To what extent is historical information more reliable than scientific information or vice versa? History is a collection of important events mostly written by the victors. Whereas, Natural or human sciences are information about the universe as well as the human mind and body. But, to what extent is one reliable more than the other? History is an interesting Area of Knowledge and relies on many Ways of Knowing in order to function and to be understood. By understanding how these Ways of Knowing are used in History one can determine how reliable historical information is. Natural and Human science can also be understood using Ways of Knowing and then judged how reliable they are compared to historical information.
Historical information relies on one main Way of Knowing: memory. Memory plays an important role as historical information is derived from primary sources that rely on their memory to provide historical information. To support this a real life situation can be applied. During the time Stalin was the ruler of Russia many events occurred on a daily basis in the life of a farmer. When a Russian farmer is interviewed by British reporter about how a farmer’s life was like during the rule of Stalin, he/she will talk about all the hard work he/she had done to grow crops and increase the production rate. In this real life situation, the farmer being interviewed is mainly relying on memory in order to provide historical information. Through the use of memory a farmer is able to provide the interviewer with correct information about a farmer’s life during the rule of Stalin in Russia. This shows that historical information taken from primary sources is correct and reliable to many extents.
There is also a counter claim that can b...
... middle of paper ...
...bility of historical and scientific information.
To what extent is historical information more reliable than scientific information or vice versa? The answer to this question depends from source to source. It depends mainly on the reporter/documenter as well as the context of the information. Historical information can be influence by memory, emotion and language. This influence makes the historical information biased and unreliable. In contract, scientific information does not have many weaknesses. Certain aspects of science such as pseudoscience are unreliable, but other sciences such as chemistry, biology and physics are a collection of proven facts and are reliable. Hence, scientific information is more reliable than historical information.
Works Cited
http://www.johndclare.net/Russ9.htm http://www.higherpowertech.com/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radionics
In conclusion, it is through these contradictions between history and memory that we learn not to completely rely on either form of representation, due to the vexing nature of the relationship and the deliberate selection and emphasis. It is then an understanding that through a combination of history and memory we can begin to comprehend representation. ‘The Fiftieth Gate’ demonstrates Baker’s conclusive realisation that both history and memory have reliability and usefulness. ‘Schindler’s List’ reveals how the context of a medium impacts on the selection and emphasis of details. ‘The Send-Off’ then explains how the contradiction between memory and history can show differing perspectives and motives.
The most successful approaches to the public’s acceptance of scientific information are the cues from political leaders, persuasive syntax, the use of narratives, and research into a scientific source’s
New discoveries are constantly made that alter how history is currently documented. Loewen’s research shows that the majority of textbooks remain unaffected by recent research (Loewen 5). Again, the story of Columbus keeping the title of the "discoverer of America", despite what recent research shows, comes into play. The historians neglect to update the information and instead just clone the already published textbooks. The historians ignore the change and leave the “facts” as they had been told up to that point. Because they neglect to update the information, textbooks are
“ Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” (32) That is one of the “Ingsoc” parties motto. Some of the characters in 1984, characters spent their days rewriting history to what the party wants, changing history. In today’s world, people depend on the internet, google or yahoo. But can those sources be trusted? Some websites aren’t what you think, like Wikipedia. Anyone can edit an article on Wikipedia, saying false information. So what is true? You will never know because nobody looks at encyclopedias anymore, they look at the internet because its faster. But is it more reliable?
The study of past events have been a common practice of mankind since the verbal telling of stories by our ancestors. William Cronon, in his article “Why the Past Matters,” asserts that the remembrance of the past “keeps us in place.” Our individual memories and experiences shape how we act in our daily lives. In addition to influencing us at an individual level, our collective history binds us together as a society. Without knowing where we have been or what we have experienced, it is nearly impossible to judge progress or know which courses of action to pursue. The goal of the historian is to analyze and explain past events, of which they rarely have firsthand memory of, and apply the gained knowledge to make connections with current and future events.
A beginning group of historians to take a closer look at is the empiricists. The empiricists have a very strictly factual and logical view on history and how to examine it. They believe that past is both “observable and verifiable” and that through adherence to three strict principles, the past can be represented objectively and accurately. (Green, Troup 3) The three aforementioned principles can be summed up as: meticulously examining historical evidence and verifying the evidence with references, making sure the research is completely impartial and free of biases and prejudices, and using an inductive, or observational, method of reasoning. (Green, Troup 3) The empiricists seek to find universal historical truths through objective research and sticking to the facts.
