Another Idea

I think the interesting thing is how this illustrates the notion of owning thoughts. The man sold the idea for a mechanical process and, while GM has the patent for the process, they have somehow also have captured the concept of it, this somewhat elusive "thought."
I ‘m curious as to how creating a process or whatever is allied with creating a thought.
Or, more precisely, where the idea becomes do-able or viable. I sort of look at the process as being the same as figuring out how to wrestle a viable thesis statement out from the assignments we were handed as high school and university students: the vague and non-helpful "Peace in the Middle East: Discuss" or " Compare and contrast three aspects of Shakespeare’s Tragedies."
Somewhere along the line, there has to be a point where an idea becomes non-generic and slips into that realm of individuality. One of the things I used to look at was the interaction between the subject and the observer.
As a photographer, one of the areas I used to concentrate on was what I called "Urban Architecture Abstracts", found interactions between buildings and light and colour. Now, I wonder who was the primary creator of those images that would eventually be framed… Me for seeing it and framing it? The Builder of the building, for making it possible to use that building in that way. God, for creating the forces that caused the light and colours as well as the textures? Luck?
The same goes for anything.
What part of your creative act is solely yours and not a result of your history?
Who really takes or can take sole credit for a product?
At what point does all your training and reading and interacting with the world at large and everything you’ve been exposed to become something other than what you bring to bear.
What part of you is solely you and not were you come from?
I think this really gets into the area of intellectual property.
Definition:
Intellectual property (IP) law definition – Intellectual Property is any product of human intellect that is unique and un-obvious with some value in the marketplace. Intellectual property laws cover ideas, inventions, literary creations, unique names, business models, industrial processes, computer program code, and more.