Comment Re:Trivial? (Score 1) 386
Purely mental processes, e.g. mathematical equations, are not patentable. This point has been affirmed.
That being said, a software patent is not always purely a mental process, or necessarily analogous to one. I would wager that if you look at the claims of each of MS's patents, there will be something more than the relationship of one item to another, which is what I understand a mathematical equation to be. Any claim to such a relationship has been deemed not patentable subject matter. In my opinion, the Federal Circuit's "machine-or-transformation" test adequately addresses this issue, requiring that a claimed invention involve more than a trivial step being performed by a machine, or the transformation of an entity, something more than transistors changing state.
I say society gains from software patents exactly what it gains from patents in every other art; public disclosure and encouragement of research and development. You ask if Microsoft would have written any software if it did not have patent protection available to it. It seems likely the answer is yes. However, going back the decades of Microsoft's existence, looking at the enormous amount of resources Microsoft poured into R&D, it is far from obvious that MS would have developed many of the technologies it has developed to date.