Volume 4
Written By Elizabeth Boyle
ARTICLES
Alan Donagan, "Historical Explanation: The Popper-Hempel Theory Reconsidered," History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 3-26.
Causal explanations of events must be deductive (Hempel's inductiveprobabilistic explanations are not causal, as they do not explain why an event occurred rather than not) but need not employ universal or covering laws. Historians have scientifically established deductive causal explanations employing hypotheticals containing individual names. Scientists' causal explanations utilize singular hypotheticals only as special cases of universal hypotheticals. Historians, however, are willing to entertain the possibility that men of the same type may act differently in the same situation. The social sciences, which are not theoretical but fundamentally identical with history, have not provided a single law for historians' use.
Othmar F. Anderle, "A Plea for Theoretical History," History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 27-56.
Everywhere--even in Germany-the great specialization of historical research and its philosophical rationale, historicism or the cult of the particular, are bankrupt. A synoptic picture of the historical world is no less necessary than one of the natural world. To obtain it we must abandon the false dichotomy between nature and history; idiographic and nomothetic methods are applicable to both. Theories of history will not compromise man's free will. Historical theory might, like economic theory, identify structural elements in human relationships as well as non-historical factors which influence them.
Gershon Weiler, "Fritz Mauthner as an Historian,” History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 57-71.
In addition to his critique of language, Mauthner wrote a four-volume History of Atheism. A radical skeptical empiricist, Mauthner held that there were no historical laws; yet there could be a craft of historical writing. Applying his idea that thinking and speaking are identical, Mauthner sought to show that the history of atheism is the gradual realization that "God" is only a word. However, the book appears to resemble the historiography of ideas ii la Hegel more than Mauthner's theories should allow. This appearance is deceptive; Mauthner's History is not a true (i.e., scientifically valid) history of the development of an idea, but rather a personal recreation of the past, allowed by Mauthner's skeptical view of scientific methodology.
REVIEW ESSAYS
Marin Pundeff on Ocherki Logiki Istoricheskogo Issledovaniia. Protsess Razvitiia I Problemy Ego Nauchnogo Vosproizvedeniia by B. A. Grushin, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 72-78.
Klaus Epstein on Friedrich Meinecke, Ausgewählter Briefwechsel by Ludwig Dehio and Peter Classen, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 78-96.
Constance I. Smith on Jean Bodin and the Sixteenth-Century Revolution in the Methodology of Law and History by Julian H. Franklin, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 96-105.
Charles Frankel on History, Written and Lived by Paul Weiss, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 105-107.
William Bark on Encounters in History by Pieter Geyl, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 107-123.
Peter Stansky on Approaches to History by H. P. R. Finberg, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 123-127.
Arnold Toynbee on Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions by A. L. Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn, History and Theory 4, no. 1 (1964), 127-129.
ARTICLES
Harry Eckstein, "On the Etiology of Internal Wars," History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 133-163.
"Internal war" is a resort to violence within a political order to change its constitution, rulers, or politicies; it is the genus of which revolution, uprising, Jacquerie, etc., are the species. The historical literature on the causes of internal wars is chaotic because historians have simply produced facts about any aspect of pre-revolutionary society which intuitively seemed significant. The real significance of these facts can only emerge from broader comparative studies. Such studies should be focussed on the preconditions of internal war rather than the (inevitably unique) precipitants and on changes in the elite holding power. Obstacles to internal wars must also be considered. Only a theory comprehending both positive and negative forces will prevent piling up of unrelated ad hoc theories and unhistorical disregard for special forces in particular cases.
George Lichtheim, "The Concept of Ideology," History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 164-195.
Ambiguities in the concept of ideology may be clarified by a history of the word and the phenomenon. "Ideology" can mean both the consciousness of an epoch and the "false consciousness" of men unaware of their true historical position. It was coined in early nineteenth-century France for a "science of ideas," knowledge of which would assure harmonious social life (positivism inherits this view). For Hegel, ideology is the false consciousness necessarily arising from the partial and transitory nature of thought in its dialectical development. Marx, as a materialist, went further, holding all speculative thought to be ideological defense of the status quo; Nietzsche cynically reduced all thought to ideology. Weber, Lukfics, and Mannheim made a more creative critique. For Lukdcs, the solution of the problem of ideology lay in the consciousness of the proletariate, the "identical subject-object" of history; for Mannheim, in that of the intellectuals.
