Objective Recount Of History

[realitycheck44]

After reading Megan Robinson's introduction post, I have some questions.

I am taking World History AP (I'm a sophmore in high school) and my teacher assigned some Howard Zinn articles for summer reading. I hated just about everything he said and responded very negatively to all the questions my teacher posed except one. She asked "Can history be studied objectively?" I responded with "No, because, although reality is objective and therefore history occurred objectively, it would be impossible to study it objectively because not everybody recorded it. Typically, (in the case of war) the winner would be around to give their rendition and the losers wouldn't. Even if they were, many articles were declared "heretical" and burned. "

Obviously, because Megan Robinson said in her intro post she is going to create a system by which historian can objectively recount history, my statement is false. Could you please explain why? I have thought alot about my statement, but I can't seem to find anything wrong with my logic.

While I'm on the subject of history, my teacher also said that it was impossible to be entirely objective because this would mean having no bias, which would mean disregarding your values. (She was talking about the media)

Is she talking about a different kind of objectivity? I think there is some logic to what she says. For example: If I am the editor of a newspaper and two stories cross my desk. One is about the death of a skier (who died skiing) and the other is about the death of somebody else. Being a skier, I am inclined to put the article about the skier in front of the other article (all other factors being the same). To call yourself an Objectivist (not that I do. I only read Atlas Shrugged, Anthem, and some of The Voice of Reason) does not necissarily mean that you are objective about everything does it? It just means that an objective reality exists and you should do your best to percieve it, right?

PS. I will apologize in advance. I do realize that I really need to read more Ayn Rand because it would answer many of my questions, but because of playing multiple sports and taking all the AP/honors classes, its not going to happen for a while. (Plus, my mom is pushing me to read other philosophies too.) Thanks for bearing with me!

Zak

[Megan Robinson]

Thanks for asking this question!

People oftern make the mistake of thinking that because things are percieved through a subjective human consciousness everything is subjective. This is absolutely incorrect. Subjectivists fail to realize that reality is still objective, and we use the same faculty (reason) to draw conclusions hence the same input ->the same conclusion. History is no exception.

History occured in reality, which is objective. ONE thing happened so we have to find out what that is. So we have to look at primary sources to find out what ACTUALY hasppened, and then using a set of principles evaluate and create a standard to establish the truth. This is very important. For example: some think the Shoguns were barbaric, and some think they were noble. I am not satisfied just to say "its all subjective", so by using an objective principle we can weigh the facts and come to a conclusion.

Another problem in history is ignorance of philosophy. Knowing why people did the things they did is incredibly important. Evaluating the philosophy of a people/person and determining its concisitancy and effectiveness is an important aspect of organizing experiences, our own and of those in history.

Anyway, i urge you to take your mom's advice and study other philosophies, no point in being indoctrinated. I think you'll find after a while that Rand is right. I did. I used to be an avid subjectivist. Descartes at one time was my favorite philosopher, but reason is the natural state. I can't imagine being happy any other way.

[BurgessLau]

Briefly, here are my suggestions. If you have more questions, keep asking. So far, your questions -- and the information you offer in trade -- have been valuable.

1. Make sure you know what ideas such as objectivity, subjectivity, and bias mean -- that is, what facts of reality they refer to. For example, be sure to look up "objectivity" in the Ayn Rand Lexicon, the single most valuable resource for the beginning study of Objectivism.

2. Don't swallow the false dichotomy of objectivity versus bias. Objectivity has a metaphysical meaning ("objective reality," that is reality independent of consciousness) and an epistemological meaning (the relationship between reality and the ideas formed logically from sense-perception of those facts).

3. In thinking about the issue, I conclude that, in a sense, everyone is biased, if being biased is having values that might tempt a thinker to distort his thinking, that is, follow an illogical path, in order to reach a prearranged conclusion (because of wishful thinking or group pressure to conform, for example).

One can be biased (having values involved in a particular issue) and objective (rigorously examining one's thought processes to make sure they are (1) based on facts, and (2) drawn logically from those facts.)

