ESSAY ON A PRESCRIBED TITLE :“The historian’s task is to understand the past; the human scientist, by contrast, is looking to change the future.” To what extent is this true in these areas of knowledge?

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INTERNATIONAL BACCALAUREATE DIPLOMA PROGRAMME
THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE
ESSAY ON A PRESCRIBED TITLE
“The historian’s task is to understand the past; the human scientist, by contrast, is looking to
change the future.” To what extent is this true in these areas of knowledge?
Candidate: Serra Koz
Supervisor:
Word Count: 1599
May 2014

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In order to understand the quota “The historian's task is to understand the past; the human
scientist, by contrast, is looking to change the future.” and show to what extend it is true,
some terms should be identified. In this respect, generally the history is defined as the study
of the past and its relation to human and the historian is defined as the “person studying about
the past and regarded as an authority on it”1
. On the other hand, human sciences are
considered as detailed investigation of social, biological and cultural aspects of the human and
the human scientist is the person carrying studies on human being from different aspects to
reach general structures of the present and to make prediction for future. Moreover, ways of
knowing can be defined as how one gains knowledge as human being and realize the
relationship with it. There are four traditional ways of knowing namely “sense perception”,
“language”, “emotion” and “reasoning” and four new ways of knowledge which are
“imagination”, “creativity”, “faith” and “intuition”. In these two specific areas of knowledge,
the history and the human sciences, both historian and human scientist use almost all ways of
knowing- some much more, some less- in pursuit of knowledge in order to reach their goals.
When we consider the quota in the light of basic definitions and general understanding, it can
be said that although the main aim of the historian is to explore the past in order to understand
it and the main aim of the human scientist is investigating the human being in different
aspects in order to make generalisations and prediction about future, quota is true to some
extend but it is not totally, since neither historian nor human scientist has just one aim. In this
respect, in the following two paragraphs the quota will be examined in order to show to what
extend it is held in these two areas of knowledge; history and human sciences respectively.
In the field of the history, main aim of the historian is to understand past and relate it to
human being and contribute to awareness of the society about their past. However,
“Historians are facing a central challenge in the knowledge they give us: they cannot
1
Historian, < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historian>

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experiment or make repeated observations of the events about which they write”2
Thus, the
historian uses variety of other recourses and evidences like artefacts, manuscripts, carcases,
ancient ruins etc. in order to analyse and interpret them to understand why, how or when past
events occurred. When the historian is investigating a historical event, an idea, a person or a
dogma etc., he attempts to make generalisations and to find patterns through documents and
artefacts. This is necessary to find the relations and see the picture from a meaningful
perspective. While studying on past historian uses different ways of knowing and different
methodologies. In order to understand and interpret the past historian uses reasoning actively
since it is mainly a chain of events involving cause-effect relationships and there are gaps in
the historical evident. He also uses emotion and imagination trying to put himself into the
time period he explore and to see events from eyes of the people lived in that particular time
to make sense about a historical period or event. Moreover, he uses language while he is
reading past records, memory while he tries to remember near past and sense perception while
he is investigating the physical evidences, intuition while he is interpreting and so on. As it is
seen the historian uses all ways of knowing on the study of past. Take the example of World
War II in order to see how a historian uses different ways of knowing. When the historian
investigate the World War II he firstly explores the pre-war period and uses reasoning to
figure out the reasons of the war, uses the emotion to understand the minds of the people
giving the war decision, uses the sense perception and imagination visiting the countries and
geographic locations in which the war take place to see the war conditions better, uses
language carrying out interviews with witnesses. So it can be said that in the field of history,
all ways of knowledge are used to get information about the past, to interpret it and to find
general patterns. As it is seen the history as an area of knowledge mainly deals with the past,
so the quota seems to be true from this point. However, the question coming to mind is that:
2
Dombrowski, Rotenberg and Bick, 2007