Peter Berger and Stanley Pullberg, “Reification and the Sociological Critique of Consciousness," History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 196-211.
Society is a dialectical process: men produce society, which in turn produces them. Certain Marxist categories are especially useful for the sociology of knowledge, dealing with the relation between consciousness and society. Social structure is nothing but the result of human enterprise. Alienation-rupture between producer and product-leads to a false consciousness in neglecting the productive process. Reification, historically recurrent though not anthropologically necessary, while bestowing ontological status on social roles and institutions only sees society as producing men. Certain social conditions encourage de-reification. Philosophy and sociology, superstructures rooted in intersubjectivity, must co-operate in pursuing the sociology of knowledge.
John C. Rule and Barbara Stevens Crosby, “Bibliography of Works on Arnold J. Toynbee, 1946-1960," History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 212-233.
G. G. S. Murphy, “Sir Isaiah Berlin on the Concept of Scientific History: A Comment," History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 234-243.
Besides the positions that historical statements have psychologistic implications (Berlin) or are scientific only if explanatory procedure involving general statements is employed, another possibility exists. Written descriptive history can be rendered in truth-functional sentences. A system of language signs-predicate letters, constants, superscripts, subscripts, and two logical signs-is constructed for these sentences. This enables lexicographical ordering and hence machine-programming. Among the requirements of a descriptive history constituted of such sentences are that there be "quickly-decidable" sentences about individuals only and that statements involving belief, probability, or other modality be excluded. Examples of proper formulation are given, and the value of the rules and techniques of this extensional treatment of history-writing to actual history-writing is asserted.
REVIEW ESSAYS
Hayden V. WhiteThe Later Philosophy of R. G. Collingwood by Alan Donagan, History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 244-252.
E. J. HobsbawmOn Revolution by Hanna Arendt, History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 252-258.
Henry M. Pachter Philosophy of History and the Problem of Value by Alfred Stern, History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 258-264.
Bernard BarberTheory of Collective Behavior by Neil J. Smelser, History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 264-271.
Jean FloudThe Evolution of Civilizations: An Introduction to Historical Analysis by Carroll Quigley and On the Plurality of Civilsations by Feliks Koneczny, History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 271-275.
Richard T. VannThe Governance of Mediaeval England from the Conquest to Magna Carta by H. G. Richardson and G. O. Sayles, History and Theory 4, no. 2 (1964), 275-278.
ARTICLES
M. I. Finley, "Myth, Memory, and History,'" History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 281-302.
Aristotle and other Greeks contrasted history and poetry because epic poetry or myth was an alternate way of apprehending the past. Myth was accepted as no less factual than history, being distinguished by its lack of any coherent dating scheme. Even Herodotus and Thucydides could not write a true history of early Greece; they were necessarily confined to contemporary history. The problem is not why Greek culture was "unhistorical," but rather why anyone should have proceeded from myth to history. Their traditional mythic understanding of the past, operating similarly to patterns of memory observable in other cultures, preserved relevant information (i.e., that benefiting powerful elites) at the cost of massive loss of data, which appears to survive only in random fashion.
William J. Bouwsma, "Three Types of Historiography in Post-Renaissance Italy," History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 303-314.
Especially after 1530, Italy was so fragmented that a national historiography was impossible. Florence, Rome, and Venice were the chief regional centers. In Florence, the utility of history for the statesman was increasingly denied. Historians lacked self-confidence, and the republican tradition faded out in the excessive empiricism of Ammirato. In Rome, the Counter-Reformation rejected the historiographical achievements of the Renaissance; historians were deflected from research into rhetoric and justification of the Church replaced disinterested inquiry. Only in Venice, formerly backward, did historiography thrive, perhaps in response to Venice's declining power. Venetian historiography was enriched by theories emanating from Padua and by close contact with political reality. Only Venice could have produced Sarpi.
CLASSICS IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY
Giovanni Gentile, "Eighteenth-Century Historical Methodology: De Soria's Institutiones," History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 315-327.
