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Tom Holland directed a BBC documentary (Islam: the Untold Story) that questioned the historical basis of Islam. Is that a thing? I thought that Mohammed's life was much better documented than that of Jesus.
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Dec 29, 2013 03:18
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Lewd Mangabey posted:I enjoyed Persian Fire as a popular history book. If you're a professional in the area and are going to dash to your blog with your butthole on fire whenever the orientation of Cyrus' tomb is reported incorrectly, then you might not enjoy it. But if you're that kind of person, you're probably not going to be enjoying any popularizing based on academic work (and you will be lonely). Out of curiosity, do you think popularizing writers in other domains, like the natural sciences, should be similarly excused if they included facts that are incorrect but seemed harmless? Would you characterize a scientist who pointed out those misconceptions as a bitter, lonely troll?
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Dec 29, 2013 04:36
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They already do that and usually they already are excused. It's the price to pay to get some of these subjects into the popular consciousness and apart from that incredibly banal reviewer I think most people think that's acceptable. "this book was unnecessary" okay then well let's just go over and choose from all the other accessible Persian history books oh wait a second.
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Dec 29, 2013 05:24
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Halloween Jack posted:Tom Holland directed a BBC documentary (Islam: the Untold Story) that questioned the historical basis of Islam. Is that a thing? I thought that Mohammed's life was much better documented than that of Jesus. Much of the early parts of Shadow of the Sword is Holland trying to show that it isn't anything like as well documented as is purported. His writing seems compelling, but I'm not a student of Islamic historiography so I don't have the context to actually say that it's correct. The way he frames it, I think it's something like the issue of China and 5000 years of unbroken history etc. that this thread has to occasionally put down. It's bound up with extraordinary levels of pride and a particularly pervasive and monolithic narrative has formed, with a large community of historians who won't countenance a challenge to this bedrock which they've always taken for granted. He talks about Islamic scholars who have been trying to break it down in search of facts and who have been ostracised, and gets indignant that non-Islamic scholars (of Islam) aren't paying enough attention to these rogues, still talking about the history of Islam as if it weren't being questioned. He suggests, I think, a kind of imperialism where Western and non-Islamic scholars are giving the Islamic scholarly community much less scrutiny that they would their own, because they don't care to spend the effort on these other institutions, however important they are to the field.
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Dec 29, 2013 05:31
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I don't mean this snidely, but what really is the value in scrutinizing it? It seems like the "did Christ really exist" question to me- even if he didn't, what's the value in trying to prove that; all you're going to do is offend a whole bunch of people, and it won't exactly alter our understanding of those periods of history. (or will it?) Whereas with China they're using it to legitimize and aggrandize themselves, I don't really get that from Islamic scholars. Mohammed was in so many ways imperfect, it's part of what makes him so compelling.
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Dec 29, 2013 05:41
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Koramei posted:I don't mean this snidely, but what really is the value in scrutinizing it? (I'm speaking more toward your earlier response about Persian Fire, but I see a relationship between your response to my question and asking this question.) I think it comes down to whether you believe historical truth is valuable in and of itself - that is, divorced from any political implications. Does it matter that an author claims that Cyrus' tomb has such-and-such a detail when evidence suggests it doesn't? Researchers did work to discover the details of the tomb. Is their work valueless because an author thinks that an untruth has more poetic resonance? Similarly, researchers have done work to uncover the year or date that a particular event, like the death of Cyrus, happened. Is their work valueless because 'what does it matter whether Cyrus died in 529 or 530?' If that work is valuable, then I think Lendering's right to blast Persian Fire in his review, because Holland is denigrating those people's work by treating it as something that can be tossed aside when convenient. If, ultimately, the judgment of the audience is that historical and archaeological evidence can be ignored, why bother with doing history or doing archaeology at all? We might as well embrace stories of giant gold-sniffing ants in India if it suits us. But that might be too harsh a way of putting it -- maybe Holland just wasn't aware of the newer research. At that point, Holland's taken the historical understanding of a hundred years ago and put it in a shiny new package. If you're reading it because you like the package and aren't so much interested in the truth of things, well, great. There's nothing wrong with that. (Though I think a better solution in this market-space, both for readers and for historians, is interesting historical fiction like Masters of Rome or the Rome HBO show. In those, it's understood that the author has done their best to be authentic, but it's fiction and so if there's mistakes it's not a big deal.) If you're reading Persian Fire because you're expecting to find the truth as currently understood by experts, well... I think it's weird to be mad at or disdainful of Lendering for pointing out Holland's mistakes. Most of the things mentioned are minor mistakes that might easily have been avoided and one of the things mentioned is a logical fallacy. Wouldn't a work of history that avoided those mistakes be a better work of history than one that still included them? Even apart from that philosophical question -- in any subject where you aren't an expert but you're an interested party, wouldn't you want an expert pointing out where another expert has made mistakes, even if they might appear to be trivial?