When you look up the dictionary, the definition of 'Science' is "a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged and showing the operation of general laws" (Webster's dictionary). In order to make a truth, many scientists take the time to observe or test with scientific method. In nineteenth century, there are some incorrect truths even if it looks like truths logically arranged by scientific method because the scientists understood the priori that already assumed the outcome would be the same as their predictions. As I read Stephen Jay Gould's argument from "Women's Brains", he found some unequal conditions that supported scientific method for intelligence of man. Paul Broca tried to measure the inferiority of women with scientific certitudes that were invidious comparisons such as races, classes, and sexes.
History is the study of the past. It is the combination of many different interpretations divided over different languages, cultures, and individuals. It is “fragments of knowledge that we put together” (Bishop). With that said, I believe that new information will disturb the already unstable model of the historical past. This is demonstrated through history’s influence on our emotion and sense perception.
John Lewis Gaddis, in his book, The Landscape of History, generates a strong argument for the historical method by bringing together the multiple standpoints in viewing history and the sciences. The issue of objective truth in history is addressed throughout Gaddis’s work. In general, historians learn to select the various events that they believe to be valid. Historians must face the fact that there is an “accurate” interpretation of the past ceases to exist because interpretation itself is based on the experience of the historian, in which people cannot observe directly (Gaddis 10). Historians can only view the past in a limited perspective, which generates subjectivity and bias, and claiming a piece of history to be “objective” is simplistic. Seeing the world in a multidimensiona...
Does science depend upon the findings and possession of other types of knowledge for its effective running or is it directly based on scientific reasoning?
We are all taught essentially the same things in school. We learn of the presidents and what they did and when they did it. But we know, as adults, that we did not get all the facts or even a portion of the correct facts in regards to history. In the essay, "The Historian and His Facts," Edward Hallett Carr shares a bit of insight into the people who record history and write about it. We are given a deeper understanding of historians and just what it is they do and what they know. By doing so Carr gives the reader an opportunity to question much of the history that we are exposed to and taught. The historian Barbara Tuchman says that the most common question asked of historians by the public is whether history serves a purpose and whether we can learn from the lessons of history (Tuchman 608).
Considering the counter arguments and the similarities between the AoKs, it is reasonable to say that both AoKs must work together to understand past, and future actions. Their similarities make them compatible Aoks and the differences also act as strengths because a PoK in one AoK can be balanced by the other Aok. For example, history cannot rerun the events of the past to know, for example, the exact date of a disaster. But through geography and analysis of information collected, the important dates can be discovered. After analysis of the claim, it is possible to conclude that there is truth in the title but its implication that the two must contrast is false because the human scientist and the historian can both individually understand the past and change the future and they can have an even greater impact by working together.
This opens the possibilities for the historian to research and thus history can be considered as a ‘Human Science’ (Smith). The major difference between history and human science is the way in which the scientist uses tools while the historian uses facts and figures. Feyerabend explains that an allegory presented by the human scientist depends on egotism, ideals, and the perspective of other forms of knowledge, and is not enveloped by method, evidence, reason or argument (Anderson 259). There is a big debate about whether social science is actually a science. J.S.Mill believes that while we can justify and discover unpretentious regularities in the physical world, we can also explore the connections between actions and thoughts through Mill’s Method on causation (Salmon).
Learning about history helps us learn about the humanities own reflection and what’s good or bad about it. This is just like a diary , people and by people I mean historians , just wrote what they saw and what seemed to cause a major change in society and we just happen to be reading it a couple of years later. I believe that historians actually wrote historical truth because it makes sense and it has been scientifically proven
The major strength of science is that it has uncertainty and skepticism. Science never claims to be hundred percent accurate. There is always some degree of ambiguity and probability in science. The Heisenberg’s uncertainty in quantum mechanics is a good example of this. According to the Heisenberg’s uncertainty, we can never be sure of the position of the quantum particles. There is always a degree of fuzziness in nature and a fundamental limit to what we can understand about these particles and their behavior. We can only calculate the probability of the nature of the particle and ho...