Comments on: Defining Plagiarism Down?

By: DensityDuck

DensityDuck — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:29:34 +0000

Southern Comfort: Listing facts in a particular order, using a particular sequence of articles, is not a meaningful piece of intellectual work. It's like saying that anyone who quotes "ROY G BIV" is plagarizing. Or suggesting that "do re mi" must always be followed by a trademark statement or brand symbol. (Which, I notice, you did not include when you appropriated a trademark of the Southern Comfort Company to form your username. Are we to believe that you just "happened" to pick those two words, in that order, with that capitalization? I think not, kind sir!)

By: Techie

Techie — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:08:30 +0000

I think that it's rich that the Russian bear is roaming southeastern Europe, and this is what the Left chooses to fixate on.

Priorities, people.

By: TexEd

TexEd — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 14:58:30 +0000

I’m glad the lefties have opened the subject of plagiarism. Hussein Obama has refused to release his undergraduate thesis. I know, I know, he can’t find it or has good and sufficient reasons for not releasing it. The good guys, however, are going to claiming that in not releasing his undergraduate thesis he is hiding something, much as Edwards has done over the past six or more months.
What could Hussein be hiding to risk the complaints? Easy! The only hypothesis that makes sense is that Hussein plagiarized his undergraduate thesis, a fact that will be proven if the paper becomes public. What’s more, questions regarding whether the Columbia faculty knew it was stolen and did nothing (probably!)will also raise issues of affirmative action and articulates blacks getting credentials they didn’t earn.
So, let’s open up the discussion of plagiarism!

By: McCain Plagiarized Georgia Facts!

McCain Plagiarized Georgia Facts! — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 11:51:09 +0000

[...] and there’s substantial variation and additional information in the McCain version. As William Beutler observes, [I]n all three examples, the text is purely expository: none of it expresses any [...]

By: dmoss

dmoss — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 11:11:15 +0000

It was a bad idea to make this allegation, since now bloggers on the right will be digging up examples from obama. Since Obama hasn’t had an original idea since ‘invade Pakistan’ I expect there will be a boat load of them.

By: Southern Comfort

Southern Comfort — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 07:47:49 +0000

Wikipedia: “regained its independence in 1991. Early post-Soviet years was marked by a civil unrest and economic crisis.”

McCain: “regained its independence in 1991, but its early years were marked by instability, corruption, and economic crises.”

I think you’re deluding yourself if you think this slice just happened to contain so many similar words in so similar an order. Pedestrian though they may be, there are 100 other ways to convey this information and the word choices are NOT “rather different.” The only real change in this slice is replacing “civil unrest” with “instability” and adding “corruption,” which were probably just to make the diction sexier.

You tell us to, “consider that plagiarized text is almost always longer than original text.” Stastically, you may be right. But I don’t think that applies to speechwriting. I’ve only written speeches for my own itty-bitty student government elections, but even the smallest of those go through countless permutations. All by my one-man campaign staff (me). I can’t even imagine how many drafts a professional politician’s speach sees, let alone a Presidential-candidate on a multi-million dollar budget.

Also, you say, “The biggest blow to the plagiarism charge, however, is that the third McCain section actually contains information not in the Wikipedia version.” I don’t follow you. Maybe the third case just isn’t plagiarized. Doesn’t negate the first two.

@Mr. Owens: To me, it’s not a question of whether he is legally in the right. It’s a question of whether or not you want the leader of the free world getting his intel from “the collective.”

And no, sorry, I’m not from the leftosphere. I’m what we used to call conservative (e.g. small, solvent government, respect for personal freedoms, etc.) Who knew we still existed?

By: Mike G in Corvallis

Mike G in Corvallis — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 06:21:25 +0000

I kinda hope Obama names Joe Biden as his VP choice. Then Biden can be the attack dog on McCain’s supposed plagiarism …f

By: ItIsAllWordPlay

ItIsAllWordPlay — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 05:43:28 +0000

I find it interesting that both sides are resorting to stretching. I find it more interesting that it is working as I found out after talking to a friend of mine this past week. They had only heard the snippets and had changed their position. This election should not be based on this crap but real positions. Not attacks no matter what course of action a candidate takes. I am talking to both sides.

By: Tactical Buddhist

Tactical Buddhist — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 05:18:07 +0000

This was already debunked on my website earlier today. Unfortunately I have had to argue back and forth with other professors about it.

votingwhileintoxicated.wordpress.com

By: Big Boy

Big Boy — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 04:52:37 +0000

“The Sun rises in the East.”

I know that, you know that, everyone knows that. If fact, I’m sure SOMEONE used those exact words to express the same thought.

So what? There is no “originality of thought.” Not even any “originality” in the expression. It is unfortunate for authors that only about 2% of any writing contains any original thought and maybe 4% contains any original expression (and that’s a generous estimate).

When one is twelve, one knows for yourself very little. After 4 years of college and 6 years of grad school, you have made much more of the great store of knowledge YOURS. It’s also in the knowledge bag of thousands of others.

You can use what you know and so can everyone else. Plagiarism charges are vastly overblown.