Talk:Plagiarism/@comment-133.45.178.129-20110301074024/@comment-82.43.146.10-20110309141711

I wrote a PhD thesis 10 years back. A modified version is now available as a book. The most that I borrowed without reference was a joke from a John Wyndham novel that even then I modified into a different wise-crack. Everywhere else I used someone else's writing, I set it out, if short, in inverted commas or, if lengthy, in an indented paragraph with increased leading above and below, and I added a footnote showing the author and work title. 'Dr' Gadaffi has taken sizeable chunks of other people's works and presented them, either in an exact form or with minor tweaking, as his own, calculated at close to 10 per cent of his thesis.

Yes, it's true that Gadaffi's fraud would have remained unnoticed had things remained calm in Libya. But, all the same, the man is a cheat. And I would say that even if I hadn't spent three years of my life doing a PhD.

Here's a poser: how will the academic establishment in Britain deal with the fall-out from this case should Gadaffi's government refuse to fall? Will it issue a statement denying the allegations of fraud?