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One of the concepts in the reading that I found interesting this week was how “the developement of history has looked different to historians, depending on the concerns of their own day” (Popkin, 25). Knowing what the major concerns of historians were during a certain time period can possibly be extremely important while researching. By knowing what these concerns are, it can help the reader to decipher any biases that the author may have had. For example, if someone was studying the works of Eusebius, it is important to know that his main “purpose of history was to show the working out of God’s plan for humanity” and that he was also trying to prove that the “Jewish tradition was older and therefore more reliable than that of the Greeks” (Popkin 37-38). Knowing this about the author would help the researcher to better understand the meanings behind his writings, and also be able to critique them better. This was particularly interesting to me because I attended a christian school from kindergarten all the way thru high school.
I really liked @derekjahwu’s comment on how people react to fire the exact same way today as they did at first during the Chicago fire. Another part I found interesting in the Helmer article was how the people seemed so comfortable with fire. At first people were going to watch the fire until they realized that it was completely out of control. This indicates that the people were comfortable with fire and that it was a fairly common occurrence. Lastly, I thought it was interesting how buildings that were described as “fireproof” were obliterated by the fire (Helmer). Obviously science has advanced much since then, but it makes me wonder how many of our disaster proof buildings and preventative measures are actually as good as they say they are. For example, are our earthquake proof buildings in southern California really earthquake proof?