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Pseudohistorians
Pseudohistory is a form of pseudoscholarship that attempts to distort or misrepresent the historical record, often by employing methods resembling those used in scholarly historical research. The related term cryptohistory is applied to pseudohistory derived from the superstitions intrinsic to occultism. Pseudohistory is related to pseudoscience and pseudoarchaeology, and usage of the terms may occasionally overlap. Although pseudohistory comes in many forms, scholars have identified common features in pseudohistorical works. Pseudohistory is almost always motivated by a contemporary political, religious, or personal agenda. It frequently presents sensational claims or a big lie about historical facts which would require unwarranted revision of the historical record. Another hallmark is an underlying premise that scholars have a furtive agenda to suppress the promoter's thesis—a premise commonly corroborated by elaborate conspiracy theories. Works of pseudohistory often poi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sonderaktion 1005
' 1005 (, 'Special Action 1005'), also called ''Aktion'' 1005 or ' (, 'Exhumation Action'), was a top-secret Nazi operation conducted from June 1942 to late 1944. The goal of the project was to hide or destroy any evidence of the mass murder that had taken place under Operation Reinhard, the attempted (and largely successful) extermination of all Jews in the General Government occupied zone of Poland. Groups of ''Sonderkommando'' prisoners, officially called ''Leichenkommandos'' ("corpse units"), were forced to exhume mass graves and burn the bodies; inmates were often put in chains to prevent them from escaping. The project was put in place to destroy evidence of the genocide that had been committed by the Order Police battalions and ''Einsatzgruppen'', the German death squads who murdered millions, including more than 1 million Jews, Roma and Slavs. The ''Aktion'' was overseen by selected squads of the ''Sicherheitsdienst'' (SD) and the uniformed Order Police. Operation ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pseudoscholarship
Pseudo-scholarship (from pseudo- and scholarship) is a term used to describe work (e.g., publication, lecture) or a body of work that is presented as, but is not, the product of rigorous and objective study or research; the act of producing such work; or the pretended learning upon which it is based. Examples of pseudo-scholarship include: *Pseudoarchaeology *Pseudohistory *Pseudolaw *Pseudolinguistics *Pseudomathematics *Pseudophilosophy *PseudoscienceJeremy Bernstein, ''A Comprehensible World: On Modern Science and Its Origins'', 2nd ed. (New York: Random House, 1967) p. 193 See also *Chaos magic *Conspiracy theory * Counterknowledge *Crackpot index *Crank (person) *Fallacy *Fringe science *Fringe theory *Ignoratio elenchi *Junk science *''Mathematical Cranks'' *Predatory journal *Proto-science In the philosophy of science, protoscience is a research field that has the characteristics of an undeveloped science that may ultimately develop into an established science. Philoso ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Legend
A legend is a genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human values, and possess certain qualities that give the tale verisimilitude (literature), verisimilitude. Legend, for its active and passive participants, may include miracles. Legends may be transformed over time to keep them fresh and vital. Many legends operate within the realm of uncertainty, never being entirely believed by the participants, but also never being resolutely doubted. Legends are sometimes distinguished from myths in that they concern human beings as the main characters and do not necessarily have supernatural origins, and sometimes in that they have some sort of historical basis whereas myths generally do not. The Brothers Grimm defined ''legend'' as "Folklore, folktale historically grounded". A by-product of the "concern with human beings" is the long list of legendary crea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Myth
Myth is a genre of folklore consisting primarily of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society. For scholars, this is very different from the vernacular usage of the term "myth" that refers to a belief that is not true. Instead, the veracity of a myth is not a defining criterion. Myths are often endorsed by religious (when they are closely linked to religion or spirituality) and secular authorities. Many societies group their myths, legends, and history together, considering myths and legends to be factual accounts of their remote past. In particular, creation myths take place in a primordial age when the world had not achieved its later form. Origin myths explain how a society's Norm (social), customs, institutions, and taboos were established and sanctified. National myths are narratives about a nation's past that symbolize the nation's values. There is a complex relationship between Myth and ritual, recital of myths and the enactment of rituals. Etymology The w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Conspiracy Theory
A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy (generally by powerful sinister groups, often political in motivation), when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * * * * The term generally has a negative connotation, implying that the appeal of a conspiracy theory is based in prejudice, emotional conviction, or insufficient evidence. A conspiracy theory is distinct from a conspiracy; it refers to a hypothesized conspiracy with specific characteristics, including but not limited to opposition to the mainstream consensus among those who are qualified to evaluate its accuracy, such as scientists or historians. Conspiracy theories tend to be internally consistent and correlate with each other; they are generally designed to resist falsification either by evidence against them or a lack of evidence for them. They are reinforced by circular reasoning: both evidence against the conspiracy ''and'' absenc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Furtive Fallacy
