| > Why write a book at all if it says "we don't know"? Related to this, someone commented on the /r/AskHistorians discussions linked by the article [1]: > What I like about history is that it teaches you humility. Even if you spend years researching a small topic, there will be so much that you don't and never will know. Political science is the opposite with lots of helicopter opinioning. New crisis in Mali? Here I come with my insta-factoids and world explanations The fact is that around these parts of the world (Eastern Europe - The Balkans) people have started wars and a lot more people have died as a result of those wars, only because one hundred years ago some historian just couldn’t say “we just don’t know” after dedicating all of his career to a specific topic (like “who was the first one between populations A, B and C to have occupied this land?”). In the meantime historians have smarten up a little, it’s not all black and white, there are a lot of “maybes”, of “we need more data to answer that question” or even “this question will probably never be answered in a satisfactory matter”. Meanwhile, I’m pretty sure people are dying at this very moment because, like you said, some political scientist or economist just couldn’t say “we don’t know” or even “it’s complicated”. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/16zhk7/as_a_... |