Sell me on history/how & why do you study history?

[Narz]

Hi. My dad was big into history. He has a library full of books on ancient Rome, Greece, European history in general, American history, war history, philosophy, etc. In school however I became disenchanted with history, mostly we were quizzed on dates, names of people & places & the context of what was happening & why, the motivations of the people acting were either superficially dealt with or not dealt with at all. Thus I became disenchanted with remembering specific details about history.

To give another example. I'm a avid chess player & all the time I talk to chess players who are fascinated with historical chess figures, who can identify the "styles" of many of the past world champions, remember dates & the chronological order of who was champion. However, they're usually not as good as me at playing the actual game. Which is fine of course, I'm just more motivated in that direction, perhaps they get more pleasure from it than me, who seeks mainly to win.

Don't get me wrong, I find listening to learned folks talking about the past fascinating. Right now I'm listening to this lecture on Buddhism & it's very helpful in understanding the Buddha & his teachings to hear the historical context they came from. Learning about the ancient Vedic religion & why people were already starting to get disenchanted with it in Buddha's lifetime, the rise of the merchant class, the Axial age, it's all fascinating. But I can't really be motivated to commit it all to memory in any rigorous fashion. It just flows over me & I hope to pick up the relevant details that can better my life & just enjoy the tale for what it is.

How do you view history? And why do you view it that way? Are you a rigorous connoisseur or a casual appreciator or not care at all (probably unlike as those types will skim past this thread).

I tend to think people who really savor learning & respinning history are important, I just don't think I'm one of them. It seems both art & science, especially ancient history or even 19th century & before. You have to try to deduce what chornicals are real, which are fabricated/embellished & get into the mind of the historical person writing (their motivations, their fears, etc.).

Anyway, just a random thread at 3AM that will eventually be forgotten history itself.

 

[classical_hero]

Well my personal motto is the quote from Edmund Burke: Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it. That is why it is important to learn from history, so we avoid the mistakes of the past.

 

[Tee Kay]

Mainly, I read history because it's one big, smashing tale. Loads and loads of colourful characters (all the people that ever lived!), all kinds of interesting happenings, the curious waves and movements, the settings, the intrigues... better than any fiction.

It's also one big prologue to the present day. History explains how we got here, how the world is what it is rather than what it could be. It explains the differences in culture and mentality. Politics, economics, religion, science, art, medicine... you can't understand any of these without delving into some history. And once you start looking into it, you see that everything is connected in strange and interesting ways. Basically, history is the common thread that runs through all human thoughts and all human endeavours.

 

[phoenix_sprite]

Mainly, I read history because it's one big, smashing tale. Loads and loads of colourful characters (all the people that ever lived!), all kinds of interesting happenings, the curious waves and movements, the settings, the intrigues... better than any fiction.

It's also one big prologue to the present day. History explains how we got here, how the world is what it is rather than what it could be. It explains the differences in culture and mentality. Politics, economics, religion, science, art, medicine... you can't understand any of these without delving into some history. And once you start looking into it, you see that everything is connected in strange and interesting ways. Basically, history is the common thread that runs through all human thoughts and all human endeavours.

Wonderfully worded.

For myself, I love history because I think it's entertaining to read and informative at the same time. I can get lost in history books in a fashion that scares me a bit, time usually flies by, but I guess that's the point you know you're really into what you're doing.

I don't think I'd ever *try* to make it into a profession or career for fear that I'd grow to dislike it.

 

[Murky]

I don't know exactly why but I feel an emotional connection to the past, especially Ancient Rome and early American History. Those are the two I have studied the most. I've read some on the medieval history and Napoleon too, but it just didn't connect in the same way for me. I think you have to find something in history that tickles your insides to get into it.

 

[rugbyLEAGUEfan]

That's just awesome Tailless . I started to post and got distracted , came back and read yours and now it's pointless to do so .

 

[Mise]

Mainly, I read history because it's one big, smashing tale. Loads and loads of colourful characters (all the people that ever lived!), all kinds of interesting happenings, the curious waves and movements, the settings, the intrigues... better than any fiction.

It's also one big prologue to the present day. History explains how we got here, how the world is what it is rather than what it could be. It explains the differences in culture and mentality. Politics, economics, religion, science, art, medicine... you can't understand any of these without delving into some history. And once you start looking into it, you see that everything is connected in strange and interesting ways. Basically, history is the common thread that runs through all human thoughts and all human endeavours.

Indeed, well put.

--

Reasons to learn history:
1) It makes you a more interesting person
2) It provides a wider context to current events
3) It allows you learn from leaders' mistakes of the past
4) It provides a broad set of data with which you can analyse how and why sovereigns, leaders, peoples, individuals, movements, etc act
5) It's fascinating.

 

[Tee Kay]

3) It allows you learn from leaders' mistakes of the past

And successes.

 

[Joecoolyo]

I like the way tailless answered this in another similar thread in the history forum (his post here is also very good); history is simply fascinating.

 

[aronnax]

Because you want your Parodox Interactive Mod to be as accurate as possible.

What Tailess said really. Most important, because it is interesting. I doubt the most seasoned historian nitpicks on the dates of every important event in his field. I think people who study and read history do it because 1) they want to know what happened, 2) why it happened and 3) how it shapes our lives today. And you feel the magical feeling of the history's weight on you when you read about a battle, walk through a temple or palace or learn that your current political system is a result of centuries of historical and legal evolution.

