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Do original ideas actually exist?

pollyannaish_poet
Strange Creature
Joined 10th June 2016
Forum Posts: 12

I've heard that there's "no such thing as an entirely original idea" because everyone takes inspiration from other sources, then combine these individual elements to create a seemingly "new" theory, belief, etc. Thoughts?

anonymouslyhere
Pariah Shadow
Dangerous Mind
United States 5awards
Joined 31st Oct 2013
Forum Posts: 1633

Well even if an ideal has elements of existing ideals to make up a new one it is still original if its something that has never been thought of in that manner, so i'd say that qualifies as original, but I guess you couldn't say it is 100% original. So in a way no, 100% original ideals do not exist, but original ideals do exist in the fact they respond to an existing ideal in a way they've not been responded to before, if that makes sense.

poet Anonymous

Exactly (anonymouslyhere) . And yes, there are original ideas. Or they would not have been original in the first place.
It would be a boring world, if originality didn't exist.  The word original means first. Great question ✌💫

case28
Alexander Case
Dangerous Mind
42awards
Joined 16th June 2013
Forum Posts: 2077

Two minutes ago I read a new poem written by a poet here on DU that pretty much ripped off my own idea for a poem, an idea that's been floating around in my head for the past month or so... I felt like my mind had been raped when I was literally reading my poem word for word... but then I saw how many comments the poet had received, which was probably 20 times more comments than I would have received, so then I thought, fuck it! He can have the lousy fucking poem now... it was so cliche anyway.

Magdalena
Spartalena
Tyrant of Words
Wales 62awards
Joined 21st Apr 2012
Forum Posts: 2993

The definition of original in part is "not a copy" so something inspired is original, something copied is plagiarism, ask Ed.  :O
Also, it is the first, poem,song,story one wrote before editing it, the blue print. If it had to be 100% uninspired to be original, then you may as well throw the word out with the trash.  

lepperochan
Craic-Dealer
Guardian of Shadows
Palestine 67awards
Joined 1st Apr 2011
Forum Posts: 14449

kinda like Lego. give ten people the same pieces to build something with,  how many will build the same thing from them






poet Anonymous

<< post removed >>
KDAmB
Tyrant of Words
Australia 13awards
Joined 5th Sep 2014
Forum Posts: 6358

Take few mirrors, few pieces of colored glass or paper and there you have the ingredients of a kaleidoscope- same here (in same vein as Craic) each mirror - the person's perception and reflection of his perspective on the same issues/topic expressed in his own signature way.

skinnyjean
Llamaliscious
Thought Provoker
New Zealand 6awards
Joined 23rd May 2010
Forum Posts: 311

No ones idea is 100 percent original, everything has been written about. That doesn't mean that said writer has read similar work before, it's merely their thoughts and they know they are not likely to be the first ones who thought it. The mind is very complex, and those similar thoughts are what brings us together as writers. Whats that phrase again? Oh yes "Great minds think alike" :)

Viddax
Lord Viddax
Guardian of Shadows
United Kingdom 31awards
Joined 10th Oct 2009
Forum Posts: 6672

".....Fools seldom differ".

Once boiled down to cliche and simple parts then nothing seems to be new or original then. Yet that misses the point about not how it is similar to the older ways but presents newer ways or makes newer connections. For example: Writing and the wheel are millennia old, but textspeak and functioning self-driving cars are 21st Century features. Such as how post offices and sentry towers are older communication features than the modern cellphone towers and wifi hotspots.

I would argue that even an idea that combines pre-existing elements and inspiration can still be an entirely original idea. Even if it is the same or similar to another idea in the same style and field, provided that the two ideas are not created while aware of each other. (As in cold fusion technology developed in France based on ideas about fridges and cold technology developed in Hong Kong based on fridges can both be entirely original ideas so long as the French and Hong Kong version do not interact. If they interact then the 'better' version or technology or first made gets precedence, with the other becoming new idea but not necessarily 'entirely original idea'.)
The point being that combining pre-existing elements in new ways makes the result a new idea, though it would have to acknowledge its pre-existing elements. Such as how the Apollo Mission could not feasibly exist without rockets and artillery of WW2, or of Copernicus' ideas about the Sun being at the center of the Solar System. That being said, WW2 rockets and Copernicus indirectly helped the Apollo Mission; they did not literally modify rockets used in WW2 while Copernicus helped them with a wrench.

Austin_Rura
Austin Rura
Thought Provoker
United States 6awards
Joined 6th Dec 2013
Forum Posts: 327

By that logic there was never a new idea... just old discoveries.

SatansSperm
Dangerous Mind
13awards
Joined 19th Nov 2015
Forum Posts: 3112

yes because the squirrel in my yard just made me a peanut butter sandwich with the nuts she had gathered for winter...so i offered her a home on the window sill

UnderYourSpell
Twisted Dreamer
United Kingdom
Joined 21st June 2016
Forum Posts: 50

I've never seen a poem for 34 and a half before

dkzksaxxas_DanielX
DadaDoggyDannyKozakSaxfn
Tyrant of Words
United States 32awards
Joined 10th Dec 2011
Forum Posts: 209

only variations there'of, butt tha's okay.....who should care about such shit?

bootselectric
Being
Thought Provoker
Canada
Joined 18th June 2011
Forum Posts: 216

if you can't find them you aren't looking

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