173 Originality does not mean thinking something that was ne

[Erin]

173 Originality does not mean thinking something that was never thought before; it means putting old ideas together in new ways.

[bravest]

28. Originality does not mean thinking something that was never thought before; it means putting old ideas together in new ways.


Originality, a kind of wonderful and mysterious thing, is very important for the development of our society. Without it, all the innovations, the inventions, and other new things are impossible to achieve. The most significant characterization about originality is that it can always contain something new and useful. However, originality never means thinking something that was never thought before; By keeping the useful parts of the old ideas and adding in them new and creative things, originality is made.

I cannot agree with the opinion that originality can achieve something that was never achieved before, and think something that was never thought before. All of the old ideas or things always contain something that is useful and could be reserved or inherited by new ideas. The ideas of originality could certainly keep these old but valuable parts of the old ideas, which will give us more efficiency. The case is true in almost all the innovations and inventions. For example, the foundation of quantum mechanics is really a system of originality in physics, and it contains much new ideas that were never thought before. However, it also inherits some basic ideas from the old system-Newtonian mechanics. In new system, some basic and valuable principles from Newtonian mechanics are reserved, on which the ideas of originality are founded. Another example is the invention of internet. Internet is a true innovative invention and revolutionizes the mutual communications among people around the world, and brings about many conveniences. However, the idea of internet did not spring out under the inspiration of a flash of human originality, but was the result of thousands of improvement of the initial model-ARPNET which was originally used for military goal. The invention of internet also inherits some value and original ideas from ARPNET, and is not a wholly new thing. So, originality does not means that it must come up with a thing that was never thought before. Rather, originality is the result of improvement of the old things and old thoughts.

Furthermore, innovations could not be made regardless of the old and traditional principles, which is often to a certain extent useful and valuable. The old things and old thoughts, or old systems are often the foundations on which the thoughts of originality are founded. Without any respect to old thoughts, originality could never be made and often is a waste of time. In mathematics, for instance, the new discovery and original ideas are made by recognizing the some old but basic ideas and principles. They can never be achieved when people ignore the basic process of fundamental math, such as plus, minus, multiplication. The case is true for other inventions. In order to come up with new and original ideas, some old, basic, and valuable principles of old ideas should be respected and inherited.

In sum, originality can never come up with a wholly new thing that was never thought before. Instead, innovation is often made by inheriting some valuable things of old systems and ideas, and is also the result of many improvements of the old ones.

[minebbs]

brasvest you have done a good work
the first paragraph is excellent.

the following paragraphs are well-organized though not so excellent as the first one

[vishnu]

This is my first Essay on the above topic that is
"Originality does not mean thinking something that was never thought before; it means putting old ideas together in new ways".

[vishnu]

hi
to every body
i got one doubt in this how this site came to know that is enterd candiadate name with out any registration.

[redflute]

I guess the answer is cookie.
A kind of cookie file in your PC which remembered the username and password .

[kala15]

The writer of the prompt believes that originality does no mean inventing something new; it simply means putting old ideas together in novel form.
The author makes a sweeping generalization about the definition of the word originality. It does not have to be one way or the other. It could be a novel twist to an existing idea or it could also be something that has never been thought before.

First and foremost, i tend to believe that the word 'originality' should be strictly reserved for thoughts and inventions that conjure human emotions. Originality is something that was not visualized before and something that crosses the borders of human imagination. It does not have to be a 'new' idea altogether, it could very well be a 'new' twist to an existing one. The later usually does not elicit the same response of astonishment and is rarely regarded as something original. Though there are instances in history where some of the original ideas have sprung by innovating on an existing knowledge. James Watt, the inventor of steam engine, simply harnessed the power of steam to an extend that was not thought of before and came up with this great invention. Then again history is full of evidences of inventions that were just sprung out of thin air with hardly any prior evidences and theories. For example, Newton's invention of the theory of gravity. So many before him had seen the apple drop from a tree and it was his mind that could conjure up the all important theory.

In addition i believe that originality is different from being inspired by someone else's work. The later often borders on the thin line of plagiarism and does not often inspire the same sense of astonishment. There are tons of artists and engineers who are working day in and day out innovating and finding a better way to represent a musical score or having a more efficient implementation of an algorithm but none of them are remembered for the 'Originality' of their work.

One might argue that 'how original can an idea be?' After all human knowledge is limited and it has been built on by centuries of discoveries and innovations. It is a process of augmentation and every great inventor has to rely upon past knowledge. However, this argument holds little water since every time the boundary of human knowledge is stretched we term those discoveries Original.

To summarize, i believe that the idea of originality does not necessarily have to be a novel thought process; it could very well be a novel angle to an existing one. As long as it crosses the bounds of human imagination, we can categorize it as being original.

[neha.chowdhry]

hi
all your essays are dam good!!iv jus started preparing for GRE...have u given ur exam??

[geek_goddess]

This is mine- oddly enough, I thought of ARPANET as a possible counterarg!

Picasso's gigantic mural stares back at you from it's wall; it's black, white and shades of grey reflecting the desolation of the civil war in Guernica. It fills the room with tragedy and pain.Picasso's Guernica is massive, bigger than the norm accepted by artists of his time. It has no oranges or poppy fields. It has a message. It condemns the deaths of people in Guernica, and questioned the concepts of liberty and power. It is original.

Today, the world seems to be out of new ideas. This is one reason why the rehashing of old ideas is referred to as "originality". However, an original idea is significantly different from all of the ideas which it seems to be derived from. Society confers on such an idea or object the title of originality, and values and respects it. If originality was akin to reiterating the lines of a poem in a different order, it would be a simple task to create something original. This would not be considered to be of great value by society.

When do we call something original? When it has an element of 'newness' to it, when it appears that the concept is not a part of our existing schemas. It appeals to us instinctively as something novel. A common counterargument to this is- How can a human create something completely new-we do not have the capacity for seeing hitherto unseen colours, or hearing new musical notes. But one cannot deny the fact that in our worlds there are objects like the personal computer, which was first developed in a single quatum jump, not an increment of steps over a long period of time.

Steve Jobs came up with something no one had dreamed of before. What he did was a startlingly different from what the other geeks had been doing. He did not rehash old ideas. As a result of his brainchild, we now have entire new schemas with which to view the world. This is what originality does.

Since an original idea requires a quantum leap, and has important outcomes for the whole of humanity, society assigns great value to originality.The rehashing of old ideas may lead to incremental improvements to what we know or how we live, but they do not exhibit a giant depart from the existing repository of human knowledge. Such ideas are welcomed, and applauded, but do not elicit the same response as Guernica, or the first personal computer did.