Is history True

summarize the “yes” and “no” positions. third page presents position.
Issue 1: Is History True
YES: Oscar Handlin

Mr. Handlin takes the position that history is true. That is to say, historical facts exist and can be researched and investigated. He proposes reliance on the scientific method to research and discover historical factors. In this way, we can discover the true facts about important events like the colonization of the Americas or the death of Julius Ceasar.
The problem Mr. Handlin recognizes is that while history is true, historians are human and therefore susceptible to the temptation to turn actual historical knowledge into a story designed to advance social goals or objectives. In this way, the historical records can be abused and manipulated. The examples of Stalin and Hitler are promintently mentioned. Under both regimes, history was rewritten and important events expunged. In Nazi Germans, no jew could be recognized as a great thinker or scientist – they stole the ideas of others. In Stalin’s Russia, capitalism is disregard and communism is heralded. In both regimesn historical facts are twisted into propaganda. Mr. Handlin considers this a failure of the historian, and not a failure of history because, for him, historical truth is absolute.
Historical truth exists and it’s the historians job to discover it. Like any scienctist, by strictly following a set of procedures the historian can seek the truth in the actual historical record. From Hanlin’s perspective, there is no failing as great as an assualt on the historical record.
According to Cicero, the first law of this historian, “ is never to dare utter an untruth and the second, never to suppress anything true.” Hanlin insists that history be used to learn from the past and not as a means of propaganda or more subtly as a method to support preconceived notions. We can all learn from the study of an accurate historical record. As Mark Twain said, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.”

Issue 1: Is History True
NO: William H. McNeil
Mr. McNeil’s position is that history is a story. And like any story it can be true or false. Historians hope that by embracing the scientific method. In this way, history would be purified and revision of the historical record would cease.
Facts can be established, but they still need to be organized and interpreted. By emphasizing certain facts and xxxx others, the historical tapestry is woven.
People and societies like to be flattered. Historians are always tempted to conform.

therefore under per-petual temptation to conform to expectation by portraying the people they write about as they wish to be. A mingling of truth and falsehood, blending history with ideology, results. Historians are likely to select facts to show that we— whoever “ we” may be— conform to our cherished principles: that we are free with Herodotus, or saved with Augustine, or oppressed with Marx, as the case may be. Grubby details indicating that the group fell short of its ideals can be skated over or omitted entirely. The result is mythical: the past as we want it to be, safely simplified into a contest between good guys and bad guys, “ us” and “ them.” Most national history and most group history is of this kind, though the intensity of chiaroscuro varies greatly, and sometimes an historian turns traitor to the group he studies by setting out to unmask its pretensions. Groups struggling toward self- consciousness and groups whose accustomed status seems threatened are likely to demand ( and get) vivid, simplifiedpor-traits of their admirable virtues and undeserved sufferings. Groups accustomed to power and surer of their internal cohesion can afford to accept more subtly modulated portraits of their successes and failures in bringing practice into conformity with principles. Historians respond to this sort of market by expressing varying degrees of commitment

Mr. Handlin’s position is compelling. The historian as scientist.
But history is always written by the . If the Native Americans had defeated the European invaders, would their history mirror our own ? It’s inconceivable.
Historical truth is absolute, but “if a tree falls ….