Historical Quotes - Page 30

• Western civilization presents one of the most difficult tasks for historical analysis, because it is not yet finished, because we are a part of it and lack perspective, and because it presents considerable variation from our pattern of historical change.

  Carroll Quigley

  Civilization, Perspective, Tasks

  Carroll Quigley (1979). “The evolution of civilizations: an introduction to historical analysis”, Liberty Fund Inc.

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• Is it not a rather fantastic historical irony that the torture techniques that the North Vietnamese used against McCain that forced him to offer a videotaped false confession are now the techniques the Bush administration is using to gain "intelligence" about terror networks. How is it possible to know that everything John McCain once said on videotape for the enemy was false, because it was coerced, and yet assert that everything we torture out of terror suspects using exactly the same techniques is true?

  Andrew Sullivan

  Enemy, Gains, Administration

  "Bush, McCain, Torture". "The Daily Dish", www.theatlantic.com. July 02, 2008.

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• History is opaque. You see what comes out, not the script that produces events, [...] The generator of historical events is different from the events themselves, much as the minds of the gods cannot be read just by witnessing their deeds.

  Nassim Nicholas Taleb

  Mind, Events, Different

  Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2016). “Incerto 4-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness The Black Swan The Bed of Procrustes Antifragile”, p.785, Random House

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• I'm trapped in a fun-house mirror reflection of a historical society where everyone was crazy by default, driven mad by irrational laws and meaningless customs.

  Charles Stross

  Fun, Crazy, Reflection

  Charles Stross (2006). “Glasshouse”, p.88, Penguin

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• The focus of all life is its economy, the mode through which every living creature produces its material existence. I know no other criterion for the evaluation of social life except that of social economy. In society, just like anywhere else, the mode of production is the focus around which revolve all the modes of life: in the historical life of conscious beings, it is also the focus of all modes of consciousness.

  Moses Hess

  Focus, Evaluation, Consciousness

  "Briefwechsel". Book by Moses Hess, p. 253, 1959.

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• History is valuable, to begin with, because it is true; and this, though not the whole of its value, is the foundation and condition of all the rest. That all knowledge, as such, is in some degree good, would appear to be at least probable; and the knowledge of every historical fact possesses this element of goodness, even if it posses no other.

  Bertrand Russell

  Knowledge, Facts, Foundation

  Bertrand Russell (1985). “Contemplation and Action, 1902-14”, p.76, Psychology Press

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• The history of capitalism has been so totally re-written that many people in the rich world do not perceive the historical double standards involved in recommending free trade and free market to developing countries.

  Ha-Joon Chang

  Country, People, Double Standard

  Ha-Joon Chang (2007). “Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism”, Bloomsbury Press

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• To say that historical conditions made personal life possible, and with it the self-consciousness that allowed psychoanalysis to emerge, is to tell half the story: one also has to consider that the erotic impulse, ever pressing for satisfaction, had something to do with making the history that encouraged its expression.

  Ellen Willis

  Self, Expression, Erotic

  "Historical Analysis". "Dissent", Winter 2005.

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• History teaches us that a given view has been abandoned in favor of another by all men, or by all competent men, or perhaps by only the most vocal men; it does not teach us whether the change was sound or whether the rejected view deserved to be rejected. Only an impartial analysis of the view in question, an analysis that is not dazzled by the victory or stunned by the defeat of the adherents of the view concerned - could teach us anything regarding the worth of the view and hence regarding the meaning of the historical change.

  Leo Strauss

  Men, Views, Victory

  "Natural Right and History". Book by Leo Strauss, 1953.

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• Nothing ought to be said or done which could create the impression that unbiased reconsideration of the most elementary premises of philosophy is a merely academic or historical affair.

  Leo Strauss

  Philosophy, Done, Unbiased

  Leo Strauss (1953). “Natural Right and History”, p.31, University of Chicago Press

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• I am guiding you to seek truth from the facts of the historical conditions of our society and to identify the problems. The correct solutions will come with the correct identification of the problems.

  Zulfikar Ali Bhutto

  Our Society, Facts, Problem

  Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (1994). “My Dearest Daughter: A Letter from the Death Cell”

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• The visual possibility of seeing the historical person (as opposed to the eternal Qur'anic man) on screen is arguably the single most important event allowing Iranians access to modernity.