Can one study history objectively? Of course. Start with facts and draw conclusions logically from those facts. Easy? Not all. Even setting aside the difficulty (but not impossibility) of identifying and setting aside bias, other problems remain. First, what are the facts. Often even these are in dispute. No evidence -- whether ancient manuscripts or archaeological remains or crumbling ancient buildings -- is immediately indisputable. Active minds can -- and should -- challenge the evidence.

And even after one has settled the issue of what the evidence is, the next step is to interpret in light of everything one knows. Because different historians have varying degrees of knowledge (and guiding philosophical principles), their conclusions often differ.

History is a fascinating field. It is still in its infancy, methodologically, despite its own 2500 year history. There is a lot of room for development here, especially in its philosophical foundation. An excellent place to start is reading Leonard Peikoff with Ayn Rand as an editor, Ominous Parallels, noting the author's guiding principles and methods.

[BurgessLau]

...

She asked "Can history be studied objectively?" I responded with "No, because, although reality is objective and therefore history occurred objectively, it would be impossible to study it objectively because not everybody recorded it. Typically, (in the case of war) the winner would be around to give their rendition and the losers wouldn't. Even if they were, many articles were declared "heretical" and burned. "

Neither of these conditions (lack of total information, presence of distortion by the winners) prevents you, the historian, from being objective (in the epistemological sense: drawing ideas logically from the facts of reality).

The amount of information available from people in the past can make a historian's conclusions less sure, but paucity of evidence does not prevent a historian from drawing some conclusions.

Even when the victors write the history of a period, there are ways for later historians to objectively assess those historical accounts. For example:

Are they internally consistent? Are they consistent with each other? Inconsistencies raise questions about the veracity of the account and may offer clues to what actually happened.

Do the accounts fit the archaeological evidence? If a historian of the Middle Ages says all Vikings were rapists, thieves, and murderers, but an archaeologist analyzes the covered up foundations of a Viking settlement in England, and the remains indicate intense commercial activity with little sign of military gear -- then the medieval scribe's account is thrown into doubt.

Did the victors, on occasion, quote passages from the writings of the losers? (Sometimes those quotes can reveal evidence for a conclusion opposite the one that the victor is advocating.)

There are many ways for historians to challenge the distortions (unexamined, unchecked bias) of past writers. There are many ways for historians to partly make up for scant evidence. This is all part of the challenge of being a historian.

[realitycheck44]

3. In thinking about the issue, I conclude that, in a sense, everyone is biased, if being biased is having values that might tempt a thinker to distort his thinking, that is, follow an illogical path, in order to reach a prearranged conclusion (because of wishful thinking or group pressure to conform, for example).

One can be biased (having values involved in a particular issue) and objective (rigorously examining one's thought processes to make sure they are (1) based on facts, and (2) drawn logically from those facts.)

If your conclusions are predetermined, you are not being objective, right? You should evaluate the circumstances and logically draw conclusions from them. Simply because you are more inclined to do something doesn't mean that you can't evaluate the facts. Okay, that makes sense. Thanks.

Also, thanks for the Ayn Rand Lexicon idea. Too many times people have different notions of what certain things mean. It is really sad when you have to ask people how they define noble and barbaric (taking Megan's example). Looking up words in the dictionary also needs to be done more often, especially at my age. People (including me) have some wierd idea of what a word means and then we take offensive and get all pissed off, even though it really means something totally different.

Zak

[Free Capitalist]

As far as studying other philosophies go, that is often useful, *after* one has studied the right philosophy. And I am guessing you view Objectivism as such a philosophy, from reading the fiction books and seeing it applied to the real world.

As Megan put it nicely, *something* happened at some point in history. A historian's job is to find out what that was - using primary sources, philosophy/psychology (why men do what they do), archaeology, etc.

Also, try not to fall for the trap modern academicians set for you, where they urge you to reject objectivity of all ancient Greek/Roman historical accounts, cynically proclaiming they are all false because they were written by the victors.

