<i>&gt; On the contrary, the presence of patents tend to slow down innovation.</i><p>I believe we may have had this exchange before, but they is no empirical evidence of that. At most there have been apocryphal examples that have mostly been debunked.<p>There are a ton of empirical studies showing the benefits (increased r&amp;d spending, vc investments, etc.) and costs (potential for patent holdup, thickets, etc) of patent systems, but nobody has ever been able to show that <i>innovation</i> itself is harmed or spurred. I&#x27;d guess this is mainly because it is almost impossible to define &quot;innovation&quot; precisely enough to measure it.