  Hamid Dabashi

  Men, Important Events, Possibility

  Hamid Dabashi (2001). “Close Up: Iranian Cinema, Past, Present, and Future”, p.15, Verso

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• Whole great chunks of written history are of little value to the psychohistorian, while other vast areas which have been much neglected by historians - childhood history, content analysis of historical imagery, and so on - suddenly expand from the periphery to the center of the psychohistorian's conceptual world, simply because his or her own new questions require material nowhere to be found in history books.

  Lloyd deMause

  Book, Childhood, Analysis

  "Foundations of Psychohistory". Book by Lloyd deMause, 1982.

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• Sociologists and historians have avoided looking for the family sources of wars and social violence. Whenever a group produces murderers, the early parental relationship must have been abusive and neglectful. Yet this elementary truth has not even begun to be considered in historical research; just stating that poor mothering lies behind wars seems blasphemous.

  Lloyd deMause

  War, Lying, Groups

  "The Emotional Life of Nations". Book by Lloyd deMause, 2002.

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• The historical record suggests that the transition to to a new hegemon has always been attended by what I have elsewhere called hegemonic war.

  Robert Gilpin

  War, Transition, Records

  Robert Gilpin (2016). “The Political Economy of International Relations”, p.351, Princeton University Press

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• Christendom is not primarily a mental construct. It is above all a fact, indeed the longest historical experience the Church has had. Hence the deep impact it has made on its life and thought.

  Gustavo Gutiérrez

  Impact, Church, Facts

  Gustavo Gutiérrez (1988). “A theology of liberation: history, politics, and salvation”

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• I suspect people would be in for a real shock if they knew the depths of his [Obama's] historical ignorance.

  Charles Foster Johnson

  Real, Ignorance, People

  "Obama: Bush is Responsible for Chavez (Bzzt! Wrong!)". littlegreenfootballs.com. May 25, 2008.

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• The butchering may continue as it will, it shall remain the historical guilt of the Western powers that they did not promptly provide the sharpest preventative measures against the continued attack-politics Germany undertook. Possibilities existed for this, but no measures were seized upon.

  Friedrich Kellner

  Guilt, Germany, May

  Diary entry, May 29, 1940.

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• Lemberger's stories are marvelous compounds of scholarship, imagination and empathy. Brought to life with rich historical detail, these biblical women, sidelined and silenced for centuries, prove to be audacious, utterly relatable, and spellbinding companions.

  Michelle Huneven

  Biblical, Imagination, Empathy

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• Jewish persecution is a historical memory of the present generation and people fear it in the present day, and that's why those references are so much more powerful. I just understand that better now.

  Gregg Easterbrook

  Memories, Powerful, People

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• Rama is a fairly common name in India. It symbolizes an individual who is interested both in enlightenment and martial arts. I do not claim to have any past life connection with the historical Rama. It's just a name I liked.

  Frederick Lenz

  Art, Past, Names

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• Like sex, poverty and power, suicide may always be with us. But like them again, the actual form is takes is essentially time-specific and culture-bound, not only in the past but in the present too. The people who took their lives, the paths which led them to that end, and the experience of dying in this way were deeply influenced by specific historical circumstances. Only by making a greater effort at historical understanding can this most secret house of death be made to yield up more of its confidences.

  David Cannadine

  Suicide, Sex, Past

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• With their own record of killing 12 million American Indians and supporting slavery for four decades after the British abolished it, Americans wish to project their historical guilt on to someone else.

  Andrew Roberts

  History, Guilt, Wish

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• I have certainly amassed many historical research gathering skills.

  Iris Chang

  Skills, Gathering, Research

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• The constructs of the mathematical mind are at the same time free and necessary. The individual mathematician feels free to define his notions and set up his axioms as he pleases. But the question is will he get his fellow mathematician interested in the constructs of his imagination. We cannot help the feeling that certain mathematical structures which have evolved through the combined efforts of the mathematical community bear the stamp of a necessity not affected by the accidents of their historical birth.

  Hermann Weyl

  Math, Imagination, Effort

  Hermann Weyl (1968). “Gesammelte Abhandlungen”

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