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Originally Posted by Morlac
You feel that way because your son has a relationship with you. Say that a stranger off the street found an unaccountable urge for a dictionary (perhaps he was stuck on a hard crossword puzzle?) and walked into your home to use your dictionary. Would you feel the same way?
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"Feel the same way"--inasmuch as "not believe it was theft," yes. Not in the sense of "have the same emotional reaction. A stranger who walked into my home without permission to use my dictionary may be guilty of breaking & entering, tresspassing, or other crimes--but not "theft."
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No, it does not necessarily mean that it "must include" those characteristics. I'd wager that many thieves justify their theft with the notion that they are only borrowing and fully intend to return the item/money/whatsit ... someday. A car thief probably does not have that intention. Someone who embezzles money from their employer or takes things from family and friends to pawn to support a drug/gambling habit certainly might fully intend to return it someday. Shall all theft cases await (a) the death of the owner, or (b) the destruction of the item, or (c) the end of time, so that we may best judge whether the owner has been "permanently deprived" of their property?
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"Intent to deprive the owner" doesn't mean "without intent to return." The intent is to take it away from the owner now, or it's not theft.
If, however, a company accidentally put the contents of their sales account budget into an individual salesperson's bank account, and he spent it, that is not "embezzlement," nor is it "theft." He took money that was not his--but without intent to deprive the rightful owner of it; he did not realize he was not the rightful owner of the money. (Perhaps he thought the bank had recalculated his loan payments and was correcting a previous error.)
If a person enters a parking lot, puts a key into a car, and drives off with it--not realizing the car next to his was the same make & model, and used the same key--again, not theft. (This has happened.)
Taking a book left on a park bench is not theft; the assumption is that the original owner has no more legal claim to it, or at least, no ability/intention to recover it. (Taking a dollar left found on a park bench follows the same rule. Is it "theft" to pick up spare change found on the ground?)
There are plenty of crimes that involve appropriation or use of someone else's property, but are not "theft." Pouring glue in the keyholes to someone's car prevents use of the car, but isn't theft; rearranging the books in a library by size & color instead of numerical listing, and hiding some in boxes on top of the shelves, is not "theft." Likewise, opening a rival bookstore next to another bookstore, offering more titles, longer hours, and more pleasant staff, is not "theft" of their business.
And creating an unauthorized copy is not "theft," because the original is still fully usable by the original owner. It can be "prevention of payment"--but that's not inherently a crime; authors are allowed to give away freebies, and there are plenty of legal ways to keep people from getting paid for their work. (If nobody buys the book, the publisher doesn't get paid for what they invested. If a nasty review convinces people the book isn't worth buying, they don't pay for the book.)
"Not paying" is not theft. "Copying" is not theft. "Copying and not paying," while sometimes illegal (fair use & CC licenses are among the reasons why not), and sometimes a crime (not the same as "illegal"), is also not "
theft."