Interesting that you chose to mix patent and copyright, or rather introduce copyright. Patents, specifically, can be a state sponsored denial of one's property rights. If I independantly arrive at an invenetion that is patented, I have stolen noone's idea and yet am forbidden to make, market or sell it and can be forced to provide restitution should I unwittenly done so. Copyright, by contrast, requires the complantant to prove that another had access to one's work.