[distances]

> And so on. Read history; and make up your own mind.

I'm of the opinion that this "do your own research" is generally bad advice. One person can be expert in a very limited number of fields, and one of the main advantages of our modern society is that we can afford to have experts in very niche areas.

It's much better to recognize who are the actual experts in any given subject, and read their output / follow their advice. Even historians have very limited specialties; someone who's expert of the ancient Greece would restrain from commenting authoritatively on renaissance topics.

Everyone can read the source material on history/medicine/astronomy/whatever for their enjoyment. Absolutely nobody should think they understand the topic better than someone who has dedicated their professional career on it. Outside of your slimmest core competence you are just another hobbyist with very flawed understanding.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

>> I'm of the opinion that this "do your own research" is generally bad advice.

I never used the words "do your own research" and I will very please ask you to not quote me as saying words I didn't actually say.

Further, "do your own research" is what conspiracy theorists say. Are you saying that my advice to read Herodotus and Thucydides is on the same level as spreading anti-vaxx propaganda or 5g-conspiracy theories?

As to expertise, I'm Greek and I grew up reading history. Literally. Not at school, where the teaching of history was a deplorable affair of memorising passages from school books, but at home. Just because I'm that kind of nerd. When other kids got dinosaurs and xboxes for Crhistmas, I got Xenophon in leather-bound tomes, with the ancient and modern text in opposite pages so I could read the original and understand it.

So I'm "expert" enough in what I'm talking about that, if you're interested in the opinion of knolwedgeable others, you should take pause and listen to what I say: the blog posts linked above are full of hot air and peddle a bunch of bullshit misreadings of history, deliberately so to provoke outrage and clicks. You won't learn anything useful by reading them.

Read the sources I link to. You don't need to be an expert in anything to read some English translations of ancient texts. You just need to be curious to know exactly who said what.

Edit: btw, the author of the blog posts is an expert on Rome ("Bret is a historian of the broader ancient Mediterranean in general and of ancient Rome in particular"; from his about page). So when he's talking about Sparta, he's not the expert you think he is. The same goes for many other of his blog posts, e.g. ones on the Middle Ages etc. If we went toe-to-toe on ancient Greek history, he might beat me on points (e.g. off the top of my head I dond't remember the date of the Battle of Salamis), but he's got as much a leg to stand on to write what he did as I have to call bullshit on it.

[distances]

I'm not trying to comment on your expertise or about how Spartans actually were, sorry if my rant came out that way. I obviously don't know a thing about you or the Spartans.

I explicitly quoted you, not trying to put words in your mouth. I do think that "read [sources], and make up your own mind" is exactly the same as "do your own research". I can't see any difference in meaning there.

My commentary was on the trend to dismiss authorities in favor of, literally, "making up your own mind". Reading the sources is not enough. They need putting into context, and understanding the positions of the historical authors. I could read original sources all day and come out with an invalid understanding.

Again, I'm not saying this article is correct. I'm saying a layman should read experts instead of interpreting sources themselves if they want to understand better.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

The problem is that the "expert" who wrote the blog posts is not an expert in the subject of the blog posts and he's talking about subjects that a particular group of people, other Greeks who, like me, grew up reading our ancient history as other kids read Marvel comics, know very well and have their own strong opinions about [1].

I agree with you that we should trust the opinions of experts. However, expertise is not only acquired through professional interestes. The opinion of professional experts cannot automatically trump the opinion of everybody else, regadless of their amount of knowledge.

In any case, it should be noted that a blog post like the one above would never pass muster as an academic text, like a scholarly paper or a textbook chapter. My main beef with the blog posts above is that they express strong personal opinions in a manner meant to cause an emotional response- which should never be what a historian does.

___________

[1] Typically, those are nationalistic opinions that I don't share, btw. But there is something to be said about everybody and their little dog wanting to tell you all about ancient Greek history, but completely ignoring what Greeks themselves think about it.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

Commenting on this separately:

>> I explicitly quoted you, not trying to put words in your mouth. I do think that "read [sources], and make up your own mind" is exactly the same as "do your own research". I can't see any difference in meaning there.

This is what you wrote:

begin_quote

> And so on. Read history; and make up your own mind.

I'm of the opinion that this "do your own research" is generally bad advice.

end_quote

So you quoted me, but then you also quoted "do your own research" as if that was what I said, not as if that was your interpretation of what I said. In the future, if you wish to discuss your interpretation of the words that someone acually said, I suggest you make this more clear. For instance, instead of saying 'this "do your own research"' say something like:

"I interpret your suggestion to "Read history" as a prompt to "do your own research" because ..." etc.

Because if you just put words in quotes and then reply to the words in quotes, what am I supposed to do? I didn't say that thing, so should I just ignore it? Are you replying to what I said or to something you just felt like replying to?

[distances]

I quoted you and then equated that quote with the phrase "do your own research". I think it was very explicit that I didn't put words in your mouth, but brought up that they say the same thing. Then I proceeded to rant why I don't think this is good advice.

If you think there's a difference in the meaning of these two phrases, I can clarify that the rest of that comment applies both to "read, and make up your own mind" and "do your own research" separately.

[CRConrad]

>> I'm of the opinion that this "do your own research" is generally bad advice.

> I never used the words "do your own research" and I will very please ask you to not quote me as saying words I didn't actually say.

Here, let me remind you:

>>> Read history; and make up your own mind.

Wow, huuuge difference.

> Further, "do your own research" is what conspiracy theorists say.

Exactly. And if you want to be taken for someone almost exactly like them, don't sound almost exactly like them.

[CRConrad]

Oops. Either add or remove a "don't" there, to make it make sense.