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what is the aim of the history? The answer is that understanding the past provides us with a
good perception of human nature and civilization. That is “understanding of the past is
fundamental to understanding of the present”3
. Analysing and interpreting the history using
different methods and ways of knowing provide a good standpoint for current events, cultures
and political or economic structures. Since the history is shaped with cause-effect
relationships, then it is not surprising that the present day is a result of the past and in order to
understand the time we live in it is necessary to understand the past. Moreover, it is necessary
to understand the past event and their consequences in order to predict future since the history
is a lesson for all societies. For example thinking on the reasons of World War One and Two,
human being may prevent a third war. In this respect, although the historian’s main task is the
past he (and in general history’s) does not only deals with the past, but also with the present
and future. Thus, the quote is true to some extend for the field of history and historian but
missing in terms of present and future aspects of the history.
Human sciences, as a area of knowledge, study the human being from different aspects and
the aim of the human scientist is to investigate social, biological and cultural aspects of the
human to reach general structures of the present and to make prediction for future. In order to
understand the human behaviour and make generalisations common about all human
universally or some groups like particular societies or interest groups, the human scientist also
uses different methods and all ways of knowledge. When a human scientist look at the human
being from outside he uses sense perception, if he wants to approach from inside with
dialogue he uses language. In some cases he uses emotion and imagination if he needs to
empathy. Moreover, when he tests the certainty and makes conclusions about his researches,
he uses reasoning and so on. In short, the human scientist uses all ways of knowing while he
is studying. Human scientists gain knowledge about the social biological and cultural aspects
3
Luttmer, 1996, < https://history.hanover.edu/why.php>

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of the human being and using ways of knowledge and then diagnose the problems related with
them to find solutions for future. That is he tries to predict and change the future in favour of
human being. For example, think about the bird flu “which is an infection of influenza viruses
in birds or other species that can be even fatal”4
. When viruses first appeared and many
people died suffering from it, scientists immediately investigate the reasons of the disease and
tried to find vaccine and treatment methods to prevent people in present time and future. As it
is indicated the human sciences and the human scientist mainly gives emphasis on
understanding the human being from all aspects of live analysing the present conditions to
find general patterns and theories to interpret present time and predict future. In this respect
quota is held true. However, is it possible to understand the present time and to predict the
future free from the past? Answer is absolutely: No. Since the present time again is a result of
the past and it is not possible to understand the human being and to generate common features
or theories about him without considering the past, human scientist should also aim to
understand the historical development of the humanity. So it is necessary to understand past to
expound the present and forecast the future. For example, we can consider the mortgage crisis
“which entailed a dramatic drop in home prices beginning in 2006 and a sharp rise in
mortgage defaults beginning in 2007”5
. When the crisis showed its impact in first United
States and then the all over the world, economists first investigate the pre-crisis conditions to
understand the reasons then relate it with the 1929 The Great Depression to find similar
patterns to solve the problem and lastly introduced new policies as precaution to prevent such
a new crisis. Thus, although in human sciences the main emphasis is given to understanding
the present to shape future; this is strictly depended on understanding past and relating it to
present and future. So quota again is true to some extend from the aspects of human sciences
and human scientist but not enough due to its lack of past consideration.
4
Suri, 2007,” Avian Influenza (Bird Flu)”
5
Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, 2005,” The Mortgage Crısıs”

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To sum up, when the fields of history and human sciences are investigated in the light of the
quota given, it is seen that the quota is true to some extend for both historian and human
scientist since they are mainly interested in past and present-future aspects of the live
respectively. However, quota is not totally true since it misses the present and future interest
of the historian and the dependence of the human scientist on past.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Dombrowski E. Rotenberg L. and Bick M., “Theory of Knowledge” Oxford University Press,
Glasgow, 2007
Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, 2005,” The Mortgage Crısıs” Preliminary Staff Report
Date of Access: 8 January 2014
<http://fcic-static.law.stanford.edu/cdn_media/fcic-reports/2010-0407-PSR_-
_The_Mortgage_Crisis.pdf>
Historian, Wikipedia, Date of access: 28 December 2013
< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historian>
Luttmer F., 1996, “Why Study History?”, Date of Access: 5 January 2014
< https://history.hanover.edu/why.php>
Suri S., 2007, “Avian Influenza (Bird Flu)” Date of Access: 8 January 2014
< http://www.csa.com/discoveryguides/avian/review.pdf>