[ambulancechaser]

> plagiarism is taking credit for someone else's ideas at their expense;

that seems like an unworkable definition. If I submit John Milton's Paradise Lost as my own work on an application to grad school, it certainly wouldn't be an "expense" to the long dead author.

Plagiarism is a fraud where you misrepresent the work of others as your own. In the academic world, what else is there but your own work?

[mjw1007]

If I discovered a lost work of Milton and pretended it was my own, then that would be acting at the expense of Milton's reputation, in the sense I mean. So I don't think it matters if the "someone else" happens to be dead.

(If I tried it with Paradise Lost there'd be no expense to their reputation, but that just means it's not a realistic example of someone attempting plagiarism.)

[thaumasiotes]

> In the academic world, what else is there but your own work?

Work published under your name but performed by anonymous flunkies. It's... the norm in the academic world, actually.