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Dec 29, 2013 07:24
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Koramei posted:I don't mean this snidely, but what really is the value in scrutinizing it? It seems like the "did Christ really exist" question to me- even if he didn't, what's the value in trying to prove that; all you're going to do is offend a whole bunch of people, and it won't exactly alter our understanding of those periods of history. (or will it?) I don't agree. I see it as being like Galileo's fight with the Catholic church. Galileo didn't end up in the poo poo because he proved Ptolemy wrong and said the Earth orbits the Sun, he ended up in the poo poo because it was the (claimed) word of an All Powerful God that everything orbits the Earth. The church stated its reputation on being infallible in all matters, and that was the foundation that all the churches teachings/rules/bulls were therefore absolutely true and must be obeyed. Galileo was able to prove beyond doubt that one of these Facts was wrong (the four known moons of Jupiter didn't orbit the Earth), meaning that the church wasn't infallible, and casting doubt onto everything every pope had ever said or ever would say. That would get anyone in the poo poo. When you can present historical evidence that contradicts religious dogma, that's a Big Deal. And if you can confirm religious dogma, well that's also a Big Deal.
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Dec 29, 2013 07:28
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Captain Postal posted:...I see it as being like Galileo's fight with the Catholic church. Galileo didn't end up in the poo poo because he proved Ptolemy wrong and said the Earth orbits the Sun, he ended up in the poo poo because it was the (claimed) word of an All Powerful God that everything orbits the Earth. The church stated its reputation on being infallible in all matters, and that was the foundation that all the churches teachings/rules/bulls were therefore absolutely true and must be obeyed... It's interesting that you would give that as an example, because that's really not what happened at all. Yes, Galileo was challenging the church, but it's not like he really stood for the 'science' side. The scientific community (to the extent that it existed) wasn't at all sold on heliocentrism. His first trial was a pretty reasonable affair; he pitched his theory, the authorities didn't buy it, and ordered him to stop teaching it. He only really got in poo poo because he then wrote a book that was pretty clearly espousing heliocentrism, and (perhaps inadvertently) managed to poo poo talk the Pope pretty hard while he was doing it. There were also a lot of political pressures on Urban to crack down on a guy general perceived to be a heretic, and Galileo had done a pretty solid job of ostracizing all his would be supporters. As it was, the punishment he got (house arrest, with visitors allowed) wasn't even particularly severe. It's also worth noting that heliocentrism as presented by Galileo wasn't exactly correct either, as he was using circular orbits rather than elliptical, which made his models less accurate than existing geocentric models.
