[Analytic philosophy|analytic]] and [[Continental philosophy|continental]] schools of philosophy. Persistent contradictions between [[classical physics]] and [[quantum mechanics]] may be pointed to as a rough analogy for the gap between the two schools of thought.

==Philosophy==

===Plato===
{{Main|Theory of Forms}}
[[Plato]] in [[Ancient Greece]] was one of the earliest philosophers to provide a detailed discussion of ideas and of the thinking process (in Plato's Greek the word ''idea'' carries a rather different sense of our modern English term). Plato argued in dialogues such as the ''Phaedo'', ''Symposium'', ''Republic'', and ''Timaeus'' that there is a realm of ideas or forms (''eidei''), which exist independently of anyone who may have thoughts on these ideas, and it is the ideas which distinguish mere opinion from knowledge, for unlike material things which are transient and liable to contrary properties, ideas are unchanging and nothing but just what they are. Consequently, Plato seems to assert forcefully that material things can only be the objects of opinion; real knowledge can only be had of unchanging ideas. Furthermore, ideas for Plato appear to serve as universals; consider the following passage from the ''Republic'':
{{Blockquote|
"We both assert that there are," I said, "and distinguish in speech, many fair things, many good things, and so on for each kind of thing."

"Yes, so we do."

"And we also assert that there is a fair itself, a good itself, and so on for all things that we set down as many. Now, again, we refer to them as one ''idea'' of each as though the ''idea'' were one; and we address it as that which really ''is''."

"That's so."

"And, moreover, we say that the former are seen, but not intellected, while the ''ideas'' are intellected but not seen."|Plato|Bk. VI 507b-c}}

===René Descartes===
[[Descartes]] often wrote of the meaning of the ''idea'' as an image or representation, often but not necessarily "in the mind", which was well known in the [[vernacular]]. Despite Descartes' invention of the non-Platonic use of the term, he at first followed this vernacular use.<sup>b</sup> In his ''[[Meditations on First Philosophy]]'' he says, "Some of my thoughts are like images of things, and it is to these alone that the name 'idea' properly belongs." He sometimes maintained that ideas were [[innate idea|innate]]<ref>Vol 4: 196–198</ref> and uses of the term ''idea'' diverge from the original primary scholastic use. He provides multiple non-equivalent definitions of the term, uses it to refer to as many as six distinct kinds of entities, and divides ''ideas'' inconsistently into various genetic categories.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-ideas |title=Descartes's Ideas |access-date=2007-05-15 |archive-date=2007-06-09 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070609135420/http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-ideas/ |url-status=live }}</ref> For him knowledge took the form of ideas and philosophical investigation is devoted to the consideration of these entities.

===John Locke===
[[John Locke]]'s use of idea stands in striking contrast to Plato's.<ref>Vol 4: 487–503</ref> In his Introduction to [[An Essay Concerning Human Understanding]], Locke defines ''idea'' as "that term which, I think, serves best to stand for whatsoever is the object of the understanding when a man thinks, I have used it to express whatever is meant by phantasm, notion, species, or whatever it is which the mind can be employed about in thinking; And I could not avoid frequently using it."<ref>{{cite wikisource |title=An Essay Concerning Human Understanding |wslink=An Essay Concerning Human Understanding/Introduction |section=Introduction |first=John |last=Locke |at=§ What Idea stands for. |year=1689}}</ref> He said he regarded the contribution offered in his essay as necessary to examine our own abilities and discern what objects our understandings were, or were not, fitted to deal with. In this style of ideal conception other outstanding figures followed in his footsteps — Hume and Kant in the 18th century, [[Arthur Schopenhauer]] in the 19th century, and [[Bertrand Russell]], [[Ludwig Wittgenstein]], and [[Karl Popper]] in the 20th century. Locke always believed in the ''good sense'' — not pushing things to extremes and while taking fully into account the plain facts of the matter. He prioritized common-sense ideas that struck him as "good-tempered, moderate, and down-to-earth."

