Empiricist Philosophy of History

The term empiricism is derived from the Greek word ‘empeiria’, which means experience. The philosophy of empiricism began with the scientific methods of Sir Francis Bacon. Empiricism, in philosophy, possesses three broad views:

• All concepts originate in experience,
• All concepts are about or applicable to things that can be experienced,
• All rationally acceptable beliefs or propositions are justifiable or knowable only through experience.

There are different stages of the development of the empiricist philosophy.

Classical Empiricism

Classical empiricism was dominated by the ideas of John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume. Classical empiricism is characterised by a rejection of innate, inborn knowledge or concepts. John Locke, well known as an empiricist, wrote of the mind being a tabula rasa, a “blank slate” when we enter the world. At birth we know nothing; it is only subsequently that the mind is furnished with information by experience.

Radical Empiricism

In its most radical forms, empiricism holds that all of our knowledge is derived from the senses. Radical empiricism means our knowledge of the world is based solely on our senses. This rejects all other knowledge claims and places experiences as the only basis of human knowledge. 

Moderate Empiricism

Moderate empiricism means our experience is based on our senses, but there are cases when our knowledge is not based on our senses. More moderate empiricists, however, allow that there may be some cases in which the senses do not ground our knowledge but hold that these are exceptions to a general rule.

Facts as Experience in History

In historical explanations, a historian uses facts to reconstruct historical events. Here facts represent the experiences of the past and thereby its interpretation allows the historian to reconstruct the past with factual experience. This method helps the historian indirectly experience the past and generate historical knowledge. The past is different from the present in every aspect. The historian should try to understand the reality of the past through the analysis of the facts. These facts allow the historian to experience the event in which he or she is studying. 

Analytical Philosophy of History

Analytic philosophy emphasizes the study of language and the logical analysis of concepts. It originated around the turn of the twentieth century with the rejection of idealism by G.E.Moore and Bertrand Russell. They used a linguistic expression based on the arguments on the “meanings” of terms and propositions.

The focused areas of study in Analytical Philosophy

• Analytic philosophy involves studies of the language in which the concepts are expressed.
• It studies the structures or forms of language or sentences and establishes logical concepts. 
• Analytic philosophy of history enquires the way in which the discipline of history discovers and understands that past.
• Its inquiry is ‘analytic’ because it critically analyses the thinking behind the ways in which historians undertake their discipline.

Language and its expressions are the primary fields in analytical philosophy. It focuses on the text and linguistic expressions of historical explanations. Analytic philosophers emphasized the empirical and scientific status of historical knowledge. There are different traditions of analytical philosophy. Analytic philosophers introduced new modes of critical evaluation of ancient texts.

Though the analytic philosophy was born in linguistic turn, later it underwent several internal micro-revolutions and passed into several phases. During the 1960s, linguistic philosophy gave way to the philosophy of language, the philosophy of language gave way to metaphysics, and this gave way to a variety of philosophical sub-disciplines.

Philosophers in the analytic tradition are deeply skeptical about the power of non-empirical reason to arrive at substantive conclusions about the structure of the world—including human history. Philosophical reasoning by itself cannot be a source of substantive knowledge about the human actions, that we call “history.” Rather, substantive knowledge about the world can only derive from empirical investigation and logical analysis. Analytic philosophers emphasized the empirical and scientific status of historical knowledge and attempted to understand this claim along the lines of the scientific standing of the natural sciences.

Speculative Philosophy of History

The speculative philosophy of history is concerned with history as a whole. It relates the past to the present and the present to the future. The basis of the speculative philosophy of history is the idea of an order or pattern in the historical process.  The speculative philosophers believe that it is possible to recognize some general scheme or design or purpose or pattern in the course of human history. The pattern is necessary to consider the historical process as a whole.

St. Augustine and the Theological Origin

Western speculation concerning the meaning of history is first derived from theological sources. It developed through the work, City of God written by St. Augustine. It proposed that history follows a linear development that is based on providential wisdom. According to St. Augustine history was guided by the divine will and the course of history is determined by forces outside human control. This consists of thinking of history “as a whole” and this employed the term ‘universal history’. This presents history as a single giant unfolding story.

After the discoveries of Charles Darwin and Sir Isaac Newton, the theological and providential interpretations were rejected in favour of the scientific approach. This is based on the idea that human nature is not been the same throughout history. Historical periods are distinct from one another. Speculative philosophy of history thus evolved from the desire to make sense of history, to find meaning in it, or at least some intelligible pattern. The rapidly changing times in history need a sense of continuity. The ultimate desire is to predict the future on the basis of identifying general forces governing history.

The themes in the speculative philosophy of history focus on:

The search for meaning or design in the flow of history: The basic idea in the speculative philosophy of history is to propose a design or pattern in the historical process. It treats the historical process of moving towards reaching a purpose. Thus the duty of the historian is to find out the pattern of this historical process.

Theories of progress in history: Speculative philosophy of history focuses on the nature of historical progress. It proposes two views of progress in history – the cyclical view and the linear view. The cyclical view of history proposes the idea of periodic cycles in the course of history. This view holds that in the historical process, one can find out a beginning or origin, stages of development, and decline. This process will repeat in the course of history. The linear view of history proposes the progress of history towards a specific purpose.

Laws of Development in History: Speculative philosophy of history looks for the laws of historical development that determine historical processes. The idea is that the course of history is determined. The search for general law of development in history is necessary to build theories about the course of history.