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Dec 29, 2013 07:47
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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If you require the authors of popular books to be masters of the field to the degree that the experts are, then you get niche books written by experts. If you want someone like Holland, who has demonstrated an ability to write entertainingly and successfully for a general audience, to write a book, you can't hold him to the same standard as an academic author, particularly since his work is never intended to be treated as an authoritative source on the subject. As Koramei says, this happens in popular science writing (my area of expertise) all the time, and it's the price you pay. Specific to the topic of this thread, there all kinds of areas of history that are completely unknown even to the majority of better educated people. Look at the number of people who post in this thread (a group self-selected for their interest in if not knowledge of the period) confused about the Eastern vs Western Roman empires. Yet someone like Norwich, who is enormously entertaining to read, gets picked apart for his popular histories. I would recommend (and have recommended) a book by Norwich or Holland in a second to a non-expert reader as long as I was comfortable with the general thesis the book put forth. That's why I found the expert criticism of Holland's Persia book off-base. Now, I know nothing about his Islam writing or this BBC special, so I will stay away from commenting on that.
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Dec 29, 2013 08:11
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Re: masters of rome, I've been reading it recently and I thought the writing was kind of bad and everyone talks like cartoon characters. Hard to take poo poo like a seven year old Caesar speechifying like a middle aged man about his dignitas and ambition seriously.
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Dec 29, 2013 11:58
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Caesar was supposed to have been a legit prodigy though. If The History of Rome Podcast is reliable then he was doing well in public life by his mid-teens and supposedly dictated multiple letters simultaneously and slept 4 hours a day etcetera.
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Dec 29, 2013 14:28
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tekz posted:Re: masters of rome, I've been reading it recently and I thought the writing was kind of bad and everyone talks like cartoon characters. Hard to take poo poo like a seven year old Caesar speechifying like a middle aged man about his dignitas and ambition seriously. You're supposed to see him, and to some extent Cicero, as jumped up little shits. Sadly McCullough has a giant ladyboner for Caesar. Augustus is much more interesting.
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Dec 29, 2013 16:21
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I've read Rubicon, but none of Holland's other books. In a case like this, I'd like to know if (or how much) the author is out on his own. Sometimes a popular author is simply coming down on the other side of a debate, and some historian is infuriated that his research isn't being used. If there's genuine debate between the academics, then you have to cut the author some slack. Big historiography debates aren't what a beginner in the field is looking for. I like them, but I'm weird.
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Dec 29, 2013 16:32
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Tao Jones posted:-snip- But discovering what exact year Cyrus died or which way his tomb faces isn't the value of their work! The value is in the greater understanding gained from seeing everything together, or the process of discovering them. If a researcher's entire worth is based on whether the world thinks Cyrus pissed around the rim or in the middle then yeah, they have some bigger problems, that is really not the point of history. And if you think those mistakes are equatable to embracing some of Herodotus' most outlandish tales then I dunno what to even tell you. And of course it'd be better for Holland to have not made those mistakes (or most of them, at least; that reviewer seems to have a pretty poor grasp of what makes something readable), and I do think it's important to correct these things, and hopefully Holland will/did in a newer edition. But when reviews are calling one of the only decent accessible books on Achaemenid history unnecessary and sparking reactions like: Octy posted:Well, that's a disappointment. I saw that on the Wikipedia page and I thought it'd be a good read, seeing as I know nothing about Persian history outside of their encounters with the Greeks. It looks like I'll have to stick with Millar and Brown for my reading entertainment. then I think it's important to give a rebuttal. Yes, don't trust everything the book says, read it with a critical eye, read people's responses to it before mouthing off like you're suddenly an encyclopedia on the Ancient Persia; that's the attitude people should have towards literally every history book. But saying "you've either gotta be one of the most expensive shows HBO has ever produced, or literally a scholarly piece" is just silly. Captain Postal posted:I don't agree. I see it as being like Galileo's fight with the Catholic church. Galileo didn't end up in the poo poo because he proved Ptolemy wrong and said the Earth orbits the Sun, he ended up in the poo poo because it was the (claimed) word of an All Powerful God that everything orbits the Earth. The church stated its reputation on being infallible in all matters, and that was the foundation that all the churches teachings/rules/bulls were therefore absolutely true and must be obeyed. Galileo was able to prove beyond doubt that one of these Facts was wrong (the four known moons of Jupiter didn't orbit the Earth), meaning that the church wasn't infallible, and casting doubt onto everything every pope had ever said or ever would say. That would get anyone in the poo poo. But Galileo was alive 500 years ago; the Catholic Church no longer has an iron grip on its subjects. I'm not disputing that making GBS threads up the foundations of Christianity and Islam wouldn't be a big deal, just that, why? The only people that we'd perhaps want to be affected by it would probably outright dismiss it, and it'd cause considerable problems for everybody else. Other than to be smug atheists, I just don't see the point. Would it alter our understanding of that time in history?