De Soria (1707-1767) read Le Clerc's Logica (1692) and Ars Critica (1696) before writing his Institutes of Rational Philosophy, which reduces methodology to analytics, discovery of truth, rather than synthetics, demonstration of discovered truth. De Soria, unlike Le Clerc, opposes syllogistic and the old logical systems. Reason, experience, and evidence from others (testimony) supply answers for soluble questions. Twenty of De Soria's thirty laws of analytics concern testimony or historical research, divide into theories of sources and internal criticism, and have no counterpart in the Logica. De Soria's canons distinguishing authentic from spurious writings derive directly from Ars Critica, which he acknowledges.
REVIEW ESSAYS
Marvin LevichPhilosophy and History: A Symposium by Sidney Hook, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 328-349.
Patrick GardinerGeneralization in the Writing of History: A Report of the Committee on Historical Analysis of the Social Science Research Council by Louis Gottschalk, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 349-353.
Robert Jay LiftonPsychoanalysis and History by Bruce Mazlish, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 353-358.
E. E. PechuroHistory and Theory.[from Vol. 1, No. 1 to Vol. III, No. 2] by George H. Nadel, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 359-368.
Paul L. WardPhilosophy and the Historical Understanding by W. B. Gallie, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 368-375.
Julian H. FranklinHumanists and Jurists: Six Studies in the Renaissance by Myron P. Gilmore, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 376-380.
Raymond WilliamsThe Language of Politics by James T. Boulton, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 380-387.
L. P. Curtis, Jr.The Image of Africa: British Ideas and Action, 1780-1850 by Philip D. Curtin, History and Theory 4, no. 3 (1965), 387-397.
The Historiography of the History of Philosophy
John Passmore, “The Idea of a History of Philosophy,” History and Theory, Beiheft 5 (1965), 1-32.
Polemical writings about philosophers, of little use if directed against straw men as is likely if not based on historical understanding, must incorporate cultural history, which, in focussing on a philosophy's relationship to its age, justifies ignoring historical sequence so long as figures are placed in context. Philosophy does progressively clarify what certain recurrent types of problems involve. The historian-philosopher writing a history of problems must know intimately philosopher and period, and reveal assumptions and aspects of problems hidden to the philosopher himself. Such a history does not merely report philosophy's results but alone elucidates its inner development.
Maurice Mandelbaum, “The History of Ideas, Intellectual History, and the History of Philosophy,” History and Theory, Beiheft 5 (1965), 33-66.
The history of ideas deals with the elemental unit-ideas which for Lovejoy are components of systems distinguished by their patterns. Special histories explain how a particular form of human history developed. General histories draw on special histories to document or explain social contexts. Since patterns influence philosophers, the history of ideas contributes little to the history of philosophy, a discontinuous strand within a period's continuous intellectual history. By accepting cultural pluralism, denying the monistic position that there always are internal connections among all or some strands of intellectual and cultural history, both continuity and change in philosophy can be best understood.
W. H. Walsh, “Hegel on the History of Philosophy,” History and Theory, Beiheft 5 (1965), 67-82.
Even though for Hegel the historian rethinks, positions not as past but as necessary stages in his own philosophical development, the history of philosophy remains external to philosophy proper since a genius could work out from the beginning the stages in the Idea's progress. Hegel's critical history allocates space according to philosophical, not historical considerations, saying little about historical contexts. Non-Hegelians also emphasize assessment more than narration, and all historians of the arts and sciences must make judgments of both importance and value. The history of philosophy, however, has become more historical; assessment requires understanding a philosopher's meaning through his historical situation.
Eugene Kamenka, “Marxism and the History of Philosophy,” History and Theory, Beiheft 5 (1965), 83-104.
The materialist interpretation of history dogmatically resolves all histories into one. Marx and Engels themselves thought philosophy progresses toward the ultimate truth of Marxism, and implicitly held all historical positions interesting since their development reveals contradictions generated by inadequacies. Bolshevik Marxism's official ideology does not include philosophy's dissolution. Marxist definitions of philosophy emphasizing correct conclusions neglect distinctively philosophical argument and method. The recent Soviet view of philosophy's history has changed from the history of superstructure to the history of conflicting materialist and idealist theories, thereby conceding the centrality of philosophical ideas rather than trying to reduce them to class or economic interests.
Cover image: Untitled, by Timothy Perry (17 January 2019)
