Comments on Mode for Caleb: Students of history

First, this is a fine and interesting post. And I...

2006-09-23T15:36:00.000-04:00

First, this is a fine and interesting post. And I think you rightly frame an important failure of historical education: the kind of quasi-nihilism/relativism it may induce in some people.

Second, I think one notable thing that Irving Babbit talks about in "Democracy and Leadership" is that liberals and ideologues of all stripes often argue in a hypothetical and ahistorical fashion. If we don't have welfare, children will starve. If we permit discrimiantion, soon every college will be "all white." One thing history permits is refutation of these kinds of ahistorical and deductive ways of thinking; history teaches us that things were neither as good, nor as bad, as they are made out to be by various ideologues. History may not easily permit us to predict the future, but history does permit us to refute the arguments of those that would proffer policies on the basis of false premises of one kind or another.

All ideology hinges in a sense on a certain view of history. I discuss this extensively here in a discussion of what may be called "constrained" and "unconstrained" visions.

http://www.affbrainwash.com/chrisroach/archives/020181.php

It seems to me the mark of any educated understanding of anything is understanding in greater detail how things are the same and how they are different in two cases. Ignorance consists of fewer examples and cruder, less refined judgments. Consider the mantra-like invocation of Munich by neoconservative advocates of worldwide interventions. Have they never heard of Algeria of WWI or any of the other examples of failed interventions and too-aggressive responses to so-called aggression and would-be aggressors?

The trick is to teach true humility, the kind that...

2006-08-12T03:11:00.000-04:00

The trick is to teach true humility, the kind that says "I might be wrong". It is a false humility that takes the lesson "I might be right after all, even though everyone else around me is telling me otherwise." I'm no history teacher, but I think the trick is to somehow convey not just how different things were previously, but how those people got there, why they felt justified in what they thought, how others came to believe differently, how they leveraged other background beliefs and values to eventually persuade people differently, and ultimately, how we here and now got to be here as we are on a continuous (if not always even) path from there and then.

P.s. If you want to see how to get past Rorty's dilemma, you should read Stout on pragmatism.

Caleb,Excellent blog. Stumbled upon it today by a...

2006-08-10T17:34:00.000-04:00

Caleb,
Excellent blog. Stumbled upon it today by accident while googling jazz-related items. I'll be back though. You and I have a number of interests that intersect.