The furtive fallacy is an informal fallacy of emphasis in which historical outcomes are asserted to be the result of hidden ( furtive) misconduct or wrongdoing by decision makers. Historian David Hackett Fischer identified it as the belief that significant facts of history are necessarily sinister, and that "history itself is a story of causes mostly insidious and results mostly invidious." Although it may lead to a conspiracy theory, the fallacy itself consists in the assumption that misdeeds lurk behind every page of history. In its extreme form, the fallacy represents general paranoia. Fischer identified several examples of the fallacy, with particular attention to the works of Charles A. Beard and his critic Forrest McDonald. Beard had argued that Franklin Roosevelt secretly and intentionally maneuvered the country into World War II. Although some critics accused him of falsifying the historical record, Fischer believed that Beard was merely pursuing a long-held misconceptio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Historical Revisionism
In historiography, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of a historical account. It usually involves challenging the orthodox (established, accepted or traditional) scholarly views or narratives regarding a historical event, timespan, or phenomenon by introducing contrary evidence or reinterpreting the motivations and decisions of the people involved. Revision of the historical record can reflect new discoveries of fact, evidence, and interpretation as they come to light. The process of historical revision is a common, necessary, and usually uncontroversial process which develops and refines the historical record to make it more complete and accurate. One form of historical revisionism involves a reversal of older moral judgments. Revision in this fashion is a more controversial topic, and can include denial or distortion of the historical record yielding an illegitimate form of historical revisionism known as ''historical negationism'' (involving, for example, dist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Big Lie
A big lie () is a gross distortion or misrepresentation of the truth primarily used as a political propaganda technique. The German expression was first used by Adolf Hitler in his book ''Mein Kampf'' (1925) to describe how people could be induced to believe so colossal a lie because they would not believe that someone "could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously". Hitler claimed that the technique had been used by Jews to blame Germany's loss in on German general Erich Ludendorff, who was a prominent nationalist political leader in the Weimar Republic. According to historian Jeffrey Herf, the Nazis used the idea of the original big lie to turn sentiment against Jews and justify the Holocaust. Herf maintains that Nazi Germany's chief propagandist Joseph Goebbels and the Nazi Party actually used the big lie technique that they describedand that they used it to turn long-standing antisemitism in Europe into mass murder. Herf further argues that the Nazis' bi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Political Agenda
In politics, a political agenda is a list of subjects or problems (issues) to which government officials as well as individuals outside the government are paying serious attention to at any given time. The political agenda is most often shaped by political and policy elites but can also be influenced by activist groups, private sector lobbyists, think tanks, courts, world events, and the degree of state centralisation. Media coverage has also been linked to the success of the rise of political parties and their ability to get their ideas on the agenda ( agenda-setting). Although the media does often have an effect on the political agenda, these results are not always immediate, which can produce a lag in the political agenda. Who can affect the political agenda The political agenda can be influenced by multiple institutional and non-institutional actors acting independently or concurrently, including political office-holders, interest groups, social movements, and other ent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pseudoarchaeology
Pseudoarchaeology (sometimes called fringe or alternative archaeology) consists of attempts to study, interpret, or teach about the subject-matter of archaeology while rejecting, ignoring, or misunderstanding the accepted Scientific method, data-gathering and analytical methods of the discipline.Pseudoarchaeology#FagFed06, Fagan and Feder 2006. p. 720. These pseudoscience, pseudoscientific interpretations involve the use of artifacts, sites or materials to construct scientifically insubstantial theories to strengthen the pseudoarchaeologists' claims. Methods include exaggeration of evidence, dramatic or romanticized conclusions, use of fallacy, fallacious arguments, and fabrication of evidence. There is no unified pseudoarchaeological theory or method, but rather many different interpretations of the past which are jointly at odds with those developed by the scientific community as well as with each other. These include religious philosophies such as creationism or "creation scie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pseudoscience
Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable claims; reliance on confirmation bias rather than rigorous attempts at refutation; lack of openness to evaluation by other experts; absence of systematic practices when developing hypotheses; and continued adherence long after the pseudoscientific hypotheses have been experimentally discredited. It is not the same as junk science. The demarcation between science and pseudoscience has scientific, philosophical, and political implications. Philosophers debate the nature of science and the general criteria for drawing the line between scientific theories and pseudoscientific beliefs, but there is widespread agreement "that creationism, astrology, homeopathy, Kirlian photography, dowsing, ufology, ancient astronaut theory, Holocaust den ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Occult
The occult () is a category of esoteric or supernatural beliefs and practices which generally fall outside the scope of organized religion and science, encompassing phenomena involving a 'hidden' or 'secret' agency, such as magic and mysticism. It can also refer to paranormal ideas such as extra-sensory perception and parapsychology. The term occult sciences was used in 16th-century Europe to refer to astrology, alchemy, and natural magic. The term occultism emerged in 19th-century France, among figures such as Antoine Court de Gébelin. It came to be associated with various French esoteric groups connected to Éliphas Lévi and Papus, and in 1875 was introduced into the English language by the esotericist Helena Blavatsky. Throughout the 20th century, the term 'occult' was used idiosyncratically by a range of different authors. By the 21st century the term 'occultism' was commonly employed –including by academic scholars in the field of Western esotericism ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
