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It being the New Year and all, I've been pondering that epigram, attributed to Thucydides. It does bring to mind what exactly we think history is -- just one damn thing after another or something with a measure of underlying structure and meaning? Here's how he elaborated on the notion:
". . . he who desires to have before his eyes a true picture of the events which have happened, and of the like events which may be expected to happen hereafter in the order of human things shall pronounce what I have written to be useful, then I shall be satisfied. My history is an everlasting possession, not a prize composition which is heard and forgotten."
One presumes that Thucydides believed we could learn from all that historical teaching and thereby become better. But perhaps he only meant we will only understand things better, powerless to improve. After all, Hobbes really liked Thucydides, being his first translator into English.
The Western tradition views history as linear; events unfold in the fullness of time and are moving toward a predictable end. Christianity has a lot to do with this viewpoint. Hegel gave us more of the same, although not so explicitly Christian. What we call "Whiggish" historical interpretations have a long tradition, and they also maintain history advances from a less-better place to a better place.
How does this fundamentally optimistic view of history play these days? Things look pretty grim on CNN and such, but at least we don't burn witches and we have banned slavery and public flogging. Are we getting anywhere? Or is the human mind essentially still that of Paleolithic hunter-gathers squabbling over a dead mastodon?
". . . he who desires to have before his eyes a true picture of the events which have happened, and of the like events which may be expected to happen hereafter in the order of human things shall pronounce what I have written to be useful, then I shall be satisfied. My history is an everlasting possession, not a prize composition which is heard and forgotten."
One presumes that Thucydides believed we could learn from all that historical teaching and thereby become better. But perhaps he only meant we will only understand things better, powerless to improve. After all, Hobbes really liked Thucydides, being his first translator into English.
The Western tradition views history as linear; events unfold in the fullness of time and are moving toward a predictable end. Christianity has a lot to do with this viewpoint. Hegel gave us more of the same, although not so explicitly Christian. What we call "Whiggish" historical interpretations have a long tradition, and they also maintain history advances from a less-better place to a better place.
How does this fundamentally optimistic view of history play these days? Things look pretty grim on CNN and such, but at least we don't burn witches and we have banned slavery and public flogging. Are we getting anywhere? Or is the human mind essentially still that of Paleolithic hunter-gathers squabbling over a dead mastodon?