Defence of originality?

Considering how difficult it is to find a job at the moment, I am going to try to make a concerted effort to blog down some of my thoughts over the next few weeks.

I personally don't feel that I am at all original or creative. I can see elements of things that have been done before in everything that I do and how it is based upon past experience. This is to be expected - in most cases there are systems that work, conventions to be obeyed. The first case seems to restrict originality in any practical applications and the later in anything artistic. As a society we have developed ways of doing things, for example when watching a film we have learnt how directors build up suspense, portray characteristics, etc. To deviate from these would be like finding a new way to peel an orange that takes twice as long as it does usually. It seems to be difficult for a life system developed under natural selection over millions of years to generate new ideas with a high frequency. Therefore, when I see something that is truly a new concept then I respect the creator even if I don't personally like it.

As a species, if we are to achieve our underlying goal of continued survival, we need people to come up with new ways to solve the problems facing us. For this we need people to continually think outside the box. Though we increasingly commit ourselves across the world to the same standards of living, merging cultures into a single Earthly identity and viewpoint, reducing the variety of ideas, leaving less unique perspectives. Just as we have lost plant and animal species from our fields as farmers all demand the single best varieties, will we lose variation in our cultures? Clearly, one only has to look at the increasingly Western ideals that are spreading throughout China and Eastern Europe for evidence of this. Can we survive by all researching on ways to improve the current "best" products and systems or are we leaving a large gap open in our armour where a virus destroys our chosen variety where one of those we have disregarded would have survived?

I seem therefore to be promoting diversification for the sake of originality. I also strongly believe in the freedom to be a unique individual. Thus I will include one of my favourite defences of the European Union - a collection of many different cultures, to use the motto of the organisation, "United in Diversity". I would advocate that the cultural exchange between countries helps develop new ideas and the best methods are adapted across the continent. To combat this loss of variation, cultures must be preserved and this is done by people expressing their individuality (as well as being heavily supported by EU funding). Citizens are allowed to live in any member state they like and consequently many live where the culture suits them best, preserving it and promoting it. A particular case of difference is language - the tool used to express thoughts can surely have much influence in developing them.

So as long as natural differences in humans are around, exchanges of views which have brought us so much in the past will continue to proliferate results. Though we must strive to keep them around, whilst being free to choose which ones we identify with. Even though it can't be sensible to only have one system, a uniform Earth would be incredibly dull.