Why We Study History During The 1600s

Why we study history can be traced all of the way back to the scientific revolution and the enlightenment period during the 1600’s. These western scientists rearranged the way governments and people evaluated themselves as societies. They came up with a new system known as the scientific method. The scientific method abandoned the old ideas of tradition based ways of life and implemented new ideas such as reason. Instead of using history to guide them in a way of life, history was being used as a way to correct past errors and better life as a whole. The new ways of life invented by western intellects around the world first started taking shape in the eighteenth century. This period of time was known as the enlightenment period. It stemmed
from many of the same ideas as the scientific revolution. During the scientific revolution, European civilizations had noticed the distance between their technological advancements and China’s during the 1500’s. They craved to better themselves and overcome China’s scientific accomplishments. This way of thinking eventually sparked the scientific revolution. The scientific revolution sparked the competitive attitude known as the “best and brightest” system. This idea was adopted by almost all European political systems. As the enlightenment period began to shape, they also adopted the “best and brightest” attitude while adding new terms such as reasoning and thinking to describe their new system called the scientific method. Prior to these new ideas, most governments used history as a guideline to operate their civilizations, but with strategies built around reasoning and thinking, it allowed people to recognize errors in the past rather than keep repeating them.
It allowed political systems to find out what worked and what didn’t throughout their history, thus creating a new system that consisted of the most historically productive pieces of government. This also allowed scientists to take a step back from analyzing themselves and take time to observe other successful civilizations across the world. This allowed new ideas to be implemented into each new government policy. These new policies helped new civilizations arise and become more powerful due to the “best and brightest” attitude of the enlightenment
period. All of these successful new systems were showing signs that change was actually for the better.
They realized knowledge and change could further progress civilization while technological, political changes and improvements could be implemented by analyzing the histories of previously successful nations. For example, in East Asia during the 1500’s, China was becoming a super power in scientific advancements. They were focused on living their lives the way they knew how, using history as a guideline rather than a source of improvement. China put an economic emphasis on agriculture, and for a while, technological improvements were only seen on the agricultural front instead of all aspects of life. Soon European ideas began influencing Chinese civilizations and instead of implementing these new ideas into their societies, they opposed the change and kept to their way of life. Europeans shared their ideas of industrialization which were ignored by China due to their agricultural way of life. As a result, China did everything in their power to oppose these new ideas by creating laws that prevented the establishment of industry in their country. Europe on the other hand, had adopted ideas and began applying changes to their states. This is the main reason Western civilizations become a more dominant factor in the world compared to China and the east. Their viewpoints were vastly different, “The competitive spirit in Europe,..China’s ideological viewpoint that favored living in
harmony and nature rather than trying to dominate”. After Europe’s scientific revolution and period of enlightenment, the aftermath left Europe as the most dominant continent in the world. It consisted of some of the most advanced nations the world has ever seen. Utilizing history as a tool rather than a guideline of rules proved to be the new way of life, and history is still used this way today. Eventually, China and the Middle East would soon follow these steps, but even today we still notice that a few nations in the east are not as modern or advanced as the rest of western civilization. We also still notice that certain political systems are bound to fail, or certain economic strategies will fail given certain circumstances. The reason we understand this is because we can look back in history and use these dilemmas as evidence in problem solving today. This is how modern historical knowledge derives from the fundamental ideas of the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment Period.