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Dec 29, 2013 18:10
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Koramei posted:But discovering what exact year Cyrus died or which way his tomb faces isn't the value of their work! The value is in the greater understanding gained from seeing everything together, or the process of discovering them. If a researcher's entire worth is based on whether the world thinks Cyrus pissed around the rim or in the middle then yeah, they have some bigger problems, that is really not the point of history. And if you think those mistakes are equatable to embracing some of Herodotus' most outlandish tales then I dunno what to even tell you. I think those things are part of the value of the work of historians. Not every historian is going to discover some earth-shaking thing that revolutionizes our view of the past. But those smaller victories over ignorance are still important and I think we should bristle a little bit and point out when someone is presenting incorrect information, which is what much of that review did. I think that Lendering calls the book unnecessary because you might as well find a book about the Persian Wars written in 1900 and read that, since you'd get the same information out of it. The style would be different, of course, and I think you're saying that it was a good thing that Holland updated the style of those older works and made it more readable and therefore better. I agree, and to go a little further, I think if someone's going to set out to update the style of past historians, shouldn't they also update old facts and eliminate old fallacies? That's where Holland falls short -- and not only on cutting edge stuff that was just discovered yesterday, but on things discovered in the 1950s, the 1970s, and so on. So the book could have been much better. But it wasn't, and I think it's unfortunate that we shrug our shoulders and say "oh well, it's popular history, what do you expect?" rather than ask for a higher standard.
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Dec 29, 2013 19:36
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Lewd Mangabey posted:As Koramei says, this happens in popular science writing (my area of expertise) all the time, and it's the price you pay. But it sounds like the guy hasn't kept up with any scholarship of pretty much the whole 20th century. What would you think of popular science writing that espoused Lysenkoism or the aether, or dismissed quantum physics by quoting Einstein saying 'God doesn't play with dice'? Not being bang up to the latest research as of 2013 is one thing, not reading anything more recent than Gibbon is rather another...
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Dec 29, 2013 20:05
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Looking up the author of that review, I'm not sure his credentials are all that good. He doesn't have a PhD, and teaches not at a university, but at a school he helped found. I'm not saying he's wrong or that the book is good. But, especially as the topic is so politically charged, I don't see why I should just take the word of a single reviewer either. A little searching turned up only one review by a history professor. He doesn't seem to have a problem with it:http://archive.archaeology.org/0607/reviews/persia.html
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Dec 29, 2013 21:20
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Koramei posted:But Galileo was alive 500 years ago; the Catholic Church no longer has an iron grip on its subjects. I'm not disputing that making GBS threads up the foundations of Christianity and Islam wouldn't be a big deal, just that, why? The only people that we'd perhaps want to be affected by it would probably outright dismiss it, and it'd cause considerable problems for everybody else. Other than to be smug atheists, I just don't see the point. Would it alter our understanding of that time in history?
