While watching 2001, Ted and I noticed many things that George Lucas stole borrowed from Kubrick's venture into sci-fi. The spacepod looks like the one R2-D2 escapes in. The bulbous nose of the Jupiter vessel looks like the Death Star, complete with the crater-like cone drilled into it. When the Pan-Am space shuttle enters the bay of the rotating space station, the scene is almost identical to when the Millenium Falcon enters the Death Star. The first scene takes place in a desert, and the next on a blindingly white set.

Here are some of Goethe's words on borrowing. They are taken from Conversations with Eckermann, 18 January 1825:

Walter Scott used a scene from my Egmont, and he had a right to do so; and because he did it well, he deserves praise. He has also copied the character of my Mignon in one of his romances; but whether with equal judgement, is another question. Lord Byron's transformed Devil is a continuation of Mepistopheles, and quite right too. If, from the whim of originality, he had departed from the model, he would certainly had fared worse. Thus, my Mephistopheles sings a song from Shakespeare, and why shouldn't he? Why should I give myself the trouble of inventing one of my own, when this said just what was wanted? Also, if the prologue to my Faust is something like the beginning of Job, that is again quite right, and I am again to be praised rather than censured.