As John Locke studied humans in his work "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding" he continually referenced Descartes for ideas as he asked this fundamental question: "When we are concerned with something about which we have no certain knowledge, what rules or standards should guide how confident we allow ourselves to be that our opinions are right?"<ref name="ReferenceA">Locke, John. "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding." (n.d.): An Essay Concerning Human Understanding Book, I: Innate Notions.</ref> Put in another way, he inquired into how humans might verify their ideas, and considered the distinctions between different types of ideas. Locke found that an idea "can simply mean some sort of brute experience."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Fitzpatrick |first1=John R. |title=Starting with Mill |date=2010 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=978-1-4411-0044-3 }}{{page needed|date=April 2021}}</ref> He shows that there are "No innate principles in the mind."<ref>Locke, John. "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding" (n.d.): An Essay Concerning Human Understanding Book, I: Innate Notions</ref> Thus, he concludes that "our ideas are all experienced in nature."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sheridan |first1=Patricia |title=Locke: A Guide for the Perplexed |date=2010 |publisher=A&C Black |isbn=978-0-8264-8983-8 }}{{page needed|date=April 2021}}</ref> An experience can either be a sensation or a reflection: "consider whether there are any innate ideas in the mind before any are brought in by the impression from sensation or reflection."<ref name="ReferenceA"/> Therefore, an idea was an  experience in which the human mind apprehended something.

In a Lockean view, there are really two types of ideas: complex and simple. Simple ideas  are the building blocks for more complex ideas, and "While the mind is wholly passive in the reception of simple ideas, it is very active in the building of complex ideas…"<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sheridan |first1=Patricia |title=Locke: A Guide for the Perplexed |date=2010 |publisher=A&C Black |isbn=978-0-8264-8983-8 }}{{page needed|date=April 2021}}</ref> Complex ideas, therefore, can either be ''modes'', ''substances'', or ''relations''.

''Modes'' combine simpler ideas in order to convey new information. For instance, David Banach <ref>Banach, David. "Locke on Ideas." Locke on Ideas. St. Anselm College, 2006{{page needed|date=April 2021}}</ref> gives the example of beauty as a mode. He points to combinations of color and form as qualities constitutive of this mode. ''Substances'', however, are distinct from modes. ''Substances'' convey the underlying formal unity of certain objects, such as dogs, cats, or tables. ''Relations'' represent the relationship between two or more ideas that contain analogous elements to one another without the implication of underlying formal unity. A painting or a piece of music, for example, can both be called 'art' without belonging to the same substance. They are related as forms of art (the term 'art' in this illustration would be a 'mode of relations'). In this way, Locke concluded that the formal ambiguity around ideas he initially sought to clarify had been resolved.

===David Hume===
[[David Hume|Hume]] differs from Locke by limiting ''idea'' to only one of two possible types of perception. The other one is called "impression", and is more lively: these are perceptions we have "when we hear, or see, or feel, or love, or hate, or desire, or will." ''Ideas'' are more complex and are built upon these more basic and more grounded perceptions.<ref>{{Citation |last=Hume |first=David |title=Of the Origin of Ideas |work=An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding |date=2008 |url=https://oxfordworldsclassics.com/display/10.1093/owc/9780199549900.001.0001/isbn-9780199549900-book-part-4 |access-date=2024-01-28 |publisher=Oxford University Press |language=en-US |doi=10.1093/owc/9780199549900.003.0004 |isbn=978-0-19-192173-5|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref name=EB1911>{{EB1911 |wstitle=Idea |volume=14 |pages=280–281 |inline=1}}</ref><ref>Vol 4: 74–90</ref> Hume shared with Locke the basic empiricist premise that it is only from life experiences (whether their own or others') that humans' knowledge of the existence of anything outside of themselves can be ultimately derived, that they shall carry on doing what they are prompted to do by their emotional drives of varying kinds. In choosing the means to those ends, they shall follow their accustomed associations of ideas.<sup>d</sup> Hume has contended and defended the notion that "reason alone is merely the 'slave of the passions'."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume-moral/#inmo |title=Hume's Moral Philosophy (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) |publisher=Plato.stanford.edu |access-date=2013-06-15 |archive-date=2021-01-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126100244/http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume-moral/#inmo |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>Hume, David: A Treatise of Human Nature: Being an Attempt to introduce the experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects. (1739–40)</ref>