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Dec 29, 2013 22:04
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Koramei posted:then I think it's important to give a rebuttal. Yes, don't trust everything the book says, read it with a critical eye, read people's responses to it before mouthing off like you're suddenly an encyclopedia on the Ancient Persia; that's the attitude people should have towards literally every history book. But saying "you've either gotta be one of the most expensive shows HBO has ever produced, or literally a scholarly piece" is just silly. This might sound even sillier, but I don't want to read popular history with a critical eye, or at least I don't have to with Rubicon. I do that enough at university. This is generally pretty dry academic stuff rewritten to be entertaining for the masses, with perhaps a bit of hyperbole and loosely translated sources. Still, I'd like at least most of the theories to be agreed upon by most people so that I can get a good introduction. I'll read other books on the Persians with a critical eye once I have a proper foundation.
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Dec 29, 2013 23:31
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Octy posted:and loosely translated sources. "As for our dear friend Cato, he speaks to the Senate as if he were living in Plato's Republic instead of Romulus's shithole" I've read that Cicero letter is probably much more accurately translated as "Romulus's dregs", but it's definitely more fun Holland's way.
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Dec 29, 2013 23:51
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PittTheElder posted:It's interesting that you would give that as an example, because that's really not what happened at all. Yes, Galileo was challenging the church, but it's not like he really stood for the 'science' side. The scientific community (to the extent that it existed) wasn't at all sold on heliocentrism. His first trial was a pretty reasonable affair; he pitched his theory, the authorities didn't buy it, and ordered him to stop teaching it. He only really got in poo poo because he then wrote a book that was pretty clearly espousing heliocentrism, and (perhaps inadvertently) managed to poo poo talk the Pope pretty hard while he was doing it. There were also a lot of political pressures on Urban to crack down on a guy general perceived to be a heretic, and Galileo had done a pretty solid job of ostracizing all his would be supporters. As it was, the punishment he got (house arrest, with visitors allowed) wasn't even particularly severe. I won't disagree that he went out of his way to stir poo poo because I'm not up on my history, but what he did do that was different to everyone else was to back his claims with evidence. Up until then heliocentric models had been theoretical mathematical ones and treated as "what-if's", which is why saying they were true was controversial. He actually showed with a telescope that there was something that didn't orbit the Earth, which is why I believe he matters. Although that's not ancient history. Koramei posted:But Galileo was alive 500 years ago; the Catholic Church no longer has an iron grip on its subjects. I'm not disputing that making GBS threads up the foundations of Christianity and Islam wouldn't be a big deal, just that, why? The only people that we'd perhaps want to be affected by it would probably outright dismiss it, and it'd cause considerable problems for everybody else. Other than to be smug atheists, I just don't see the point. Would it alter our understanding of that time in history? Well, what I was trying to get across is that the catholic church squashed all scientific research for 1500 years, and refused to allow science to move forwards from around the time of Christ (give or take a century or so) for purely dogmatic reasons. Galen, Ptolemy etc were still the cutting edge 1500 years later because the church said "this is true and any disagreement is heresy which will be punished". Galileo showed (with evidence) that it wasn't true, the church (eventually) pulled its head in to focus on the spiritual and get out of things which weren't its core business, and the end result was modern science. There were of course other things that were important (such as someone actually opening a book that wasn't written by a christian instead of burning it), but the church getting out of the way was a big part. Heliocentric view precipitated religion pulling back from science to focus on religion, and everyone was eventually better off for it. I believe that doing research into the historicity of the earliest days of religion is the archeological equivalent. The controversy it brings probably won't yield as dramatic changes in society, but it might bring something positive once everyone un-bunches their panties. Having proof of the facts might push us from "I believe this happened" "no I believe that happened" "wanna fight about it?" "bring it!" to "OK, we KNOW this happened... what does it mean?". Well, that's what I hope it will do.
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Dec 30, 2013 00:39
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Amused to Death posted:"As for our dear friend Cato, he speaks to the Senate as if he were living in Plato's Republic instead of Romulus's shithole" Indeed, I only wish we had been encouraged in Latin to translate like that rather than as though we were still living in the Victorian era with 'thee' and 'thou'.
