Some Neglected Philosophical Problems regarding History of Education

Abstract

IN applying philosophy to the special conceptual problems that arise out of the practice of history of education, (1) one is doing critical phi losophy of history. (2) Philosophy of history, envisaged in this sense, can provide the historian of education with an awareness of the underlying assumptions he makes and the methodological limitations inherent in his task. If one approaches philosophy of history in terms of positivist and nonpositivist thought, it is found that some of the more urgent prob lems center on a discussion of the nature of historical knowledge, the uniqueness and/or generality of historical events and their im plications for historical explanation. The positivists, with their bold defense of the unity of science, assert that the study of history is amenable to the same mode of inquiry as is the study of physics, the paradigm science. No particular branch of knowledge, they claim, ever deals with anything but past events and, in this sense, the dif ference, for example, between history of education and astronomy is mainly a difference of degree. Although there are variations in their thought, Ernest Nagel, Carl Hempel, Patrick Gardiner and others have been associated with this view of the philosophy of history. The claim that history, hence history of education, is something other than a kind of natural science is advanced by Benedetto Croce, R. G. Collingwood and William Dray, to mention only a few. These non positivist philosophers of history have concerned themselves mainly with the thoughts of historical agents. (3) A number of problems are raised when philosophy is applied to history of education. For example, Professor M. Oakeshott asserts that