[BurgessLau]

If your conclusions are predetermined, you are not being objective, right?

...

Also, thanks for the Ayn Rand Lexicon idea. Too many times people have different notions of what certain things mean. It is really sad when you have to ask people how they define noble and barbaric (taking Megan's example). Looking up words in the dictionary also needs to be done more often, especially at my age. People (including me) have some wierd idea of what a word means and then we take offensive and get all pissed off, even though it really means something totally different.

1. Right, predeterming a conclusion before looking at the facts and considering what they mean is prejudice -- that is pre-judging.

2. Keep several points in mind. As Ayn Rand explains in her Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, a word (spoken or written) is a label for an idea, and an idea (such as a concept or principle) refers to something in reality.

So, strictly speaking, words don't have meaning. It is ideas that have meaning.

This is why communication can be difficult between two or more people. One word can mean different things in different contexts. And each individual has a context of his own. (Context just means the knowledge you have that in some way affects a particular idea.)

Ideally, people can communicate best when they agree on the meaning of the words (actually ideas) they use. But arriving at a common vocabulary is difficult under the best of conditions, and sometimes it is impossible. In the former situation, a few polite questions -- What do you mean by xxxxx? -- will iron out the differences in meanings. But people who have radically different philosophies (contexts) will have a terrible time communicating.

For example, if you or I say "reality" we mean what we can see or touch. A Platonist might say, "Oh, no, that is only appearance; reality is what exists in perfection in another dimension."

3. Keep in mind that most dictionaries don't actually define words (ideas), but merely record common usages of the words. However, dictionary "definitions" are often useful as a starting point for developing a properly formed, rigorous definition of a term you are wrestling with.

When you look at The Ayn Rand Lexicon, you will see that generally the editor, Dr. Harry Binswanger, presents a definition (formal or informal) first, and subsequent excerpts elaborate that meaning.

Remember too that a definition is a kind of short-hand description. If I define "man" as a rational animal (using Aristotle's definition), then you have the two essential characteristics of every man: animality and rationality. But that definition doesn't tell you how many fingers people have or whether man can fly by swinging his arms. Those would require a full description.

[realitycheck44]

1. Right, predeterming a conclusion before looking at the facts and considering what they mean is prejudice -- that is pre-judging.

3. Keep in mind that most dictionaries don't actually define words (ideas), but merely record common usages of the words. However, dictionary "definitions" are often useful as a starting point for developing a properly formed, rigorous definition of a term you are wrestling with.

When you look at The Ayn Rand Lexicon, you will see that generally the editor, Dr. Harry Binswanger, presents a definition (formal or informal) first, and subsequent excerpts elaborate that meaning.

Remember too that a definition is a kind of short-hand description. If I define "man" as a rational animal (using Aristotle's definition), then you have the two essential characteristics of every man: animality and rationality. But that definition doesn't tell you how many fingers people have or whether man can fly by swinging his arms. Those would require a full description.

I really like that "prejudice- that is pre-judging" idea. I never thought of it that way.

I was just going off of my experiences and frustration with my classmates who think they know idea conveyed in the meaning of a word, when really they do not. Often times a dictionary really will help them. My statement was pretty random. I was just thinking about how we were studying Christianity in World History the other day, and this guy got all mad at what was really a fairly neutral statement, but he thought the word meant something offensive. It was just me venting. It usually happens with kids who have kind of a low self-esteem because they don't like to admit they don't know what it means. I hope this happens less with adults. Anyway, after re-reading my post it sounded pretty dumb- I just got back from tutoring this kid in math and was pretty frustrated.

Zak

[BurgessLau]

...

I was just going off of my experiences and frustration with my classmates who think they know idea conveyed in the meaning of a word, when really they do not. Often times a dictionary really will help them.

...

It usually happens with kids who have kind of a low self-esteem because they don't like to admit they don't know what it means. I hope this happens less with adults. Anyway, after re-reading my post it sounded pretty dumb- ...