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Dec 30, 2013 00:46
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Captain Postal posted:Well, what I was trying to get across is that the catholic church squashed all scientific research for 1500 years, and refused to allow science to move forwards from around the time of Christ (give or take a century or so) for purely dogmatic reasons. Galen, Ptolemy etc were still the cutting edge 1500 years later because the church said "this is true and any disagreement is heresy which will be punished". This isn't really true at all.
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Dec 30, 2013 01:28
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Alchenar posted:This isn't really true at all. Yeah. Galileo, among other things, pissed off the other top researchers of the time-- who all worked for the Catholic Church. He used data gathered by other churchmen in order to do his calculations. I've got as big of a hate on for the Catholic Church as anyone, but they promoted a ton of scientific research and while the dogma did interfere, Galileo's biggest problem was being an enormous, Italy-sized prick to the contemporary scientists.
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Dec 30, 2013 01:58
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Captain Postal posted:I won't disagree that he went out of his way to stir poo poo because I'm not up on my history, but what he did do that was different to everyone else was to back his claims with evidence. Up until then heliocentric models had been theoretical mathematical ones and treated as "what-if's", which is why saying they were true was controversial. He actually showed with a telescope that there was something that didn't orbit the Earth, which is why I believe he matters. Although that's not ancient history. I'm just trying to point out that the Galileo affair wasn't church vs. science, despite the fact that Galileo was mostly right, and that the Church was trying to entrench a position we now see as profoundly unscientific. Trying to paint it as such doesn't help explain what was actually happening. quote:Well, what I was trying to get across is that the catholic church squashed all scientific research for 1500 years, and refused to allow science to move forwards from around the time of Christ (give or take a century or so) for purely dogmatic reasons. Galen, Ptolemy etc were still the cutting edge 1500 years later because the church said "this is true and any disagreement is heresy which will be punished". And again, this isn't true at all.
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Dec 30, 2013 02:47
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Didn't the church in regards to Galileo actually acquisce to his ideas possibly being true but basically wouldn't accept it without more research and told Galileo to stop promoting it as truth, to which Galileo basically went "lmao gently caress all y'all"
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Dec 30, 2013 03:38
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I don't know enough about Persia to judge the book well. I will say when I see minor errors, it makes me question the entire work. I just started reading Justinian's Flea, and there have been a few small but obviously wrong things said in the early pages (sowing Carthage with salt was one) that make me treat the rest of it with a vague suspicion.Octy posted:Indeed, I only wish we had been encouraged in Latin to translate like that rather than as though we were still living in the Victorian era with 'thee' and 'thou'. I loving hate the way Latin is translated and anyone who puts it into modern English is automatically a hero.
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Dec 30, 2013 03:46
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Amused to Death posted:Didn't the church in regards to Galileo actually acquisce to his ideas possibly being true but basically wouldn't accept it without more research and told Galileo to stop promoting it as truth, to which Galileo basically went "lmao gently caress all y'all" More or less. They were perfectly happy with him exploring the theory himself, just not teaching or promoting it. Apparently there's some debate over whether Galileo intended to be a dick in the book he wrote, but he certainly pissed off lots of folks.
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Dec 30, 2013 03:50
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Grand Fromage posted:I loving hate the way Latin is translated and anyone who puts it into modern English is automatically a hero. I once took a class that compared 3 translations of the play Lysistrata, a bowdlerized older translation full of euphemisms, a fairly modern but literal translation, and one that translated to modern colloquial language fucks and all. Despite deriving from the same source they came off radically differently, and of course everyone preferred the colloquial translation and thought the oldest was bullshit, while the literal translation was rather difficult to read and didn't make a lot of sense in places. It was basically the only time I ever thought to myself "this would be easier if we just learned to read Greek".
