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September 2003 · Historically Speaking 35 method of controlled experimentation and social scientific and historical research on the other is a false dichotomy. No two scientific experiments using the same methodology, constants, and variables are truly identical. There are always subtle differences andvariations . These differences and variations are notso great as tonegate the conclusions, but they still exist. Roehner and Syme contend that the same is true for analytical history. Their conclusionis thatresearchers usingscientific experimentation and analyticalhistorians using the modular approach will produce results ofequivalent reliability. Obviously some scholars will reject the arguments of Pattern and Repertoire. But whether or not one agrees with them, Roehner and Syme have boldlypresented an intriguing portrait ofanalytical history and its possibilities. Tn a time when postmodern obscurantism is still influential, itis hearteningthat two scholars canworkon an assumption that objective facts do exist in history. For them, knowledge ofthe pastis notjusta construct. It is also refreshing to find two scholars who propose a methodology that requiresthesynthesis oflarge amounts ofsecondaryresearch . Historians continuallyproduce more and more specialized scholarship, butcomparativelylittle effortgoes into makingthatscholarship accessible to anyone outside ofa narrow circle ofspecialists. Itis too soon to sayifRoehnerand Syme are anywhere nearcorrectbut theycertainly presenta good case. More than 300years ago Thomas Hobbes observed that "the best prophetnaturallyis the bestguesser, and the bestguesser, he thatismostversed and studied in the matters he guesses at, for he hath the most signs to guess by." While Roehner and Syme mightnotlike Hobbes'suse ofthe words "guesser" and "guesses," they would certainly recognize their own enterprise in Hobbes's description. Theirs is an endeavor that itselfhas a long history. The pattern of analytical history before Roehner and Syme has not been auspicious, but perhaps they have given historians a new repertoire. RonaldFritze ?professorofhistory at the University ofCentralArkansas. Hismost recent book is New Worlds: The Great Voyages ofDiscovery, 1400-1600 (Sutton , 2003). "Scientific" History? John Lukacs This ambitious book is yet another breathless attempt to assert that the studyofhistorycan (and ought) to be made "scientific," since historyitselfdemonstrates recurrent elements that follow the "laws" ofnatural science. From beginning to end its assertions are unconvincing. The authors state: "We show that by breaking up complex historical phenomena into simpler 'modules,' it becomes possible to study the latter from the point of viewofsociology. Inthisway, historicalsociology can aspire to bridging the long-standing gap between history and sociology .... we wish this book to be judged on the basis of new connections that it suggests, on the unexpected regularities that it discloses, and on the basic historical mechanisms that it highlights"(ix-x). And later: "[T]his book's ambition is to explore a new avenue in historical sociology"(48). Waita minute. Isn'tall sociology a part ofhistory? First came society ; then came the studyofsociety; then came the study ofsociety by men who attempted to apply the "laws" ofnatural science to that kind ofstudy, which they called "sociology." On the other hand, historyis notnecessarily sociological; but it is—even in the case of biography, the description ofthe life and the character of a single person—necessarily sociographical. Sociographical: it describes, it cannot but describe. Sociology attempts to define. (Samuel Johnson: "Definitions are tricks for pedants"—and, even at best, definitions tend to leak.) When people attempt to describe rather than define, so much the better. Hence we can learn more from the descriptions ofa Balzac or a Trollope than from the definitions ofmany sociologists: the former give us a picture ofa particular society ata particularhistoricalperiod, notonlywhat certain people did but how they talked and thought and desired. Roehner and Syme gallop backand forth between takingnatural science and social science as their models. In their first chapter, "Analytical History," there is this subchapter: "A Parallel Between Paleontology and Historical Sociology," which they describe as a "search ofrecurrent events" (25): As a historical event the French Revolution is unique in the same sense that the horse is unique as an animal species. But horses did not appear all ofa sudden; they had ancestors: Eohippus, Mesohippus, Merychippus. In the same way historical events can be traced back to a number of precedents and forerunners . A complex event such as the Revolution of 1789 is of course made up ofa number ofcomponents and strata. In much...

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