Left Wing Historical Revisionism

[tater]

I would never pretend not to be biased. Being human, I can't help it. All one can do (if they even wish to) is to try and make it more subtle.

My bias is going to always be clear where "death by government" is concerned. Put 2 countries next to each other, and the one with the bigger democide body count is worse (bigger by number, or ratio of population). The US killed at least a few hundred thousand civilians that might not have been killed, but the japs bumped off millions (and that's without going into bombing actually saving net lives, which it very likely did (doesn't suck less if you're the one getting bombed, though)).

As for "professionals," it's more a matter of time than anything else. Primary sources, for example. I'm very well read in a few areas of history (ww2 in particular), and I am long past "popular" mass-market books in ww2, anyway. Still, I simply don't have the time or inclination to look at primary sources much except for some stuff on the net now (many of the post-war interrogations of japanese officers are now online, and are fascinating reads). It clearly gets far more complex as you get farther back into ancient history, as you need to start thinking about archeology, etc. "Primary sources" would be a dream come true for many areas/eras, no?


History is NOT a "science," however.

[MH]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

And often when reading these forums I find myself being very happy for it.

With me its quite opposite.
That's why i don't ignore jerks like Tribesman.

That's again may be due to lack of academic tools on my side.

"Revisionist History" is not necessarily a bad thing as new evidence emerges due to the declassification of documents, accessing previously unused sources or for any number of reasons.

All history is subjective and bias inevitable. Dig deep and most historical accounts of anything are riddled with mythology, propaganda and the apocryphal accepted as "Truth" or "Fact". Few historians have matched Thucydides for objectivity.

Here at SubSim some of the most respected historical works that are constantly referenced by respected Members of the Forum are in many respects "revisionist" in how their interpretation of event differ from the conventional account.

Shattered Sword rewrites the Battle of Midway in a manner that answered many of those nasty little logical contradictions in the mainstream narratives.

Hitler's U-Boat War changed the narrative of the Battle of the Atlantic by concentrating on the convoys that got through instead of the traditional merchant ship body-count and feasting on the Allied disasters that featured in most popular works.

Currently great work is being done on the history of World War 1 as German records believed lost in Allied bombing raids or carted off into captivity in 1945 are discovered in archives where they have laid for decades. More English language historians are using French, Belgian, Austrian and Russian documents previously ignored or unavailable and these are challenging the orthodoxy of the common accounts of the war and backing up the new narrative with some impressive evidence.

There are certainly some schools of thought that intentionally project their political or social agendas into history. Rather than raving about them, one should identify their bias, deconstruct their arguments and offer up evidence that suits your agenda. Because you know you have one: we all do somewhere.

It's a great time to have an interest in history if one can keep an open and skeptical mind.

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

And often when reading these forums I find myself being very happy for it.

Originally Posted by MH

With me its quite opposite.

I agree with both of you. Here in interwebz I don't mind that trench warfare to which discussion here often go (atleast with formula politics+usa). Face-to-face I prefer more hegemonic people.

Originally Posted by MH

That's why i don't ignore jerks like Tribesman.

I try not to but sometimes temptation is quite high. Its good that discussions with Tribesman happen here in boards and not face-to-face.

[Hottentot]

Originally Posted by tater

History is NOT a "science," however.

Elaborate, please.

[August]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

Elaborate, please.

According to Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, the definition of science is "knowledge attained through study or practice," or "knowledge covering general truths of the operation of general laws, esp. as obtained and tested through scientific method [and] concerned with the physical world."

How do you test history using scientific methodology?

[GoldenRivet]

Want an unbiased account?

Read "flyboys"

War is hell, WWII in the PTO was a unique special kind of hell on earth.

I'll never read that book again.

[August]

Originally Posted by GoldenRivet

Want an unbiased account?

Read "flyboys"

War is hell, WWII in the PTO was a unique special kind of hell on earth.

I'll never read that book again.

I read it. There may have been worse places to get shot down over than Chi Chi Jima but none come to mind.

[Hottentot]

Originally Posted by August

How do you test history using scientific methodology?

What does the dictionary say about "social sciences"? I'm genuinely curious.

Just for the record since I'm not a native speaker: the Finnish language doesn't in normal use make a distinction between the sciences. We naturally have a term for natural sciences as well as social sciences, but refer to these generally just as "sciences", for example "history science". If your definition of science in English concerns natural sciences, then I can understand the point.

However, if you exclude social sciences completely from the scientific field, then I must disagree.

[MH]

Originally Posted by August

How do you test history using scientific methodology?

You mix it with theological one sometimes.
To be good historian you need to be analytical and psychologist and have some good knowledge of the period in time and its mentality.
Then you make educated guesses(like in archaeology) when no concrete evidence exists-which is the fun part and problematic one also bias prone.
Some so called facts can be interpreted differently and given different wight therefore outcome can vary.
The question then is if those so called interpretation are within the established academic norm that also may vary in between between different institutions in some cases.

[Stealhead]

Boy I am I glad that I get my historical information from the most trusted source The History Channel.

Personally I think any "historian" is going to have some bias one way or another which is why the person digesting the information needs come in expecting there to be some angle this is why it is best to read about a given topic from multiple points of view(short of blatantly biased stuff) if you read every angle you can better understand the "truth" as they say.

I always like accounts written by ones that where there such as E.B. Sledge
just a person telling what they saw and did nothing more.

By they way some what related to the topic has anyone every seen the film "City of Life and Death" it is about Nanking in 1937 it a Chinese film but the Japanese
are all Japanese actors interestingly enough.

I don't know if this is the case with every Japanese but my friends wife is Okinawan and she obviously went to Japanese schools and they are taught a very revisionist
view on Japans role in WWII.

[August]

double post

[August]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

What does the dictionary say about "social sciences"? I'm genuinely curious.

Just for the record since I'm not a native speaker: the Finnish language doesn't in normal use make a distinction between the sciences. We naturally have a term for natural sciences as well as social sciences, but refer to these generally just as "sciences", for example "history science". If your definition of science in English concerns natural sciences, then I can understand the point.

However, if you exclude social sciences completely from the scientific field, then I must disagree.

The science label is thrown around pretty loosely these days but you should agree that there is a rather large difference between the natural and social when it comes to demonstrating cause and effect.

[Hottentot]

Originally Posted by August

The science label is thrown around pretty loosely these days.

History, as in the research of the past, is an academic discipline taught in (Western) universities since the 19th century. It has formed its methods of systematically gaining knowledge of the unknown. It is as dedicated to this goal as any science should be. It changes when new discoveries are made and discussion is based on new interpretations of old theories. It aspires for knowledge of the past, while it may not ever be completely possible.

How is that not scientific?

Sorry, I replied before you edited. You are right, there is a clear difference between social sciences and natural sciences. It is much more easy (at least according to my layman knowledge of natural sciences) to prove that 1 + 1 is 2, than to prove what Julius Caesar thought when the invaded Britain. History can also use more definitive methods such as statistics, but it's still often based on the best material we can work with and in the end is always subject to interpretation because we can't ask Caesar directly.

I would consider history a science more because of the things I wrote in the first paragraph. Especially if you compare what "history" and writing it were before evolving into a more scientific direction.

[CCIP]

The definition of natural science and evidentiality is also a problematic one. In the end, the tricky thing is that no science is free of values and observer bias - even the 'hardest' and most natural, which by the way are some of the more problematic ones philosophically precisely because of claims to positivism.

Historiography as a field of study exists exactly for that reason - to develop forms, norms and measures for history. In that sense, history is even somewhat more reflective than many other sciences on its methods, because it constantly returns to questions of "why" and "how", and doubts itself more readily.