===Immanuel Kant===
[[File:Printing4 Walk of Ideas Berlin.JPG|left|thumb|135px|"Modern Book Printing" from the [[Walk of Ideas]]]]
[[Immanuel Kant]] defines ''ideas'' by distinguishing them from ''[[Concept#A priori concepts|concepts]]''. ''Concepts'' arise by the compositing of experience into abstract categorial representations of presumed or encountered empirical objects whereas the origin of ''ideas,'' for Kant, is a priori to experience. ''Regulative ideas'', for example, are ideals that one must tend towards, but by definition may not be completely realized as objects of empirical experience. [[Liberty]], according to Kant, is an ''idea'' whereas "tree" (as an abstraction covering all species of trees) is a ''concept''. The [[wikt:autonomy|autonomy]] of the rational and [[Universality (philosophy)|universal]] [[subject (philosophy)|subject]] is opposed to the [[determinism]] of the [[empirical]] subject.<ref>Vol 4: 305–324</ref> Kant felt that it is precisely in knowing its limits that philosophy exists. The business of philosophy he thought was not to give rules, but to analyze the private judgement of good common sense.<sup>e</sup>

===Rudolf Steiner===
Whereas Kant declares limits to knowledge ("we can never know the thing in itself"), in his [[epistemological]] work, [[Rudolf Steiner]] sees ''ideas'' as "objects of experience" which the mind apprehends, much as the eye apprehends light. In ''[[Goethean Science]]'' (1883), he declares, "Thinking ... is no more and no less an organ of perception than the eye or ear. Just as the eye of perception perceives colors and the ear sounds, so thinking perceives ideas." He holds this to be the premise upon which [[Goethe]] made his natural-scientific observations.

===Wilhelm Wundt===
[[Wundt]] widens the term from Kant's usage to include ''conscious representation of some object or process of the external world''. In so doing, he includes not only ideas of [[memory]] and [[imagination]], but also [[perceptual]] processes, whereas other [[psychologist]]s confine the term to the first two groups.<ref name=EB1911/> One of Wundt's main concerns was to investigate conscious processes in their own context by [[experiment]] and [[introspection]]. He regarded both of these as ''exact methods'', interrelated in that experimentation created optimal conditions for introspection. Where the experimental method failed, he turned to other ''objectively valuable aids'', specifically to ''those products of cultural communal life which lead one to infer particular mental motives. Outstanding among these are speech, myth, and social custom.'' Wundt designed the basic mental activity [[apperception]] — a unifying function which should be understood as an activity of the will. Many aspects of his empirical physiological psychology are used today. One is his principles of mutually enhanced contrasts and of [[assimilation (philosophy)|assimilation]] and dissimilation (i.e. in color and form perception and his advocacy of ''objective'' methods of expression and of recording results, especially in language. Another is the principle of heterogony of ends — that multiply motivated acts lead to unintended side effects which in turn become motives for new actions.<ref>Vol 8: 349–351</ref>

===Charles Sanders Peirce===
[[Charles Sanders Peirce|C. S. Peirce]] published the first full statement of [[pragmatism]] in his important works "[[s:How to Make Our Ideas Clear|How to Make Our Ideas Clear]]" (1878) and "[[s:The Fixation of Belief|The Fixation of Belief]]" (1877).<ref>[[Charles Sanders Peirce#Pragmatism|Peirce's pragmatism]]</ref> In "How to Make Our Ideas Clear" he proposed that a ''clear idea'' (in his study he uses [[concept]] and ''idea'' as synonymic) is defined as one, when it is apprehended such as it will be recognized wherever it is met, and no other will be mistaken for it. If it fails of this clearness, it is said to be obscure. He argued that to understand an idea clearly we should ask ourselves what difference its application would make to our evaluation of a proposed solution to the problem at hand. [[Pragmatism]] (a term he appropriated for use in this context), he defended, was a method for ascertaining the meaning of terms (as a theory of meaning). The originality of his ideas is in their rejection of what was accepted as a view and understanding of knowledge as impersonal facts which had been accepted by scientists for some 250 years. Peirce contended that we acquire knowledge as ''participants'', not as ''spectators''. He felt "the real", sooner or later, is composed of information that has been acquired through ideas and knowledge and ordered by the application of logical reasoning.  The rational distinction of the empirical object is not prior to its perception by a knowledgeable subject, in other words. He also published many papers on logic in relation to ''ideas''.

