There are very distinct differences between the areas of study history and mathematics and the natural sciences. One would initially not see any similarity between these fields due to the language they each deal with, and the conclusion they aim for. However you may look at Mathematics, weather it is right or not, there are always contradicting ideas, from people who do not believe that sciences have answers to everything. This gives mathematics an uncertainty to its complex level where people cease to understand its use in the community. Similarly with history, people may argue that it does not have a use at the present day, “Happy is the country that has no history”, 16th Century English proverb. There is also never one answer to history, as in mathematics and sciences, people do not always agree with the attained answer, except in a much more infected way than mathematics. Where mathematics and sciences would have two sides to every answer, the logical answers by common thinkers, and the non believers, history has multiple sides, usually between nations or cultures, especially in the case of a history of warfare, or who had the idea of any invention used today first. Historians are the investigators of history, but history is reminiscent of the study of mankind, and there are an indefinite number of views, therefore every historian is biased to a certain degree.
History may be concluded to state that it aids the present day, if we believe that history does not repeat itself, which is proved to be true to a certain extent, where people do not make the same mistakes twice if not for patriotic reasons or an excess of hormone activity or a mal-informed population or person. Knowledge is how people get around every day and get a job to make a living, using knowledge collected and accumulated in past days and centuries of mankind’s history. Logically, then, Knowledge is essentially history itself and vice-versa. If history is misinterpreted and disregarded, then knowledge has to be thought of again, and there is a repetition of ideas thought before, which is a waste of time and thought, which is when errors re-occur. This is what we consider when we assume that history does repeat itself, but we fail to take notice that the repeated error offenders do not have an accurate view of past happenings, as not every part of knowledge is passed on and to everyone. In an ideal world where everyone knew exactly what anyone ever did when and why, and what the outcome of that specific experience came to be, knowledge would be immense, and no one would repeat it, as they would know what would happen if it were to be undertaken in the same way. By the statement that there are never any new ideas, that every idea has been thought of before, this would essentially mean that every human being would be perfect and would know exactly what to do, and knowledge would be complete.
Mathematics and the Natural sciences are included in history and have always been used to attain knowledge more accurately, regardless of what oppositions dictate. Mathematics is the most objective field of study, followed by the other sciences, which strive to be objective, but rely on experience based induction to the problem. History is the least objective of them all where there are many right answers, and yet no right answers. Objectivity is to follow the right sources, in quantity, but every source is unreliable. History flows as we accept it, and the written word is believed and taken to future generations, and becomes modern knowledge. As experiences of history are set forth, Mathematics is created, and designed, developed as a language, investigated as an undeveloped field. Sciences are observed noted and formulated to their patterns by intellectuals, and all three fields combined form knowledge from the past till today, but they all can be confined to one title: history, as it is every happening in the past, by definition.
I believe that the assertion that: “Without a knowledge of the past, we would have no knowledge at all” is a valid observation to the definition of knowledge, as through my eyes and through my investigation, there are no sides that disprove the assertion, as long as history, mathematics and Natural Sciences are known to the knowers investigated. It is essential for us to understand history to have knowledge, as it is directly derived from history. The information we hold in knowledge was discovered along time, and is our history. A knowledge without history can never be shared and becomes knowledge with a small “K”, as it is limited to each knower, as it can never be passed on, as from the point it has been passed on, it will have become history, and invalid as information by then, if the questioned assertion were to be incorrect. I therefore conclude my investigation in the belief that Knowledge may only be gained through time, and old time becomes history, so history is essential for a knowledge of the past.
Bibliography:
Ways of Knowing, Michael Woolman, IBID Press, 2000
