Quote:
Originally Posted by tater
People tend to only notice bias contrary to their own. So if you think there is little bias in your particular are of interest, it likely just means you share the same biases.
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True. I would just hope that the years in university have taught me to recognize my own biases, write them down to the readers of my texts to evaluate on their own, and to look at each research text I'm reading without thinking if I agree with it or not, but by thinking how it's written.
I would hope I wouldn't start blaming the bias of the writers at any point, but instead conclude on more scientific merits if their research is good or not. Likewise I would hope I could just shrug and chuckle the next time someone calls me a Soviet symphatizer because I didn't use 35 pages of the 40 page seminar thesis to tell how evil the Soviet cinema system was. (Not referring to this thread, as it hasn't happened here.)
I would hope that is what separates me, a future professional of history, from the countless of people thinking they are experts in history because they can read. For history is a difficult science, because it makes everyone an expert. Everyone who can read can also read history. They are usually even free to go and study the original sources themselves. They can do most of the things professionals can, but that doesn't make them professionals.
As a professor in my university so well summarized it: "It's very difficult to debate with commoners [poor translation by me, but he didn't mean it as an insult], because they know so much."