I’m going to put forth a thought experiment. I imagine that I’ll get one or two comments about it, but I’d like to get more. Chances are I’ll probably get zero. So it goes to my point here.
I am going to write an intellectual academic paper. It makes a good argument. It has a proposal, it has thoroughly investigated rebuttals, propositions for solutions and faults, etc., but it does not site one single person in the history of written material.
Would I ever get published by a reputable journal, say?
My answer is, no. And then, why?
In in a paper I am currently writing I introduce the question of why it should matter whether someone came up with an idea that someone else already came up with, that is, in Philosophy or in critical theory or something like that.
Often, we will hear as a critique of someone’s work that it is derivative, or that someone else said it better, or that someone else said the same thing 300 years ago.
Why should that discredit or devalue at all what this other person said presently?
Chances are if the person comes up with a conclusion that other people already came up with, I would guess that the person is only putting this particular idea in a context which address is the current situation. So I’m not sure why the person’s proposal would be set aside or devalued because they didn’t reference all the other people who said something similar.
Why is it important to reference other people?

The Veritable Counsel 
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