Chapter 4 examines the codification of agricultural knowledge, the process through which practical knowledge was transformed into writing. Rather than asking whether this produced ‘useful’ knowledge to improve farming methods, it asks: for whom was such knowledge useful? It first identifies the construction of ‘agriculture’ as a literary category and an independent body of theory in the seventeenth century, departing from classical and medieval genres. The main section analyses four key modes of codification from 1669 to 1792: systematic, theoretical, experimental and observational. It argues that fundamentally all these modes of codification were shaped by the need to subordinate customary knowledge and labour and establish the supremacy of written knowledge. It further argues that the art of husbandry was codified in accordance with the cultural preferences and managerial interests of landowners, professionals and large farmers. Hence farming books provided a managerial knowledge suitable for the emerging occupational structures of agrarian capitalism.

Section 5 of Hume’s An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, “Why Utility Pleases,” is a remarkable text for a variety of reasons. First, there is no directly analogous section in the Treatise, so it raises questions about whether Hume engaged in substantial revision of his previous thought. Second, it offers evidence of a normative moral theory. Third, because Hume discusses the role of utility so favorably, it may suggest a nascent form of utilitarianism. Finally, “Why Utility Pleases” advances some of the few positions that draw criticism from Adam Smith. This chapter addresses each of these features. In response to the first, I argue that there are important differences between the Treatise and Section 5, but none that involve a rejection of the claims of the earlier work. In response to the second, I argue that “Why Utility Pleases” is best interpreted as falling squarely within Hume’s descriptive moral psychology. In response to the third, I argue that the notion of Hume as a utilitarian is dubious. Finally, in response to the fourth, I suggest that the disagreement between Smith and Hume, though nuanced and interesting, is not deep.

As an area of legal study and practice, intellectual property (or IP) law lacks the conceptual coherence of an internally consistent and discrete law subject like contract, crimina’ or tort, which each has its own normative rules applicable throughout, or even one that describes a category of law involving the application of a number of such law subjects to a particular subject matter, like environmental law or entertainment law. For this reason, mixing and matching notions or terms from one area of IP law with those from others can be at best confusing and at worst dangerously misleading, however beguiling it may be to do so. To avoid both, the well-crafted IP treatise provides invaluable assistance and clarification.

Given all the circumstances surrounding the attempts to oversee the performance of legal academics and their research efforts, it is remarkable that Sam Ricketson has written and published his treatises on the law of intellectual property (in Australia), the 100-year history of the Berne Convention and the Paris Convention. Hindsight is always 20/20 as noted so frequently by the courts when considering inventiveness and what was obvious at a given prior point in time. it was not obvious at the time of commencing these works that they would be so successful Yet hindsight tells us that Ricketson’s decisions to invest so much of his time and energy into writing his treatises were rational and obvious decisions and the outcomes for both himself and the multiple audiences that enjoy the fruits of his labour equally predictable.