Plagiarism on "The West Wing"?

[progressivejazz]

The Jan. 7 episode of "The West Wing" just concluded for those of us using Central Time. It includes a letter from a dead President to President Bartlett. The end of the letter rang a bell with me.

Here are the last few sentences from Chapter 11 of J. Bronowski's book "The Ascent of Man", published by Little, Brown and Co. in 1973:

"We have to cure ourselves of the itch for absolute knowledge and power. We have to close the distance between the push-button order and the human act. We have to touch people."

Two of these sentences seem identical to sentences in the letter in the episode.

Coincidence or plagiarism?

Probably coincidence.

[Cleita]

1. Maybe they got permission to use it.

eom

[Cocoa]

2. I didn't see it but...

good catch, if you're right. That's pretty damn impressive recall.

[progressivejazz]

3. Not such impressive recall.

The Bronowski book was a compilation of the scripts from his PBS series of the same name.

In the series, he is standing in a pool of the effluent from the crematoria at Auschwitz when he makes the statements. As he says "We have to touch people" he bends and scoops up a handful of the effluent. One of the most memorable and moving television scenes I've ever seen.