===G. F. Stout and J. M. Baldwin===
[[George Stout|G. F. Stout]] and [[James Mark Baldwin|J. M. Baldwin]], in the ''Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology'', define the ''idea'' as "the reproduction with a more or less adequate [[image]], of an object not actually present to the senses."  <ref>{{Cite web |url=http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Baldwin/Dictionary |title=Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology |access-date=2007-05-15 |archive-date=2007-04-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070413000149/http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Baldwin/Dictionary/ |url-status=live }}</ref> They point out that an idea and a perception are by various authorities contrasted in various ways. "Difference in degree of intensity", "comparative absence of bodily movement on the part of the subject", "comparative dependence on mental activity", are suggested by psychologists as characteristic of an idea as compared with a [[perception]].<ref name=EB1911/>

An idea, in the narrower and generally accepted sense of a mental reproduction, is frequently composite. That is, as in the example given above of the idea of a chair, a great many objects, differing materially in detail, all call a single idea. When a man, for example, has obtained an idea of chairs in general by comparison with which he can say "This is a chair, that is a stool", he has what is known as an "abstract idea" distinct from the reproduction in his mind of any particular chair (see [[abstraction]]). Furthermore, a complex idea may not have any corresponding physical object, though its particular constituent elements may severally be the reproductions of actual perceptions. Thus the idea of a [[centaur]] is a complex mental picture composed of the ideas of [[man]] and [[horse]], that of a [[mermaid]] of a [[woman]] and a [[fish]].<ref name=EB1911/>

=== Walter Benjamin ===
"Ideas are to objects [of perception] as constellations are to stars,"<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Benjamin |first=Walter |title=The origin of German tragic drama |date=2003 |publisher=Verso |isbn=1-85984-413-8 |location=London |pages=34, 36, 23 |oclc=51839777}}</ref> writes [[Walter Benjamin]] in the introduction to his ''[[The Origin of German Tragic Drama]]''. "The set of concepts which assist in the representation of an idea lend it actuality as such a configuration. For phenomena are not incorporated into ideas. They are not contained in them. Ideas are, rather, their objective virtual arrangement, their objective interpretation."

Benjamin advances, "That an idea is that moment in the substance and being of a word in which this word has become, and performs, as a symbol." as George Steiner summarizes.<ref name=":0" /> In this way ''techne--''art and technology—may be represented, ideally, as "discrete, fully autonomous objects...[thus entering] into fusion without losing their identity."<ref name=":0" />

==In anthropology and the social sciences==
[[Diffusion (anthropology)|Diffusion]] studies explore the spread of ideas from culture to culture. Some anthropological theories hold that all cultures imitate ideas from one or a few original cultures, the Adam of the Bible, or several cultural circles that overlap. Evolutionary diffusion theory holds that cultures are influenced by one another but that similar ideas can be developed in isolation.

In the mid-20th century, social scientists began to study how and why ideas spread from one person or culture to another.  [[Everett Rogers]] pioneered [[diffusion of innovations]] studies, using research to prove factors in adoption and profiles of adopters of ideas. In 1976, in his book ''[[The Selfish Gene]]'', [[Richard Dawkins]] suggested applying biological [[evolution]]ary theories to the spread of ideas. He coined the term ''[[meme]]'' to describe an abstract unit of [[Selection (biology)|selection]], equivalent to the [[gene]] in [[evolutionary biology]].

==Ideas and intellectual property ==
{{Main|Intellectual property|Idea-expression divide}}

===Relationship between ideas and patents===

====On susceptibility to exclusive property====
{{Blockquote|It has been pretended by some, (and in England especially,) that inventors have a natural and exclusive right to their inventions, and not merely for their own lives, but inheritable to their heirs. But while it is a moot question whether the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all, it would be singular to admit a natural and even an hereditary right to inventors. It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre of land, for instance.

By a universal law, indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men equally and in common, is the property for the moment of him who occupies it, but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property.

If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.

That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property.

Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody. Accordingly, it is a fact, as far as I am informed, that England was, until we copied her, the only country on earth which ever, by a general law, gave a legal right to the exclusive use of an idea. In some other countries it is sometimes done, in a great case, and by a special and personal act but, generally speaking, other nations have thought that these monopolies produce more embarrassment than advantage to society.<ref>[http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_8s12.html Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8Article 1, Section 8] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091026024035/http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_8s12.html |date=2009-10-26 }} (Electronic resources from the University of Chicago Press Books Division)</ref>|[[Thomas Jefferson]], letter to [[Isaac V. McPherson|Isaac McPherson]], 13 August 1813}}

[[Patent]] law regulates various aspects related to the functional manifestation of inventions based on new ideas or incremental improvements to existing ones. Thus, patents have a direct relationship to ideas.

===Relationship between ideas and copyrights===

[[File:Crystal Clear app ktip.svg|thumb|150px|A picture of a [[Incandescent light bulb|lightbulb]] is often used to represent a person having a ''bright'' ''idea''.]]
In some cases, authors can be granted limited [[legal]] monopolies on the manner in which certain works are expressed. This is known colloquially as [[copyright]], although the term [[intellectual property]] is used mistakenly in place of ''copyright''. Copyright law regulating the aforementioned monopolies generally does not cover the actual ideas. The law does not bestow the legal status of [[property]] upon ideas per se. Instead, laws purport to regulate events related to the usage, copying, production, sale and other forms of exploitation of the fundamental expression of a work, that may or may not carry ideas. Copyright law is fundamentally different from [[patent]] law in this respect: patents do grant monopolies on ideas (more on this below).

A [[copyright]] is meant to regulate some aspects of the usage of expressions of a work, ''not'' an idea. Thus, copyrights have a negative relationship to ideas.

Work means a tangible medium of expression. It may be an original or derivative work of art, be it literary, dramatic, musical recitation, artistic, related to sound recording, etc. In (at least) countries adhering to the [[Berne Convention]], copyright automatically starts covering the work upon the original creation and fixation thereof, without any extra steps. While creation usually involves an idea, the idea in itself does not suffice for the purposes of claiming copyright.<ref name="Gene Quinn">[http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2014/02/15/protecting-ideas-can-ideas-be-protected-or-patented/id=48009/ Protecting Ideas: Can Ideas Be Protected or Patented?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190821213007/https://www.ipwatchdog.com/2014/02/15/protecting-ideas-can-ideas-be-protected-or-patented/id=48009/ |date=2019-08-21 }} – article by [http://www.ipwatchdog.com/author/gene-quinn-2/ Gene Quinn] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180426015419/http://www.ipwatchdog.com/author/gene-quinn-2/ |date=2018-04-26 }} at [http://www.ipwatchdog.com/ Ipwatchdog] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190301082732/http://www.ipwatchdog.com/ |date=2019-03-01 }}, February 15, 2014</ref><ref>''Copyright protection extends to a description, explanation, or illustration of an idea or system, assuming that the requirements of copyright law are met. Copyright in such a case protects the particular literary or pictorial expression chosen by the author. But it gives the copyright owner no exclusive rights concerning the idea, method or system involved. ''CIT : [https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ31.pdf US Copyright Office] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190128103702/https://copyright.gov/circs/circ31.pdf |date=2019-01-28 }}, circular 31 reviewed: 01 ⁄ 2012 P</ref><ref>''In the case of copyright law, it is the work that realizes the idea that is protected (i.e. a document), and it is the act of recording that work that fixes copyright in the item itself.'' – CIT : [https://www.copyrightservice.co.uk/protect/p21_protecting_ideas The UK Copyright Service] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190331204344/https://www.copyrightservice.co.uk/protect/p21_protecting_ideas |date=2019-03-31 }}, Issued: 17th May 2007, Last amended: 17th May 2007</ref><ref>''(…) there is likely to be an infringement of copyright if the way the information is expressed in the copyrighted work used without the permission of the copyright owner and no exception to infringement applies to the use. This can sometimes occur even if the precise expression is not directly reproduced, but important elements of the work, such as the structure and arrangement of the information, are copied.'' – CIT : [https://www.copyright.org.au/acc_prod/ACC/Legal_Advice/Manage/Precedents/019_Protecting_Ideas.aspx?WebsiteKey=8a471e74-3f78-4994-9023-316f0ecef4ef Australian Copyright Council] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180414235559/https://www.copyright.org.au/acc_prod/ACC/Legal_Advice/Manage/Precedents/019_Protecting_Ideas.aspx?WebsiteKey=8a471e74-3f78-4994-9023-316f0ecef4ef |date=2018-04-14 }}, ACN 001 228 780, 2017</ref><ref>''Intellectual property consists of products, work or processes that you have created and which give you a competitive advantage. There are 3 subcategories: '''Industrial property''' : inventions (patents), trademarks, industrial designs, new varieties of plants and geographic indications of origin '''Artistic work''' protected by copyright: original literary and artistic works, music, television broadcasting, software, databases, architectural designs, advertising creations and multimedia '''Commercial strategies''' : trade secrets, know-how, confidentiality agreements, or rapid production.'' – CIT : [https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/start-grow/intellectual-property-rights/index_en.htm Intellectual property rights] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181009074501/https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/start-grow/intellectual-property-rights/index_en.htm |date=2018-10-09 }}, [https://europa.eu/ European Union] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200910081642/https://europa.eu/ |date=2020-09-10 }}, Updated 22/01/2018</ref>