1. Yes, dictionaries are great sources for getting a general understanding of the meaning of an idea behind a word we have never seen before. I use my dictionary daily in my readings, especially for philosophy but also frequently for readings in history.

2. Sadly, some adults are even more defensive (because, as you said, of low self-esteem) about their own ignorance. In one sense, we are all ignorant of something. Asking about something should never be an embarrassment. No one is or can be omniscient. Besides, asking someone (politely) to explain what they mean is also a very good way to find out, not only an answer, but whether the speaker knows what he is talking about. In good humor, Ayn Rand, in Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, called the "What do you mean?" question the dreaded avenger. Dishonest people cringe when asked that question. An honest person welcomes the question, because it gives him a chance to check his own understanding.

3. Your post did not sound at all dumb. You have an active mind, and minds are like muscles: They get stronger only when they are worked. Sometimes we make mistakes, but mistakes are merely opportunities for further learning. Occasional embarrassment is only a pothole on the road to learning.

[Free Capitalist]

<FC: Moved to History forum>

[punk]

History is objective in that facts are facts. What happened happened, whether you like it or not.

Most history books suffer from the same problem (although this becomes less of a problem as one goes earlier and earlier in history): there is too much material to include in the book. The author makes a selection of what is important and what is not important.

A history book can be methodologically objective. That is the author can put forth a clear methodology of how they approached the material and selected what to include and what not to include. Ideally the methodology should be clear enough that the author could have another person apply it and write their own book using the methodology and include pretty much the same material. In this case then the reader could just evaluate the worth of the book by looking at the methodology used to produce. If they agree with the methodology they have to agree with the book even if the results dont sit well with them.

Mostly the methodology isn't included (even in rudimentary form). But often it is. Often it is strongly implied in the title.

A case in point (and another thread around here) is Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States". If the title did not clue you in, he states in the introduction that his methodology involves taking all the voices that were on the losing side of American History and presenting them. That is the methodology, that is what he does (and does quite well). The book is good history in that everything in it is true. The book gives a clear methodology describing what is and is not included (Moreover it does not claim to be presenting all of American History). The book should also be complemented by another book presenting the voices of the winners in American History.

[Inspector]

First you defend Adbusters and now Howard Zinn? I'm starting to notice a pattern here... Who's next? Noam Chomsky? Stalin?

Zinn has no intention of releasing the "equal and opposite" book that you speak of. His purpose was to defecate on the freest and most capitalistic and moral nation in history and I can't believe that you don't see that.

[punk]

Are you saying there things in his book he presents as historical facts which are not true?

[Inspector]

Are you saying there things in his book he presents as historical facts which are not true?

I'm saying that there were selected with a specific purpose. Do you deny that his purpose in writing that book was what I said it was?

Below is an excerpt from a man who has a good handle on what men like Zinn and Chomsky are all about. The author is no Objectivist, but he is a good writer that is often right about these sort of things.

I believe it answers nicely your allegation that Zinn's book is "factual." Sure it is. But, Zinn is, to paraphrase, "lying like the most pernicious son of a bitch that ever lived."

Now, ask any professional magician how they pull off their illusions and every last one will tell you it’s all about misdirection. Sadly, those boring, insensitive, dead-white-male laws of physics don’t allow for quarters to disappear into thin air. So to make someone believe that precisely this has happened, we need to physically make that coin go someplace where it is not expected. And the way to do that is to make everyone look somewhere else for a moment.

Humans have retained several reflexes, and for good reason too – they keep us alive. All of today’s animals are reflexively attracted to fast motion in their field of vision. There were undoubtedly many animals that did not have this brain wiring, and these extinct animals are known by the scientific name, breakfast. If you’re a two-ounce tree shrew or a one-ton wildebeest, something moves fast in the bushes it would behoove you to give it your undivided attention.

This is hard-wired, and there’s not a damn thing we can do about it. So watch a magician carefully next time he makes a coin disappear. You’ll see one hand move quickly – and that is the hand you will watch. Coin’s in the other hand.

