what is history?

[Tangata]

www.dictionary.com

hahahahaha

 

[WanderingMagi]

In theory, maybe. But in practice, human, not machine, writes history. Human are never completely objective and without bias. So what's the point of calling history "factual reality of what happened" when it has never been written that way, and probably will never be?

Very true: but I don't think what we write is history at all, but the reflection of it.

Also, if we are to do our best at presenting some form of useful history that is similar to past event and from which we may learn, then we must hold up the ideal of history, unattainable though it is.

WanderingMagi

 

[Haethurn]

Very true: but I don't think what we write is history at all, but the reflection of it.

Also, if we are to do our best at presenting some form of useful history that is similar to past event and from which we may learn, then we must hold up the ideal of history, unattainable though it is.

WanderingMagi

History is objective. You can't tell me that students of history don't learn objective reasoning skills. The ability to sift through conflicting accounts of events in the past and come to a confident conclusion is an application of objective reasoning that is useful to any proper citizen.

 

[WanderingMagi]

History is objective. You can't tell me that students of history don't learn objective reasoning skills.

I agree history is objective - but not what I, a historian, do.
To learn objective reasoning skills is not to be objective: it permits at most a degree of objectivity in your reasoning.
In history, no one ever comes to a confident conclusion about things that matter or are interesting. We may be able to say 'x happened' but saying confidently what x is or why it happened is almost impossible.
One of the most noticeable things about historians is just how good they are at disagreeing: the same evidence always results in different conclusions, and history is one of the fastest moving fields around - a book's out of date (though still useful) in a couple of years. You know absolutely, like most academics, that you may be great for perhaps a decade, mabye a bit more, but a good few years before you are dead people will laugh at what you write more than they will read it.

The ability to sift through conflicting accounts of events in the past and come to a confident conclusion is an application of objective reasoning that is useful to any proper citizen.

Absolutely! Studying history is great!

WanderingMagi