===Relationship of ideas to confidentiality agreements===
Confidentiality and [[nondisclosure agreements]] are legal instruments that assist corporations and individuals in keeping ideas from escaping to the general public. Generally, these instruments are covered by contract law.{{Citation needed|date=April 2023}}

==See also==
{{Portal|Philosophy|Psychology|Religion}}
{{Wiktionary}}
{{Wikiquote|ideas}}
* [[Idealism]]
* [[Brainstorming]]
* [[Creativity techniques]]
* [[Diffusion of innovations]]
* [[Substantial form|Form]]
* [[Ideology]]
* [[List of perception-related topics]]
* [[Notion (philosophy)]]
* [[Object of the mind]]
* [[Think tank]]
* [[Thought experiment]]
* [[History of ideas]]
* [[Intellectual history]]
* [[Concept]]
* [[Philosophical analysis]]
{{Clear}}

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==References==
* ''The Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Macmillan Publishing Company, New York, 1973 {{ISBN|0-02-894950-1}} {{ISBN|978-0-02-894950-5}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060907141147/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv1-45 Dictionary of the History of Ideas] Charles Scribner's Sons, New York 1973–74, {{LCCN|72007943}} {{ISBN|0-684-16425-6}}
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20071211021125/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&query=nous&docs=div1&title=&sample=1-100&grouping=work - Nous]
:: ¹ Volume IV 1a, 3a
:: ² Volume IV 4a, 5a
:: ³ Volume IV 32 - 37
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070807105612/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&query=Idea&docs=div1&title=&sample=1-100&grouping=work Ideas]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070806072659/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=9030627&query=Idea&tag=IDEOLOGY Ideology]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070807143201/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=1129686&query=Idea&tag=AUTHORITY Authority]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070807145708/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=5531029&query=Idea&tag=EDUCATION Education]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20110424180029/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=10374338&query=Idea&tag=LIBERALISM Liberalism]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070503133057/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w Idea of God]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070807110048/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=14090262&query=Idea&tag=PRAGMATISM Pragmatism]
:: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070806070421/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=2479574&query=Idea&tag=CHAIN+OF+BEING Chain of Being]
* ''The Story of Thought'', DK Publishing, [[Bryan Magee]], London, 1998, {{ISBN|0-7894-4455-0}}
: a.k.a. ''The Story of Philosophy'', Dorling Kindersley Publishing, 2001, {{ISBN|0-7894-7994-X}}
:: (subtitled on cover: ''The Essential Guide to the History of Western Philosophy'')
:: <sup>a</sup> Plato, pages 11 - 17, 24 - 31, 42, 50, 59, 77, 142, 144, 150
:: <sup>b</sup> Descartes, pages 78, 84 - 89, 91, 95, 102, 136 - 137, 190, 191
:: <sup>c</sup> Locke, pages 59 - 61, 102 - 109, 122 - 124, 142, 185
:: <sup>d</sup> Hume, pages 61, 103, 112 - 117, 142 - 143, 155, 185
:: <sup>e</sup> Kant, pages 9, 38, 57, 87, 103, 119, 131 - 137, 149, 182
:: <sup>f</sup> Peirce, pages 61, ''How to Make Our Ideas Clear'' 186 - 187 and 189