 

[Dachs]

Why study biology, literature, physics, or computer science? Because it interests you. I can't make you care about the Committee for Union and Progress, and you sure as hell can't make me care about Newtonian physics.

---

I disagree with many, if not most, of the responses in this thread, chiefly because they have attempted to describe why history is "useful" and, for the most part, have failed. I have opinions about why teaching history is important and useful, but I think they lie outside the scope of this thread.

 

[Tee Kay]

I will regret this, but




please do elaborate.

 

[Dreadnought]

I have my own reasons for studying history (mainly because the personalities of history are so fascinating) but the question "Why study history?" in the general sense has varied throughout history; and that answer is much too long to write in a single post.

 

[Smellincoffee]

In my younger days I loved history in part because it showed me that human beings are more alike than we are different, and knowing history allowed me to feel connected to people across the centuries. As Tailless mentioned and the rest of us can only echo, history is also exceptional entertainment. As I've grown older I've learned to appreciate history more deeply. I know now what no history teacher in elementary school ever told me: the litany of facts and dates isn't important isn't important. What matters is that you realize history is a way of understanding reality -- of 'knowing the tides in which we move'. Studying the record of human actions gives us insight into how people behave; it gives us a massive collection of connected events that allow us to understand cause and effect. Studying history can reveal to us that we are often motivated by things we're not even aware of -- that our culture, our mental environment, is transient, ever-changing. It allows us to realize that the way things are not is not the way they have to be: they can change, and will change.

 

[Dachs]

I will regret this, but




please do elaborate.

I originally did, but deleted the overwhelming majority of my post on the grounds that I was having trouble making it coherent.

My problem is chiefly with the assertion that one should learn from the past in order to avoid repeating the mistakes of dead people. But history is nothing without context, and comparing what happened a long time ago to what is happening now strips that away. More fundamentally, though, history has little to no predictive power. This isn't Newtonian physics, where you can hit a pool ball and figure out more or less where it's going to go. There are simply too many variables. Two different people, both with ample understanding of the history behind a situation and both well trained in critical thinking, can have two well-thought-out, logically consistent opinions on how that situation will turn out that differ from each other in fundamental ways. The past can never dictate the actions of those in the present; it can only contextualize them.

 

[Glassfan]

Here's some context.

 

[Tee Kay]

I originally did, but deleted the overwhelming majority of my post on the grounds that I was having trouble making it coherent.

My problem is chiefly with the assertion that one should learn from the past in order to avoid repeating the mistakes of dead people. But history is nothing without context, and comparing what happened a long time ago to what is happening now strips that away. More fundamentally, though, history has little to no predictive power. This isn't Newtonian physics, where you can hit a pool ball and figure out more or less where it's going to go. There are simply too many variables. Two different people, both with ample understanding of the history behind a situation and both well trained in critical thinking, can have two well-thought-out, logically consistent opinions on how that situation will turn out that differ from each other in fundamental ways. The past can never dictate the actions of those in the present; it can only contextualize them.

I agree almost completely. I'd only say that while the "lessons" of the past can't be applied directly to the present, historical happenings are still important as case studies, from which insights can be drawn, adapted and applied to contemporary issues. In any case, helping to contextualise present happenings is valuable enough.

 

[Dachs]

I agree almost completely. I'd only say that while the "lessons" of the past can't be applied directly to the present, historical happenings are still important as case studies, from which insights can be drawn, adapted and applied to contemporary issues. In any case, helping to contextualise present happenings is valuable enough.

See? No regret involved.

 

[Glassfan]

Back in the day, "Social Policy History" was the fad. I was in competition for a full PhD. scholarship at Case-Western Reserve University (lost). The idea was that our dumb leaders could use a Staff Historian to show them historical context for current problems. It apparently didn't work out. I see such types teaching in university departments instead of working in the "real world".

In the "real world", organizations have institutional memory - or none at all. Historians are entirely irrelevant and invisible to them. Or in the case of the self-important, ego-driven leaders, a pet historian to record their achievements (ie., JFK & Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.).

 

[Mise]

I originally did, but deleted the overwhelming majority of my post on the grounds that I was having trouble making it coherent.

My problem is chiefly with the assertion that one should learn from the past in order to avoid repeating the mistakes of dead people. But history is nothing without context, and comparing what happened a long time ago to what is happening now strips that away. More fundamentally, though, history has little to no predictive power. This isn't Newtonian physics, where you can hit a pool ball and figure out more or less where it's going to go. There are simply too many variables. Two different people, both with ample understanding of the history behind a situation and both well trained in critical thinking, can have two well-thought-out, logically consistent opinions on how that situation will turn out that differ from each other in fundamental ways. The past can never dictate the actions of those in the present; it can only contextualize them.

I don't think anyone in this thread thinks that history has "predictive power" in the way that Newtonian physics has predictive power. What tailless said about "case studies" is more the point; you learn from other people's experiences with, say, segregation or European diplomacy. "Person X did action A and it turned out bad; the reasons why it turned out bad are P, Q and R; P, Q and R are still relevant today." What's wrong with saying that? Sure, someone might say "this time it's different", but that debate is still valuable, isn't it? And the debate is made all the more informed by having historical precedents as aides.

I really don't think anyone is trying to say that there's only ever one lesson that could possibly be learnt from a particular historical event, in the way that there is only ever one physical law that can explain a particular experimental finding.