The Plagiarist Within You?

[cronus]

When you read something are you not in effect copying it? You are all but a plagiarist without a original thought in your head.

[Hermit]

Who did you copy that from?

[Jason]

Yes. And reading 'aloud' in your head is unauthorized public exhibition for the schizophrenic.

[cronus]

Yes. And reading 'aloud' in your head is unauthorized public exhibition for the schizophrenic.

I'm not on Facebook so I wouldn't know. Folks still got thousands of friends that way?

[JimC]

The meme ecosystem infects us all: that, of course, is one of the major triumphs of H sapiens...

[Hermit]

The meme ecosystem infects us all: that, of course, is one of the major triumphs of H sapiens...

Good point, particularly since we occasionally do rather more than plagiarise. We expand on what others had thought of before. If we did not, we'd still live in caves, waiting for someone to figure out how to light a fire or how to send a man to the moon or...

[cronus]

The meme ecosystem infects us all: that, of course, is one of the major triumphs of H sapiens...

Good point, particularly since we occasionally do rather more than plagiarise. We expand on what others had thought of before. If we did not, we'd still live in caves, waiting for someone to figure out how to light a fire or how to send a man to the moon or...

...paradise on earth.

[Hermit]

The meme ecosystem infects us all: that, of course, is one of the major triumphs of H sapiens...

Good point, particularly since we occasionally do rather more than plagiarise. We expand on what others had thought of before. If we did not, we'd still live in caves, waiting for someone to figure out how to light a fire or how to send a man to the moon or...

...paradise on earth.

Ahem. What's that got to do with the topic of plagiarism?

[Tero]

Copy/paste

I haven't written anything for years.

[Svartalf]

I can't write anything worth diddly, my better offerings are somewhere here in the haiku games...

[jamest]

When you read something are you not in effect copying it? You are all but a plagiarist without a original thought in your head.

Then was there no first thought? And, if so, how could there be a second; third; fourth; etc.?

There has to be a first thought about everything, which kinda fucks this thread up.

[JimC]

When you read something are you not in effect copying it? You are all but a plagiarist without a original thought in your head.

Then was there no first thought? And, if so, how could there be a second; third; fourth; etc.?

There has to be a first thought about everything, which kinda fucks this thread up.

Cognitive abilities evolve, and thus so do thoughts. Before there were clearly defined thoughts, there were somewhat more inchoate pre-thoughts, and so on.

Thinking did not spring into perfect existence, as if by magic. Or theology...

[pErvinalia]

Yeah, it's like how it's utterly unexplainable how a new born has no thoughts, but by the time they are 2 years they are having plenty of thoughts. You can't explain that. Tides go in, tides go out.