"Use another person's thoughts" is obfuscating the reality of the situation so far as to be disingenuous. The way society ensures new works are created is to guarantee a temporary monopoly over certain narrow types of ideas to their creators. Why would anybody be an author if everyone could download free copies of any new book that came out?

I think patents are granted too liberally, and that copyright lasts at least twice as long as it should, but to argue that intellectual property can't even in theory be beneficial to protect is silly.