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Dec 30, 2013 03:57
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Amused to Death posted:Didn't the church in regards to Galileo actually acquisce to his ideas possibly being true but basically wouldn't accept it without more research and told Galileo to stop promoting it as truth, to which Galileo basically went "lmao gently caress all y'all" Yeah, basically the Church said that they agreed with him but couldn't just get up in the pulpits the next Sunday and announce that they'd been wrong about that Earth being the center of the Universe stuff. They wanted time to put together a coherent theology around it and introduce it all to the laity slowly. Galileo basically told them to gently caress off and he'd tell everyone himself if the Church didn't want to do it. It was only then that they laid the Inquisition on him. It was more of a power and politics issue than anything else. Most people seem to forget that Copernicus was a Polish monk, who developed his heliocentric system at the request of the Pope in order to determine more accurately the correct dates for Easter celebrations.
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Dec 30, 2013 04:00
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I'm Crap posted:This is a strange attitude. "Hey, don't do fundamental research in the field of history you're interested in, you might hypothetically find something that I think certain people will both not care about and be extremely angry about, at the same time! Hey you, Islamic scholar, you're only interested in the early history of Islam because you're a smug athiest!" I like you. In any case, if it will piss people off, so what? That's not ... relevant, right? Making someone angry has nothing to do with whether your research is true or not. It's a dumb emotional reaction, not a considered intellectual or moral objection, and you can't just give up the advancement of understanding - in however small and unnoticeable a manner it might be, and I think this is probably a more important matter than you're giving it credit for - for that.
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Dec 30, 2013 05:57
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It's a fair point, but Sleep of Bronze posted:in however small and unnoticeable a manner it might be No. If you're going to upset literally billions of people, I think you ought to have a good reason. "Why not" is not one. Neither is "because I'm interested in the subject". People are interested in sketchy poo poo in science and most people don't think every subject should be free reign there, why should it be different with history? It's a really callous attitude. I know one dumb chick's dumb opinion on an internet forum isn't gonna stop scholars from being scholars but this is a topic that really rubs me the wrong way so I tend to yell about it where I can. I will stop now.
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Dec 30, 2013 06:17
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Koramei posted:It's a fair point, but What sketchy topics in science are off limits? The only sort of shut downs I ever see about fringe science stuff is just "that's not even remotely correct, stop listening to that." I still think you're pretty wrong on this one. Things being true and correct is a good enough goal on their own. People are going to be offended isn't a good reason not to do research or publish. You don't have to ram it down their throats, but any and all evidence should be documented, published and discussed, even if it says that Jesus was a lesbian woman.
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Dec 30, 2013 06:26
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I'm generally in favor of all research and pursuit of knowledge in any capacity. History, science, whatever. All knowledge is good. On the other hand, it's also valid to say that, for example, the debate/research about whether Jesus was a historical figure or not doesn't affect anything. It would be very interesting to have some piece of incontrovertible evidence one way or the other. It also would not materially change anything. So, I'm all for doing the research. I also do not personally give a poo poo. It's okay to have both!
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Dec 30, 2013 07:03
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Sleep of Bronze posted:He talks about Islamic scholars who have been trying to break it down in search of facts and who have been ostracised, and gets indignant that non-Islamic scholars (of Islam) aren't paying enough attention to these rogues, still talking about the history of Islam as if it weren't being questioned. He suggests, I think, a kind of imperialism where Western and non-Islamic scholars are giving the Islamic scholarly community much less scrutiny that they would their own, because they don't care to spend the effort on these other institutions, however important they are to the field.
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Dec 30, 2013 14:53
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PittTheElder posted:What sketchy topics in science are off limits? The only sort of shut downs I ever see about fringe science stuff is just "that's not even remotely correct, stop listening to that." What's the point of publishing if you're not trying to actually convince people you're right? You're not gonna win over 1/2 the population of the world with your first article called, "LOL Jesus was fake!" You build up to that poo poo...if that's your ultimate thesis, fine, but you should probably have some awareness of the likely reception and aftermath.