:: <sup>g</sup> Saint Augustine, pages 30, 144; ''City of God'' 51, 52, 53 and ''The Confessions'' 50, 51, 52
:: - additional in the Dictionary of the History of Ideas for [https://web.archive.org/web/20070807110005/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv3-64 Saint Augustine and Neo-Platonism]
:: <sup>h</sup> Stoics, pages 22, 40, 44; The governing philosophy of the Roman Empire on pages 46 - 47.
:: - additional in Dictionary of the History of Ideas for [https://web.archive.org/web/20071210150050/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=15375238&query=stoics&tag=RATIONALITY+AMONG+THE+GREEKS+AND+ROMANS Stoics], also here [https://web.archive.org/web/20071213122327/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=11461153&query=stoics&tag=CHANGING+CONCEPTS+OF+MATTER+FROM+ANTIQUITY+TO+NEWTON], and here [https://web.archive.org/web/20071213122327/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=11461153&query=stoics&tag=CHANGING+CONCEPTS+OF+MATTER+FROM+ANTIQUITY+TO+NEWTON], and here [https://web.archive.org/web/20071210182051/http://etext.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/ot2www-dhi?specfile=%2Ftexts%2Fenglish%2Fdhi%2Fdhi.o2w&act=text&offset=17347564&query=stoics&tag=ETHICS+OF+STOICISM].
* ''The Reader's Encyclopedia'', 2nd Edition 1965, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, {{LCCN|65012510}}
:: An Encyclopedia of World Literature
:: <sup>¹a</sup>page 774 Plato ({{circa}}427–348 BC)
:: <sup>²a</sup>page 779 Francesco Petrarca
:: <sup>³a</sup>page 770 Charles Sanders Peirce
:: <sup>¹b</sup>page 849 the Renaissance
* This article incorporates text from the [[Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge]], a publication now in the [[public domain]].

==Further reading==
* Stephen Laurence and Eric Margolis, ''[https://academic.oup.com/book/57984?login=false The Building Blocks of Thought: A Rationalist Account of the Origins of Concepts] (''Oxford University Press, 2024)
* [[Jerry Fodor]], ''Hume Variations'' (Oxford University Press, 2003)
* [[Stephen Stich|Stephen P. Stitch]] (ed.), ''Innate Ideas'' (University of California Press, 1975)
* A. G. Balz, ''Idea and Essence in the Philosophy of Hobbes and Spinoza'' (New York 1918)
* Gregory T. Doolan, ''Aquinas on the divine ideas as exemplar causes'' (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2008)
* Patricia A. Easton (ed.), ''Logic and the Workings of the Mind. The Logic of Ideas and Faculty Psychology in Early Modern Philosophy'' (Atascadero, Calif.: Ridgeview 1997)
* Pierre Garin, ''La Théorie de l'idée suivant l'école thomiste'' (Paris 1932)
* Marc A. High, ''Idea and Ontology. An Essay in Early Modern Metaphysics of Ideas'' ( Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008)
* [[Lawrence Lessig]], ''[[The Future of Ideas]]'' (New York 2001)
* [[Paul Natorp]], ''Platons Ideenlehre'' (Leipzig 1930)
* {{cite book |author=Melchert, Norman |title=The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy |url=https://archive.org/details/greatconversatio00norm |url-access=registration |publisher=McGraw Hill |year=2002 |isbn=0-19-517510-7}}
* W. D. Ross, ''Plato's Theory of Ideas'' (Oxford 1951)
* Peter Watson, ''Ideas: A History from Fire to Freud'', Weidenfeld & Nicolson (London 2005)
* J. W. Yolton, ''John Locke and the Way of Ideas'' (Oxford 1956)

{{Metaphysics}}
{{Philosophy of mind}}
{{Idealism}}
{{Authority control}}

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[[Category:Concepts in metaphysics]]
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