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Comment by chaostheory | Hacker News Reader

> sounds to me purely like a bashing exercise.

For the record, I like the Khan Academy and they do a lot of good; but I still think that's really unfair to say that given that the article brings up a really important point (regardless of its style of writing): Khan Academy history lessons are so abbreviated, that key, important points and figures in history are skipped. Why is this not good? One of the major key reasons we study history is so that major mistakes of the past are not repeated in the present or future. Now this is an extreme example that no Khan like outlet actually does, but what if they skipped over Jim Crowe laws in their history of the US?

Going on somewhat of a tangent, reading this article reminds me of this TED talk about filter bubbles.

http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bu...

Essentially Khan Academy and other ventures like it, may be inadvertently creating dangerous filter bubbles.

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I seriously doubt a history lesson in 15 minutes that covered WWII to Vietnam is meant to be comprehensive. With that said, when I was in school we regularly covered a thousand years in a single page. And in many cases complete eras as pertained to geography were skipped altogether. To this day I don't think I could tell you the name of a single African King pre-1900.

With that said, one of the things I still prefer about Khan's lectures, even abbreviated ones like these stated, is that I can pause them at any time, and look up the Japanese oil embargo. And start right back up where I left off in the video. With live lectures at best you can take a note of it, and look it up later, but then other facts that build upon this in the lecture are missed -- and you may not even know that you missed them.

I agree with everything you just wrote, but I think you're missing the point of my post. I was just merely giving reasons as to why people shouldn't dismiss the article.

If they skip over something like Jim Crowe laws and someone notices, then that someone can mention it to Sal, explain why (s)he thinks it's important, and then Sal (or another instructor in the future) can make a video, and it can easily be incorporated into the curriculum. This process is much easier than it would be to incorporate it into a textbook, curriculum, etc.

"One of the major key reasons we study history is so that major mistakes of the past are not repeated in the present or future."

And yet we learn nothing from history even when we know what is considered factual.

The things we learn from history that are important become implicit part of our culture, our DNA not our curriculum.

> The things we learn from history that are important become part of our culture, not our curriculum.

How does it become part of our culture if it's not part of our curriculum? Given my own personal tastes (when I was a child), I would have skipped everything in history except for WWI, and WWII. Even with WWI and WWII, I probably would have only focused on the battles and not the social issues if given the chance. I wouldn't have learned about things like the Trail of Tears, the Japanese Internment camps in Hawaii, and so on.

And many people don't learn about those things because they are brought up in difference cultures. But to claim that some history books are better than others is just wrong. (I know you are not claiming that)

You will naturally learn your countries history albeit not to the point where you can become a history professor but it's not the end of the world.

History is perspective it can't be anything but perspective. There is no right or wrong teaching in history. Only survivors to tell the tales.

> You will naturally learn your countries history albeit not to the point where you can become a history professor

How? Through video game blockbusters like Call of Duty or summer movie hits like Saving Private Ryan?

How is Saving Private Ryan different from the US schools interpretation of 2nd World War?

How is Call of Duty different than a soldiers account of how a battlefield looked like? They are after all consulting soldiers.

I am not talking about learning historical facts but about growing up in a culture that has a memory of a past. Things that naturally flows between people.

I knew of 2nd world war before I had history, I knew of JFK before I had history. And I am Danish.

How is Call of Duty different than a soldiers account of how a battlefield looked like?

Between a WWII veteran's personal account of the battles and playing CoD, which one would you pick? If you pick the veteran's account, you know that Call of Duty trivializes war. There is a difference.

That is simply your opinion.

I don't think it trivializes war.

Yes, it was my opinion. Did it seem otherwise? If so, I'm sorry.

> How is Saving Private Ryan different from the US schools interpretation of 2nd World War?

Simple. It throws out a lot of the context and details of how we got to the meat grinder in the first place. It's traded for eye candy and emotion. All an individual with little background in the subject would know is that - these are the good guys over here and the bad guys over there.

> I knew of 2nd world war before I had history,

That's no surprise. Almost every kid enjoys anything with guns and bullets.

Having superficial knowledge of something is very different from getting a decent understanding of it. It's like knowing that Martin Luther was some guy who nailed a piece of paper to a door because he was angry with Catholicism, without understanding the details and background to how he got to the point and its future implications on the world.

For example.

Also during dinners at family table, chit-chats, watching TV news, reading newspapers, magazines, visiting museums, etc.

But to claim that some history books are better than others is just wrong.

How can you even write that? That statement is just so ridiculous as to befuddle belief. There are history books in existence written with deliberate lies mean to indoctrinate people in certain ways. Are you saying that these books are no different from other books that have no lies inserted? Are you saying that books that don't incorporate newly discovered evidence about the past aren't more complete than books which don't?

Yes, it's true that we have to account for the unreliable narrator, but to then say that we must abandon all attempt at objectivity with regard to history is absurd! There is so much one can do to mitigate the problems of an unreliable narrator and when we can't mitigate it entirely (most of the time,) we can always express our margin of error. True, there will always be some degree of uncertainty but the purpose of studying history is to decrease that degree of uncertainty.

I am saying that all there are no right way to tell a story.

No matter what history book you read it is excluding more things than it is including. That doesn't mean that you can't say factual wrong things. But the perspective of a history book can never be without an agenda nor without a perspective.

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