Misdirection.

Now to show you how this works in the real world, I need to tell you a story about a real man named Robert Wayne Jernigan. I guarantee you this story will make you very angry, but this is the kind of world we live in today.

Robert Wayne Jernigan is now 28 years old. People who knew him said he was quiet, somewhat stand-offish. He was not widely liked in high school.

Four years ago, a witness reported seeing Jernigan enter a building in a remote suburb of Dallas with an axe. Four people were found dead at the scene, including a nine year old girl. No charges were filed. Less than two days later, Jernigan turned up again, this time at the scene of a suspicious fire in a day care center. Miraculously, no one was injured. But it was just a matter of time.

During the next several weeks, it is possible to place Jernigan at the scene of no less than thirteen suspicious fires. Eleven people died. Eyewitnesses were unshakable in their determination that Jernigan had been on the scene. And yet the police did nothing.

Jernigan had long been fascinated with fire. A search of his apartment revealed fireman-related magazines, posters and memorabilia. Despite the deaths of fifteen people, despite repeated eyewitness accounts and photographic evidence placing Jernigan at these fires, no criminal charges were ever filed against Robert Wayne Jernigan. He remains a free man to this day.

And rightfully so. Because Robert Wayne Jernigan is an ordinary fireman for the Dallas Fire Department.* He is not a serial arsonist at all.

Now re-read the previous paragraphs and tell me where I lied.

Everything I told you was factually true. But the spin, the context, the misdirection… The press always reports serial killers with all three names – Robert Wayne Jernigan sounds a hell of a lot more ominous than Bobby Jernigan. Quiet, stand-offish, not widely liked – instant psychopath, if you read the papers. Entered the building with an axe – oooh! That ought to get the blood boiling. That the people had died from smoke inhalation I decided was irrelevant to the story…

And so on. And so on.

This is how you lie by telling the truth. You tell the big lie by carefully selecting only the small, isolated truths, linking them in such a way that they advance the bigger lie by painting a picture inside the viewer’s head. The Ascended High Master of this Dark Art is Noam Chomsky.

I have long admired Noam Chomsky. It must be absolutely intoxicating to be able to write so free of any ethical constraints. Chomsky flitters and darts through the vast expanse of human experience, unerringly searching out those few, isolated data points that run contrary to the unimaginably vast ocean of facts crashing ashore in the opposite direction.

Here’s a Noam Chomsky moment for those of you without enough duct tape to wrap around your heads to keep your brains from exploding while you actually read his works:

Let’s say we stand overlooking the ocean along Pacific Coast Highway. From high atop the cliffs, we look down to the waves and the sand below. I ask you what color the beach is. You reply, reasonably enough, that it is sandy white. And you are exactly right.

However, there are people who cannot see the beach for themselves because they are not standing with us on this very spot. This is where Noam earns his liberal sainthood. Noam takes a small pail to the beach and sits down in the sand.

If you’ve ever run sand through your fingers, you know that for all of the thousands upon thousands of white or clear grains, there are a few dark ones here and there, falling through your fingers. With a jewelers loupe and an EXCEEDINGLY fine pair of tweezers, you carefully and methodically pluck all of the dark grains you can find – and only the dark grains – and carefully place them, one by one, into your trusty bucket.

It will take you a long time – it has taken Chomsky decades – to fill this bucket, but with enough sand and enough time, you will eventually do so. And then, when you do, you can make a career touring colleges through the world, giving speeches about the ebony-black beaches of Malibu, and you can pour your black sand onto the lectern and state, without fear of contradiction, that this sand was taken from those very beaches.

And what you say will be accurate, it will be factually based, and you will be lying like the most pernicious son of a bitch that ever lived.

Why do so many people take this hocus-pocus at face value? Because, like any audience at a Magic show, they want to believe.

Do this long enough, and you will become an Icon– no more hours spent sorting sand for you! No sir! And finally, after a few decades as Icon, you may manufacture whatever data you need to make your case, and not one of your followers will call you on it.

