April 10, 2003
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Creation
"It isn't plagiarism if you don't get caught." any high school student
Sometimes I hit a wall. I mean really, I slam hard into a brick wall. I've been working on a writing project and all of a sudden I'm staring at a blank monitor. I have thoughts in my head, things that seem important to me, ideas I'd like to share. Lately I've been struck by how very unoriginal most of these thoughts are. I start to say something about 'faith' and then I realize, this is basically the same thing that Kierkegaard said. I start to say something about 'knowledge' and I realize, oh, that's straight from Kant, or Wittgenstein, or Derrida, or . . . So I sit here and think about John Nash (as portrayed by Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind) how he paced, and thought and used his grease pencil to work out the equations on windows, searching and exploring and hoping to find that one original thought. Nash stands out because of all the people of his generation hoping to find that original new idea, he's the one who had a breakthrough. Millions and millions of people out there thinking, and how many of them ever think anything new?
I think about how specialized everything is today. I read a lot of science, philosophy of science, history of science, psychology, language studies, science of the mind, cosmology, and phsyics. Then I switch gears and read theology, literature, philosophy of religion, church history, and biblical studies. Sometimes I'd like to take those authors by the hand and introduce them to one another. Mr. Pinker - I'd like you to meet Stuart Kauffman, he has some fascinating ideas about chaos, entropy, emergent behavior and natural selection that seem to be related to the work you are doing in evolutionary psychology. Here, do you mind if I just sit and take notes of your conversation? So many competing ideas, and so few people seem to realize the connection between their pet theories and the work of others in related fields. Maybe if they got together and compared notes, they could generate a truly new idea.
Karl Popper argued that we need paradigm shifts in order to move forward in thought and that sounds truly exciting - we'll just shift the paradigm and vast fields of unexplored ideas will open before us. But Popper also said that in order for the shift to occur the people who hold the current ideas must literally die off to make way for people who can question the unquestionable. Once an idea is accepted as foundational, it takes an extraordinary naivete or intellectual courage to see that it might not be the bedrock we think it is. Einstein had to turn Newton on his head before relativity could be born. But what kind of person has the confidence to oppose foundational thought? Almost no one has that level of courage, so the new thought, the improved formualae comes from the person who simply doesn't know that it can't be done.
Then I think of my little essays. I like to write about the things I think about. Primarily I think about knowledge, How do we know anything? Why do we choose to believe one piece of evidence and not another? How do we know what questions to ask? Where do we derive our hypotheses? What does it mean to be 'alive'? What does it mean to say that 'a' cannot be 'not-a'? Where do new ideas come from? What's the difference between arguing for the truth and spreading propaganda? Does 'knowing' something prevent us questioning and possibly learning something new?
Wouldn't you like to know why I'm sitting here asking impossible questions? I have a list of essay topics I've been working through. All of them broad topics with room for me to say anything I want related to the general theme. I've written, and rewritten, and edited and re-edited, and I sit here thinking, "that's not your idea." Richard Foster said that better, Jacob Bronkowski argued that point fifty years ago, Clark Pinnock said that yesterday. So what's the difference between restating an idea that's been proposed before and plagiarizing the idea. According to my dictionary, plagiarism is "to steal and pass off as one's own the ideas of another without crediting the source". I'm not worried about overt plagiarism, if I open a book and copy a sentence, I credit that to the source. But I worry very much about unconscious plagiarism. What if I thought that sentence was my idea, but it's really a hybrid of something that I read in Kant and crossed with Derrida. Now I've said something that needs not one but two footnotes and I don't have any idea what page I should note as the source, because I've forgotten that the idea isn't mine to start with.
It's possible that my readers won't realize that the ideas in the essay have been spoken before. It's even possible that if they 'catch' me explaining faith in the same way that Tillich explained it they'll graciously say, "well, after all, there's nothing new under the sun." But I stare at the blank monitor and hope for a thought that I can say is truly mine.
Comments (20)
Do you think those guys had thoughts that weren't influenced by others? Hell no. Only a smidgeon of what they thought was original, and it flowed from there. Perhaps you're reading too much. I know that sounds insane, but I've found myself thinking that same thing, that my thoughts aren't original enough. So what it sounds like to me you really need, instead of sitting around editing and re-writing, is a weekend with two women you can talk to, bounce ideas off of, and possibly, in a position where you have to explain your own views, develop new ones. I'm gonna call you right now! Are you home?
I think my last orignial thought took place somewhere around 1971. After all - I am Diddly Squat - I don't have to know what I am talking about!
Hmmmm...maybe you're thinking too much...it's not original, but it's the best I can do this morning...
I've heard several actors/musical writers/ect say that they don't listen or watch much of other's works, so that what they do as an artist is not based on what they see, or hear, even unconsciously. Maybe you should put the big books down for a while...
