Page 3 - An Evening with Maxwell's Daemons

Call to order

observance of these rules and the presentation of violations at the
beginning of each meeting. It should be obvious, however, that the
people occupying these two executive positions are, in fact, the least
successful among us in getting published. By custom, the
chairperson speaks last and the secretary next-to-last in the
sequence of presentations. Any person may bring up new business
prior to the story discussions. That business has no limitations on
subject matter, but must be brief and relevant to the organization’s
function and operations.”
“The final reason for termination is the most serious:
blackballing by conviction of plagiarism by a majority of the group.
We are here, despite the occasional acrimony of the members’
commentary, to help each other—not steal ideas. An active member
may be blackballed if it is discovered that he or she has published,
even under a pseudonym, a story based on another member’s
presentation. In such cases, the degree of similarity justifying such a
determination will be decided by the majority, following an
accusation made by any other member, whether or not he or she is
the injured party. The secretary will be responsible for finding and
playing the recording of the material allegedly pilfered, as well as
reciting relevant passages from the suspect work. The burden of
proof must be on the accuser, but each of us is sensitive enough in
protecting our work to spot telltale elements going beyond mere
coincidence. But most ideas are already in the zeitgeist, either as
inspirations from existing published works or extrapolations from
trends in science and popular culture: therefore, we cannot fault
anyone outside the group—including former members—for
‘getting there first’ with what we may feel is something original and
therefore unknown outside our circle.”
“That raises the issue of the ‘honor system’ and the character of
people in the profession to which we aspire: writers who get paid
and are recognized for their work. The implicit contract we have all
made to obtain the benefits of membership cannot be legally
enforced: actual plagiarism in a court of law requires both works to
have been published in some formal context. If any group member
feels their work to have been stolen as a result of being presented

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