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Dec 30, 2013 18:23
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PittTheElder posted:What sketchy topics in science are off limits? The only sort of shut downs I ever see about fringe science stuff is just "that's not even remotely correct, stop listening to that." There's loads of ethical restrictions in science, e.g. biology and psychology experiments. Researchers in those fields used to have a freer reign to research whatever and however they wanted, and a lot of pretty horrifying experiments came out of it. Obviously research into the roots of Islam and Christianity isn't unethical in the same way that the Tuskegee experiment was, but it probably has much broader social implications than most historical research. I think historians should just keep in mind that what might be an academic topic for them is a deeply personal matter to a lot of other people, and they should approach that kind of research much more carefully than if they were researching, well, anything else. Out of politeness if nothing else.
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Dec 30, 2013 18:30
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PittTheElder posted:What sketchy topics in science are off limits? The only sort of shut downs I ever see about fringe science stuff is just "that's not even remotely correct, stop listening to that." There are at least three ways research can produce factually correct results but be very problematic in an ethical or social sense. The first way is research where the methods are considered unethical. Examples would be vivisection, medical experiments performed without consent or locking a child up without human contact to see if they start speaking Latin. It is possible to get correct and important results using these methods but we don't because the methods are cruel. The second way is where the results could be considered unethical. Examples would directed research into nuclear weapons or biological warfare. Exactly how connected the research needs to be before it is unethical is a matter of very active debate. A third way would be if neither the methods or results are not unethical in-and-of themselves but where the results that could be harmful given the social context. An example might be some of the studies of intelligence or ability difference based on race. Without great care, such results can (and have) been used to viciously oppress people, even if that was not the original intent of the researchers. These are all things that are active matters of ethical debate and researchers cannot simply wash their hands of the possible negative repercussions of what they publish simply because they are presenting the "truth". I don't think publishing something about the historical Jesus or Mohammed is particularly ethically problematic but there are definitely issues in both the sciences and the arts that are. Then again, if a historian published something about the historical Jesus that the knew would cause rioting and destruction they'd better have a better reason for it than "I was just publishing the truth" and I would consider them partially responsible for any harm that came from that.
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Dec 30, 2013 19:54
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Ynglaur posted:On the topic of historical fiction set in Rome , what do others think of Colleen McCullough's Masters of Rome series? Others have answered, but I will say they're tremendously entertaining and enjoyable books and a great way to fire up interest in learning more about the history.... but once you start learning more about the history you realize just how many liberties she took, and how hugely accommodating/forgiving she is of any flaws or foibles in Caesar's character. Speaking of historical fiction, I finally got a copy of I, Claudius for Christmas (the television series, not the books) and the first episode (well, first disc, which I gather is roughly three episodes put together?) was immensely entertaining. It took a while to reconcile my internal vision of what Augustus looked like (handsome but slight, short and rather sickly) with Brian Blessed, but the portrayal is still excellent. It seems similar amounts of liberties are taken in terms of historical accuracy, are the books a little closer to the reality or do they indulge in poetic license as well? Also, Siān Phillips is amazing as Livia 
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Dec 31, 2013 01:18
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This is anecdotal, but I personally know a biology/pediatric research team that suppressed some of their own findings concerning iron levels in the blood and breastfeeding. It suggested that breast feeding women in areas with poor access to proper nutrition could be at risk of developing anemia, but the researchers felt that any reduction in breastfeeding would cause more harm than it would prevent. I know of other incidences involving environmental research where people have not published because they feared that their results had the potential to be manipulated and used out of context by unsavory interest groups. Though I find the idea that finding out if Jesus or Mohammad were historical figures is unimportant strange. I mean confirming that kind of thing seems like it would be good spring board for a better understanding of the very early stages of two of the most influential religions in history, and that seems fairly 'important'. I mean it's not likely that kind of thing could be confirmed in any kind of definitive way, but from a historical perspective it doesn't seem trivial.
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Dec 31, 2013 01:18
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