Vaniver comments on Rationality Quotes: March 2011 - Less Wrong

6 Post author: Alexandros 02 March 2011 11:14AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (383)
Tags: quotes

Comments (383)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: Vaniver 06 March 2011 06:12:00AM 3 points [-]

The book is propaganda. Wikipedia's collection of critical views.

Comment author: MinibearRex 06 March 2011 06:28:54AM 5 points [-]

The book is quite clearly propaganda. It sets out to advance a specific thesis, and there is literally no evidence provided against that idea. The bottom line was written at the beginning of the book, and he spent the rest of the book providing arguments for it. That doesn't mean, however, that his positions are necessarily wrong (see the addendum on the link above). Certainly, Zinn's positions have some flaws, but he does raise some issues that haven't been raised with other history texts.

Comment author: RichardKennaway 06 March 2011 01:21:56PM 2 points [-]

The bottom line was written at the beginning of the book, and he spent the rest of the book providing arguments for it.

It seems to me that the original quote is an explicit statement that that is what he is going to to. As is, even more explicitly, the mission statement on the top page of that website. An extract:

History isn't what happened, but the stories of what happened and the lessons these stories include. ... We cannot simply be passive. We must choose whose interests are best: those who want to keep things going as they are or those who want to work to make a better world. If we choose the latter, we must seek out the tools we will need. History is just one tool to shape our understanding of our world. And every tool is a weapon if you hold it right.

Powered by Reddit Powered by Reddit