The Lechmere/Cross sources

[Templarkommando]

[QUOTE=Pierre;377123]

Hi Templarcommando,

Yes, I did miss your post. Thanks for posting again.



Well, you see, I do not use logic and I have never studied logic. I am an historian and sociologist. So I do not use pure logic and the logical systems.



No, I said that newspapers are often of low reliability. And if I say that the Daily Telegraph´s report was not reliable, I would not say that because I believe I can deduct such an idea from all newspapers to one newspaper by pure logic. I would say it because our empirical studies of newspapers often show us that articles are not reliable.

Thanks again,
Templarkommando

Thanks for your comments.

Kind regards, Pierre

Pierre,
I'm sorry if I seemed a bit impatient earlier. Thank you for your response. I would offer you an immediate response, but I find your reply has put me in a thoughtful mood. I need a little bit of time to chew on what exactly my reply will be.
Thanks
Templarkommando

[David Orsam]

OK, David. You are only here to destroy everything I say. That is you only interest and that is the only reason you are asking me for literature, since you are not even the slightest interested in the literature I recommend to you.

I can not teach you and make you an historian, you will have to go to a university and read the literature and do all the work.

Do not "suspect" me, and do not imply that I am not a "serious historian" and so on and so forth.

I gave you a list of serious literature and you are being ridiculing and belittling.

You destroy this thread, which is a thread about the sources that Fisherman is using. You are not contributing but you are rude and time consuming.

Time and time again, you do this. You destroy my threads. That is you only purpose for even discussing with me.

That's a remarkably evasive response Pierre.

Time and again in this forum you refer to the "tendency" of a source but I am suggesting that this is not a concept or word used by academic historians when writing about history. You have had the opportunity to provide examples of such a concept being used but it is evident that you cannot provide even one example.

[Pierre]

Hello Pierre,

At least two of the authors you cite are postmodernists, whose view of history is radically different to that of, say, the traditional historian. Thus, isn't it the case that the postmodernist approach ranges from nihilism to using the imagination to reconstruct historical events, i.e. on the basis that the past is inaccessible and therefore history is mainly fiction?

In fact, Foucault himself once said, "I am well aware that I have never written anything but fictions""

Yes, John. History happened to change during the last decades. So did sociology.

Kill the memory of Foucault and close the universities. And fold them neatly on a chair.

[Pierre]

That's a remarkably evasive response Pierre.

Time and again in this forum you refer to the "tendency" of a source but I am suggesting that this is not a concept or word used by academic historians when writing about history. You have had the opportunity to provide examples of such a concept being used but it is evident that you cannot provide even one example.

You suggest wrongly but you are not interested in knowing and you will never bother to find out. My opportunities are not given by you, David. You are very rude and provocative. I gave you a list of literature which you ignored. And that is what you must soon be - again! (how many times now?)
- since you try to destroy everything I write here.

[Elamarna]

OK, David. You are only here to destroy everything I say. That is you only interest and that is the only reason you are asking me for literature, since you are not even the slightest interested in the literature I recommend to you.

I can not teach you and make you an historian, you will have to go to a university and read the literature and do all the work.

Do not "suspect" me, and do not imply that I am not a "serious historian" and so on and so forth.

I gave you a list of serious literature and you are being ridiculing and belittling.

You destroy this thread, which is a thread about the sources that Fisherman is using. You are not contributing but you are rude and time consuming.

Time and time again, you do this. You destroy my threads. That is you only purpose for even discussing with me.

Pierre

I see your standard reply churned out again, of you are destroying my thread, when not able or unwilling provide an answer.

By the way I answered your question about my background yesterday, why don't you answer the question you are asked.

s

[Pierre]

Pierre

I see your standard reply churned out again, of you are destroying my thread, when not able or unwilling provide an answer.

By the way I answered your question about my background yesterday, why don't you answer the question you are asked.

s

Hi Steve,

Sorry, I didn´t see it, since I have no time for reading posts. David is taking ALL my time. So now I will ignore him again.

And when I do this, I will go in now and then to see if he is spreading rumors about me. And then I will contact Admin, since I have no other choice left.

I will look for your post and read it.

Regards, Pierre

[David Orsam]

You suggest wrongly but you are not interested in knowing and you will never bother to find out. My opportunities are not given by you, David. You are very rude and provocative. I gave you a list of literature which you ignored. And that is what you must soon be - again - since you want to destroy everything I write here.

I am trying to find out Pierre by continually asking you. All you gave me were guides to the theory of writing or researching history which is not what I am looking for or asking about. I'm specifically looking for an actual work of history so that I can see the concept of "tendency" used when discussing actual evidence in the context of a discussion relating to an actual historical period or event. In other words, I want to see the practice not the theory. If you don't know of any such books, just admit it. What's the problem?

[Kattrup]

Time and again in this forum you refer to the "tendency" of a source but I am suggesting that this is not a concept or word used by academic historians when writing about history.

Having been educated as a historian at the University of Copenhagen, I can attest to the fact that the word "tendency" plays a large part in the courses on source criticism, the "tendency of the source" often being analysed.

The word, of course, in Danish is "tendens", which would in this context perhaps be better translated as "bias" or similar.