Shortly after 9/11, and somewhat before the “Taliban forces did finally succumb, after astonishing endurance” St. Noam thundered that America’s “Silent Genocide” in Afghanistan would kill – pick a number, any number -- somewhere between 3 to 4 million civilians. At one point, he intimated that up to 10 million could die.

The real number was around 500.

Being Noam Chomsky means you get a pass for being wrong not by a factor of ten to one, or even a hundred to one. In Afghanistan, Chomsky was wrong by a factor of 20,000 to one. Being that wrong on a regular basis means going for a $2.99 Happy meal at McDonald’s and paying $59,800 for it. It means frugally walking out of a Nothing Over 99 Cents! store with the seven most expensive items, having just put $138,600 on your credit card. That’s how wrong Noam Chomsky is.

Misdirection. Unsubstantiated allegations. Undocumented assertions. Counting a few scattered hits and ignoring millions of misses. You can prove anything in this manner, if your audience is a willing accomplice and refuses to challenge you.

Michael Moore used exactly this technique to make people believe that America is a land of terrified, racist murderers who are armed to the teeth solely because of their fear of black people. For this he was given an Academy Award, and Bowling for Columbine has been called “the best documentary film ever made.”

I told you this story would make you angry.

(full article: http://www.ejectejecteject.com/archives/000051.html)

[punk]

I dont follow.

Are there items in Zinn's book that he presents as historical facts that are not? It is a yes/no question.

[punk]

Also, I dont see where Howard Zinn is mentioned in the passage you quoted.

[Inspector]

Also, I dont see where Howard Zinn is mentioned in the passage you quoted.

I am intimatating that he is using the same method as Chomsky (the black sand) and is doing so for the same reasons.

I cannot comment on the truth or falsehood of what is in his book. I am commenting on whether it is a GOOD BOOK and what his intentions were in writing it.

Now what about my question: do you deny that I have an accurate portrayal of Zinn's motives: i.e. to defecate on the freest nation in history BECAUSE it is the freest, most capitalistic and most moral (in its founding principles) nation in history. Do you deny that he has no intention of releasing the equal and opposite book you spoke of. Do you deny that he is a raving leftist crackpot who harbors an immense hatred of the good for being the good?

And just what is your opinion of Noam Chomsky? How about Michael Moore? You seem to be a constant apologist for man-hating leftists. That's why I included Stalin on the list.

[punk]

I am intimatating that he is using the same method as Chomsky (the black sand) and is doing so for the same reasons.

I cannot comment on the truth or falsehood of what is in his book. I am commenting on whether it is a GOOD BOOK and what his intentions were in writing it.

Now what about my question: do you deny that I have an accurate portrayal of Zinn's motives: i.e. to defecate on the freest  nation in history BECAUSE it is the freest, most capitalistic and most moral (in its founding principles) nation in history. Do you deny that he has no intention of releasing the equal and opposite book you spoke of. Do you deny that he is a raving leftist crackpot who harbors an immense hatred of the good for being the good?

And just what is your opinion of Noam Chomsky? How about Michael Moore? You seem to be a constant apologist for man-hating leftists. That's why I included Stalin on the list.

I see, guilt by association. Very rational.

So you concede that there is nothing in the HISTORY book by Howard Zinn that he presents as historically true but is really historically false.

History is history. What happened happened whether you like it or not. Facts are facts. Existence exists, A is A. If this doesn't matter to you I can only conclude you are an irrational whim-worshipper.

Chomsky, Moore, Stalin, are all irrelevant since we are discussing Howard Zinn.

[Free Capitalist]

Punk, the truth of history, just like of everything else, is contextual. Zinn, Chomsky, Moore, take facts out of context and string them together. Thus to verify whether they are right or not, it is not enough to ask whether their facts are accurate,but also whether it's accurate how these men strung those facts together, and what they try to achieve by it.

