Interpretation in History: Or What Historians Do and Philosophers Say

Abstract

The topic for discussion is historical interpretation, which, it is important to note, will be treated as part the history. That is because, whatever vagueness exists in such matters elsewhere in philosophy, philosophy . forms inquiry are answerable to a clear and inescapable standard. It is this. In any philosophy . -of law, of science, of history,-the has a subject, and if it is to be that subject, it must get the subject right. In a philosophy . there must be at least an initial correspondence between label, for example, and merchandise, for example, history. Everything that follows is intended to be understood and evaluated in a context philosophy . (in this case, history), and historical interpretation, I shall be claiming, is a significant part my subject, that is, actual history. I shall try to show that the exercises which historians and I call interpretations are neglected or distorted in almost all what passes for from which it follows that almost all what passes for philosophy history, is less than, or different from, history. But I shall also try to show why this is so; this will lead me to give reasons more philosophically interesting than sloth or inadvertence for the neglect and the distortion.