"History is bunk"
Nonetheless, it needs to built on historical facts and logics. With no culture of asking the questions and analysis, a true fact could be portrayed as a half truth or no truth with enough passage of the time. This can easily happen in countries like Bangladesh where daily survival is more important than the correct history.
Science is rather a different animal, which needs a solid bunk! It is corrected with time but people who cheat for a temporary advantage for say, tenure or funding, do pay a heavy price. Baltimore did not retract the paper in time for his big ego, I suppose. He was still supporting Imanichi and that might have killed his Rockefeller presidency.
The same goes with Robert Gallo, who simply stole Luc Montagnier HIV virus and wanted to sell it as his own isolated virus. Ultimately, DNA sequencing proved him as a thief and that killed his chance of sharing the Nobel price.
-SD
"All great truths begin as blasphemies." GBS
From: Kamal Das <kamalctgu@gmail.com>
To: mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2012 12:54 AM
Subject: Re: [mukto-mona] Muntassir Mamoon, a Professor with true courage! A lone soldier too?
History is bunk, said Henry Ford. Neither Science, nor History corrects itself without human endeavor. We have seen Aristotlean Science reigning supreme for thousands of years. As Bertrand Russell wondered on Aristotle's observation that women has less number of teeth (apparently lacking wisdom!), if the later had enough wisdom to check it in his wife's mouth. Such wise scientists abound even today. David Baltimore, a Nobel Laureate, was asked to quit his job as President of Rockefeller University for having defended falsification of data in his research group on insisting that "Science has the inherent ability to correct itself".
On Sat, Jul 7, 2012 at 8:42 PM, Shah Deeldar <shahdeeldar@yahoo.com> wrote:
Prof. Mamun's sharp pen is not only comical but he also points out how History of a country can be changed if enough idiots get their Bangladeshi History thesis approved by their non-critical supervisors and bogus external examiners. It basically boils down to writing up some rubbish around certain famous or infamous people of Bangladesh during the tumultuous time our History and take it to the finish line. The new historical thesis based on mainly presumptions, lies and self-gratifying exaggerations of certain villains will then be used as solid references for the next generations of new thesis. And, in no time, people who opposed Bangladesh independence would be portrayed as heroes while the true freedoms fighters/victims can be shown as villains of 1971 liberation war. It is strange that this is happening right in front of many of our surviving witnesses of that liberation war. Their only fault is that their naivety about the History. Many of us think History will correct itself as Science does but that is a total fallacy. Historical facts should be challenged but the rebuttal should be fast and furious before the non-believers attack the next historical fact. I do not know how long Prof. Mamun can fight this war alone with an opponent who has both infinite amount of money and muscle? Ironically, when a governmental force promotes the lies for its advantage, we might see a quick distortion of our History within another generation. Are we ready to fight this trend or should we be relying only people like Prof. Mamun tackle the problem?What do you think?A concerned citizen,-SD"All great truths begin as blasphemies." GBS
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