[punk]

Punk, the truth of history, just like of everything else, is contextual. Zinn, Chomsky, Moore, take facts out of context and string them together. Thus to verify whether they are right or not, it is not enough to ask whether their facts are accurate,but also whether it's accurate how these men strung those facts together, and what they try to achieve by it.

I addressed that in my initial post above. That is a methodological question. And even then I disagree with what you say. You can question the methodology because you dont like how something is being done. But you cannot dismiss a book because you dont like the result.

Historical facts are facts. All history books are going to only include a subset of historical facts. This subset will be selected by some methodology.

The methodology also includes some notion of scope. We do not fault an American History book for leaving out facts about Mongolian History. So when Zinn says at the outset that he is going to write a history book from the point of view of the losers of history, we do not fault him for leaving out the winners. That is a different book. I advise one to read such a book. "People's History of the United States" is a complement to the average history book of America from the point of view of the winners. There are plenty of these out there, so I dont see where Zinn would need to write yet another one.

I can see the complaint if I were saying "The only history book one should ever read is Zinn and no others as all the facts are there." But I am not saying any such thing.

But then I read a lot and tend to assume I'm talking to people that read a lot. I'll say it here:

If you are only going to read one history of the US dont read Zinn

If you are going to read several histories of the US, Zinn is a good one to read among them. There is much in there that is normally left out and provides a more complete picture.

But we cannot dismiss a book just because it presents facts we are uncomfortable with.

[Inspector]

Punk, the truth of history, just like of everything else, is contextual. Zinn, Chomsky, Moore, take facts out of context and string them together. Thus to verify whether they are right or not, it is not enough to ask whether their facts are accurate,but also whether it's accurate how these men strung those facts together, and what they try to achieve by it.

Thank you Free Capitalist, that was my point exactly. I believe I've made my point here, so I'm going to bow out of this discussion for the moment.

Punk, that's TWO leftist capitalism-hating crackpots that you've attempted to construe as legitimate. I wonder who the third will be...

[BurgessLau]

Punk, the truth of history, just like of everything else, is contextual. Zinn, Chomsky, Moore, take facts out of context and string them together. Thus to verify whether they are right or not, it is not enough to ask whether their facts are accurate,but also whether it's accurate how these men strung those facts together, and what they try to achieve by it.

I agree, FC. In bare bones form, I look at a particular historian's book for three factors he offers: facts, interpretation of facts, and evaluation. A historian may make an error -- or worse, an act of evasion -- at any step in that chain.

Few historians are Objectivists (and even if they are, there is no guarantee they are accurate in facts, interpretation, and evaluation). We must read about history through books written by conservatives and leftists. Both are biased. They both have values which might distort their collection of facts, their interpretation of the facts collected, and their evaluation of the results -- might, that is, if they don't use all their tools of objectivity (for example, inviting early critical reviews by other historians in the field of study).

A book that is defective in its evaluation (America is rotten) may still have its facts straight (the U. S. government largely tolerated slavery for decades and made radical changes only after a civil war had started) and even its historical interpretation correct. Such a book has value for some objective readers.

A book that is defective in its evaluation and even in its interpretation can still offer some value if the historian has brought to light facts not otherwise known to historians. Such a book has value for some objective readers.

A book that is careless in collecting facts, mistaken or dishonest in interpretation, and false in its evaluation has no value to objective readers.

If I were doing a study of the U. S. Civil War, for example, I would deliberately read histories by both conservatives and leftists -- and then compare the results for facts, methods of interpretation, and standards of evaluation.

[Tom Rexton]

If you are only going to read one history of the US dont read Zinn

If you are going to read several histories of the US, Zinn is a good one to read among them.  There is much in there that is normally left out and provides a more complete picture.

But we cannot dismiss a book just because it presents facts we are uncomfortable with.

That is a snide insinuation--implying that we are somehow evading historical truths because we are "uncomfortable" with them. We are not "uncomfortable" with the facts presented by Zinn or any others like him. We simply consider their methodology to be invalid and the motive behind the methodology to be (allegedly) sinister.