"[M]otivating inventors was not the purpose of patents, it's merely the side effect of the method used to get inventors to give up their trade secrets."
You seriously need to explain how, because as far as I can tell your claim here is nothing but brain-damage. As we've agreed, "promoting the progress of science and useful arts" is the purpose of patents. PROMOTING DISCLOSURE IS A MECHANISM, and PROMOTING INVENTION IS A MECHANISM and YOU WERE TALKING ABOUT BOTH, dismissing the former as ancillary and pushing the latter as central. A claim that you weren't talking about mechanisms... baffles me. Without some clarification, I'm calling it quits on this thread.
No I was not talking about both, I dismissed them as mechanisms to bring the point back to the only thing I was discussing, the goal. I don't care about the mechanisms and if you can't see that then maybe you've got some brain damage to cope with and you should stop talking.
Holding on to the slim remaining chance you're not trolling...
I quote you again:
"[M]otivating inventors was not the purpose of patents, it's merely the side effect of the method used to get inventors to give up their trade secrets."
Let's break this down a little:
"X was not the purpose of patents, it's merely a side effect of the method used to get Y."
And now you're claiming you weren't talking about X and Y?
Note that I've shown this to others, and they don't understand your position either, so if it's brain-damage it's not uniquely mine.
"[M]otivating inventors was not the purpose of patents, it's merely the side effect of the method used to get inventors to give up their trade secrets."