Amen sister!
Sail on... sail on!!!!
I think that happens to all writers or thinkers... because we are all influenced by someone. What brings about "original" thought is taking all that we learn and assimilating it to what we personally think or believe and then going from there... it sounds like we are mimicking but I think it's our own stuff - with our own words and style.
I look at it this way: we're all interconnected like a huge jigsaw puzzle & there's not a thought that the human mind hasn't conceived in one form or another. We just simply do in our own ways.
Faith
Whatever you write will be a blessing to those who read it. How do you find time to get that much reading gone!
See, that's why I'm a poet and not a philosopher. You copy in literature, and it's not plagiarism, it's skillful allusion. When they figure out you copied, they smile and pat themselves on the back, instead of getting mad at you.
For some reason, your blog made me think of the Scarecrow, singin' this lovely song:
I could while away the hours, conferrin' with the flowers
Consultin' with the rain.
And my head I'd be scratchin' while my thoughts were busy hatchin'
If I only had a brain.
I'd unravel every riddle for any individ'le,
In trouble or in pain.
With the thoughts you'll be thinkin' you could be another Lincoln
If you only had a brain.
Oh, I could tell you why the ocean's near the shore.
I could think of things I never thunk [sic] before.
And then I'd sit, and think some more.
I would not be just a nothin' my head all full of stuffin'
My heart all full of pain.
I would dance and be merry, life would be a ding-a-derry,
If I only had a brain.
So what if you owe a debt to previous thinkers for putting ideas and books into the marketplace? So what if you're not completely 100% original? Do you think anyone would understand a word you say if you were? Unconscious plagiarism is something to worry about if a) you are publishing your work professionally or b) you're defending a doctoral/masters thesis. In the former case, you're going to have an editor and peer review to tease flaws out, and in the latter case, a committee. And footnotes are an accepted method of excusing your unoriginality in both cases.
Ease up on yourself already!
This is Xanga!
Maybe you are trying to hard. Sometimes you need to accept ideas from other sources and then expand your thoughts from there and not feel bad that it started from someone else’s original thought.
Heck I shouldn't be trying to give advice. I hardly finished High School. So never mind what I just said. In a world full of authors it is hard to find an original thought but don't lose hope.
Great writing today! You are thought provoking.
I have always thought of ideas as something that I draw to me....never something that is generated by me. I guess I have my doubts whether there is such a thing as an original idea.
So many times in my life I have had a thought come to me... out of the blue...thinking that I was brilliant for coming up with it....but then later running across the exact same thought but expressed by someone that I had not yet encountered. For that reason I have stopped looking for the original idea and just opened myself up to the "Flow". When we spend time echoing the wisdom of another we add energy to their vision. I wouldn't consider that plagiarism. When I come across someone who echoes my thoughts I take that as confirmation that there is truth and validity within that idea. I would also think that those who inspire you would be flattered to know that they are not alone in their thinking.
That's just my wacky way of looking at things.
Okay...I'm done blogging in your comments section now.
Good luck with the writing assignments.
Angie
but if you draw your own conclusions from already existing text, isn't the conclusion your own? and i have seen the same conlusions drawn different ways, the same answer from different equations. we create something new over and over again in our own little way. there is hope yet.
It isn't plagiarism if you don't get caught - I like this statement! lol
Well I can in all honesty tell you that this would NEVER happen to me...as I have a brain the size of a grain of sand when it comes to remembering anything...unless I physically read it over and over and over again and write it down I cannot retain it.....I never have been able to do that...so I guess that is why I suck at acting...and that career never took off!!! LOL
Kidding...but seriously...I think you explain things the way you see it..you are only drawing off of those that you read....so you really arent quilty of plagiarism....simply common concepts put in your own words....
You've had some great comments on this entry. I agree with Daffodilious...thoughts are definitely influenced by everything we see, experience, read, hear. That doesn't mean you can't have original thoughts or that your thoughts aren't your own.
Well you surprised me with all that deliberating. I never think before I write .I just write what comes into my head, if I feel it is good ,I send it somewhere if not sometimes I will put one on here but all that introspection of yours, makes writing sound difficult whereas it should be a joy. Good luck with your thoughts Cheers Portia
o/
God Bless - Dale
At least you recognize that you're influenced by what you've ingested. Most people miss that.
Great post. Nothing perhaps is really original except maybe for what you do with it or how you spin it? It killed me when studying a certain history class at UGA how the prof wanted/demanded us to conform to various dogmatic modes, yet I noticed how the great historians we studied broke all the rules of their times. Seemed a contradiction to me. I sometimes wonder if higher education does more harm than good to some folk.
Love Nash and the movie. Have started the book, but not light reading, so maybe will tackle it again later. PBS has excellent piece on Nash, but never have caught all of it. That's what got me interested in him in the first place.
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