Is there really anything original?

[Mr. Rogers]

As I've been working on my photography and a little bit of graphic design, I've been wondering this question: Is there really anything original? Nothing that hasn't been done before by someone else? I know, for example, that when God first created the world and people they were inventing new things all the time - music, agriculture, etc. So I guess it is possible to make totally new things (Just thought of that this second, actually xD). Do you think everything new has been used up? I've also heard since God is infinate, there must be infinate possibilities. I was just wondering everyone's opinions on this.

[SigmaKnight]

All that is, is all that was, and there is nothing new under the sun~


Oh hey, I got my 100th post Thats new (not really XD)

[Radical Dreamer]

Personally, no, I don't think there is. I mean, sure, there are some things that are different from the norm, but even those things had inspiration from something that already existed. So yeah, nothing truly new under the sun. Not that that's a bad thing, really, it's just how it is. *shrugs*

[Mr. SmartyPants]

My cosplay will be original!

[Kaligraphic]

There is one thing new. And I have it in a jar.

[Golden_Griff]

That's a question that I've asked my self many times before as well.

Take fashion for example: these bell bottom jeans and bell-sleeved shirts that the whippersnappers think are so trendy? from the 70s (yeah I had to learn that one myself). Same thing with music: you hear a song with a nice beat to it, 3 days later on the radio you hear the same beat but different and much older song, and then 5 hours later you hear the song THAT song was derived from.

I think that there are still some things out there that we as humans have yet to see, but at the same time it's "all been done" seems like.

[Puguni]

I read Sophie's World, and they had a blurb about this which interested me hugely. It's a philosophy book, so it's a philosophical answer.

Anything ever imagined always stemmed from something we've experienced or seen. We can't make truly fantastical creatures from our mind; notice how the unicorn or the elf resemble things that we see or are familiar with. Aliens take human characteristics, even though we can't possibly know what they look like. We're always tagging unknown things with the familiar. A common phrase about foreign food is, "It taste like chicken." How else can you describe it?

Art, as you mentioned, can't be truly original, but it can be original in the sense that it takes a view that is seldom considered, ie. whoever thought of mixing Arabian music with Country music [though, I highly doubt it...^^;] ? Perhaps there are infinite possibilities of combinations or different views, but you can't simply pull a totally new, nobody-has-thought-of-it-but-you idea out of your brain.

[GhostontheNet]

I read Sophie's World, and they had a blurb about this which interested me hugely. It's a philosophy book, so it's a philosophical answer.

Anything ever imagined always stemmed from something we've experienced or seen. We can't make truly fantastical creatures from our mind] ? Perhaps there are infinite possibilities of combinations or different views, but you can't simply pull a totally new, nobody-has-thought-of-it-but-you idea out of your brain.

Hmm, the description of David Hume's philosophy of miracles and the like in Sophie's World? Hume, being one of the most arrogant philosophers ever as regards miracles (a lot more so than the book implies) would have on that criterion probably have dismissed the existence of the duck billed platypus or the okapi using those criteria. After all, if we didn't actually have these animals in captivity, they would be a lot easier to explain as fairy tales then living creatures. In music, for example (coming from my underground music bias), the key is creating a unique combination of already existing elements and themes drawing on some tradition or other.

[SnoringFrog]

Some ideas or concepts may at first seem to be completely original, but upon closer inspection, they often turn out to be nothing more than a conglomeration of numerous other things, and thus are only original in the way they were combined, not in the actual idea.

So, while many things may appear as though they are new, I don't think anything really is or has been for a good while.

[Seppuku]

hm i do believe there is always room for originality, if everything is takin up then combine them to make something new ^ - ^ <- makes techno

[agasfas]

I've somethings wondered the same idea... I do agree that many things are just variations of other ideas, but there are always unique people coming up with new and orginal ideas... photography or art is something that has unique meaning and beauty to the creator. People may take a photo of similar things, but the meaning behind them may a bit different- which makes them somewhat orginal. though one way I look at is that my thoughts and feelings are original to myself and I doubt others have all the same thoughts and feelings I do ^_^

[Maledicte]

"It's all been done...(woo woo woo) It's all been done (woo woo woo)
It's all been dooooooooone....befoooooooooore" ~ the Barenaked Ladies

I second Golden_Griff on the grounds of fashion. It's rather sad, how already we've gone back to the 80's. They can't seem to think of anything new anymore *cries*

[Seppuku]

>< lol i hate that song

tho i luv th bnl

[Bobtheduck]

As I've been working on my photography and a little bit of graphic design, I've been wondering this question: Is there really anything original? Nothing that hasn't been done before by someone else? I know, for example, that when God first created the world and people they were inventing new things all the time - music, agriculture, etc. So I guess it is possible to make totally new things (Just thought of that this second, actually xD). Do you think everything new has been used up? I've also heard since God is infinate, there must be infinate possibilities. I was just wondering everyone's opinions on this.

Everything is new, but nothing is absolutely new... that's the most basic answer...

Everything is new because every person is unique, and so the exact thing can't happen the exact way numerous times because it would be different people or at the least different points in those people's lives, not to mention issues not involving people.

Nothing is entirely new because everything humans do have to have something we've experienced or learned about as its basis... We have to take everything from something... It's just combining it in a way that we've never seen, that's what originality is.

There is no absolute originality, it's not possible...

[Slater]

Solomon: The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.


HUUUWAHHH

[Wind]

Iwill use an example from my own life

My fantasy novel I am writing is very loosely based of lord of the rings and then JRR tolkien based his books alot of the ancient legend Beowulf among others

Every one is inspired by something else I am always inspired when i draw usually by God through what I see around me and then i draw it sometimes or I just draw what comes naturally

I agree there is no complete originality

[Myoti]

I believe it was Barnum who said something to the extent of (maybe some *coughKaecough* can find it):

"True genius is finding what is already there that no one ever noticed."

I take for examply favorite manga writer, Eiichiro Oda. Looking at his work, there's many, MANY things you can recognize from other stories/series. The way the at resembles Akira Toriyama's work, Usopp's design being a take of Pinocchio, "Zoro," the rubber abilties (or most of the abilities and powers), etc. Yet, it is one of the most "original" stories I've read in quite awhile, not because of the content itself, but how that content is put together.

It's... kinda like MacGyver, if you think about it. XD

[desperado]

A reaccuring theme of originality is those who find it either become insanely rich, quickly dead, or lost because the sheer scope of the idea cannot be proccessed by the people at the time, hence the term ahead of its time.