Just mentioning this, as Pierre has a partly Danish background, and therefore possibly took his history degree in Denmark.

[David Orsam]

Having been educated as a historian at the University of Copenhagen, I can attest to the fact that the word "tendency" plays a large part in the courses on source criticism, the "tendency of the source" often being analysed.

The word, of course, in Danish is "tendens", which would in this context perhaps be better translated as "bias" or similar.

Just mentioning this, as Pierre has a partly Danish background, and therefore possibly took his history degree in Denmark.

"Bias" makes sense Kattrup but are you aware of an actual work of history (not theory) which, in English, refers to the "tendency of a source" or the "tendency of a witness" when putting forward any sort of historical argument?

I rather suspect that the Wikipedia page mis-translates the original Swedish. When you refer to your courses at the University of Copenhagen, were they in Danish so that "tendency of the sources" is your own translation from Danish to English and that one could equally say "bias of the sources"?

[Pierre]

Having been educated as a historian at the University of Copenhagen, I can attest to the fact that the word "tendency" plays a large part in the courses on source criticism, the "tendency of the source" often being analysed.

The word, of course, in Danish is "tendens", which would in this context perhaps be better translated as "bias" or similar.

Just mentioning this, as Pierre has a partly Danish background, and therefore possibly took his history degree in Denmark.

Hi Kattrup

Nice to hear you studied History in Denmark and took the courses on source criticism!

Yes, tendency is an historical concept and important in historical source criticism.

Therefore it is also useful and important in the research on Jack the Ripper.

Kind regards, Pierre

[Pierre]

[QUOTE=Templarkommando;377127]

Pierre,
I'm sorry if I seemed a bit impatient earlier. Thank you for your response. I would offer you an immediate response, but I find your reply has put me in a thoughtful mood. I need a little bit of time to chew on what exactly my reply will be.
Thanks
Templarkommando

Hi Templarkommando,

No problem at all.

Kind regards, Pierre

[Kattrup]

I rather suspect that the Wikipedia page mis-translates the original Swedish. When you refer to your courses at the University of Copenhagen, were they in Danish so that "tendency of the sources" is your own translation from Danish to English and that one could equally say "bias of the sources"?

Yes, they were in Danish, and the phrase "tendency of the sources" was meant as a translation of the phrase used in the courses - "kildernes tendens".

I do agree that the translation is flawed, since "tendency" in English has different connotations, more statistical I'd say.

I just mentioned the term as a possible explanation for part of the...communication gap? in this thread, i.e. Pierre might during the debate have used an approximate and similar-sounding term to what he studied at uni.
I don't know, since I also don't know that he actually studied history in Denmark - his degree could be from elsewhere.

"Bias" would cover the intent of the courses in source criticism much better, I think.

And no, I'm not presently aware of anyone using the term in actual works on history. It's mainly a theoretical term. I'm eyeing my bookshelves, if I come up with anyone I'll let you know.

Hi Kattrup

Nice to hear you studied History in Denmark and took the courses on source criticism!

Yes, good times

[David Orsam]

Yes, they were in Danish, and the phrase "tendency of the sources" was meant as a translation of the phrase used in the courses - "kildernes tendens".

I do agree that the translation is flawed, since "tendency" in English has different connotations, more statistical I'd say.

I just mentioned the term as a possible explanation for part of the...communication gap? in this thread, i.e. Pierre might during the debate have used an approximate and similar-sounding term to what he studied at uni.
I don't know, since I also don't know that he actually studied history in Denmark - his degree could be from elsewhere.

"Bias" would cover the intent of the courses in source criticism much better, I think.

And no, I'm not presently aware of anyone using the term in actual works on history. It's mainly a theoretical term. I'm eyeing my bookshelves, if I come up with anyone I'll let you know.

Thank you very much Kattrup, now we're getting somewhere. As a phrase, "source bias" (if that is a fair translation of "kildernes tendens") makes much more sense and, as far as I am concerned, is unobjectionable.

I do wonder, though, what is the original Swedish for the sentence on Wikipedia, attributed to Thurén, was has been translated as: "The tendency of a source is its motivation for providing some kind of bias" because both "tendency" and "bias" are used in that sentence. The sentence which follows it, "Tendencies should be minimized or supplemented with opposite motivations", just screams out as something that has been translated from a foreign language into English.

[Kattrup]

I do wonder, though, what is the original Swedish for the sentence on Wikipedia, attributed to Thurén, was has been translated as: "The tendency of a source is its motivation for providing some kind of bias" because both "tendency" and "bias" are used in that sentence. The sentence which follows it, "Tendencies should be minimized or supplemented with opposite motivations", just screams out as something that has been translated from a foreign language into English.

I don't know the original wording - the first sentence is hard to deconstruct but the second is completely clear to me from years of indoctrination

[John G]

Yes, John. History happened to change during the last decades. So did sociology.

Kill the memory of Foucault and close the universities. And fold them neatly on a chair.

Hello Pierre,

But hasn't it been argued that postmodernism is ultimately self defeating? Thus, if truth is subjective, and reality cannot be known or described objectively, then postmodernism itself must be a social construction.