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The Poverty of Historicism (Routledge Classics) (Paperback)

~ Karl Popper (Author) "In strong opposition to methodological naturalism in the field of sociology, historicism claims that some of the characteristic methods of physics cannot be applied to..." (more)
Key Phrases: historicist moral theory, piecemeal technologist, piecemeal technology, Professor Hayek, Logic of Scientific Discovery, Professor Toynbee (more...)

4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Probably the only book published this year which will outlive the century." -- Arthur Koestler, author of Darkness at Noon

'Karl Popper was a philosopher of uncommon originality, clarity and depth, and his range was exceptional.' - The Times

Karl Popper was a philosopher of uncommon originality, clarity and depth, and his range was exceptional. - The Times

'One of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century.' - The Daily Telegraph

'Popper's work is of far greater than mere academic value; it has an immediate and manifest bearing on the political decisions everyone has to make.' - The Listener

'This is one of the three or four most important books of the methodology of the social sciences to appear since the war.' - New Statesman

'This is the theoretical companion to the better-known Open Society and Its Enemies. It puts paid to all attempts at futurology by pointing out that the future depends on new knowledge which by definition we do not have today.' - Samuel Brittan, The Week

One of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century. - The Daily Telegraph

Poppers work is of far greater than mere academic value; it has an immediate and manifest bearing on the political decisions everyone has to make. - The Listener

This is one of the three or four most important books of the methodology of the social sciences to appear since the war. - New Statesman

This is the theoretical companion to the better-known Open Society and Its Enemies. It puts paid to all attempts at futurology by pointing out that the future depends on new knowledge which by definition we do not have today. - Samuel Brittan, The Week

Product Description

Hailed on publication in 1957 as "probably the only book published this year that will outlive the century," this is a brilliant of the idea that there are fixed laws in history and that human beings are able to predict them.

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Product Details

Paperback: 176 pages
Publisher: Routledge; 2 edition (March 29, 2002)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0415278465
ISBN-13: 978-0415278461
Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 4.9 x 0.5 inches
Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #130,824 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)
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#80 in Books > Nonfiction > Philosophy > Epistemology

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Inside This Book (learn more)

First Sentence:
In strong opposition to methodological naturalism in the field of sociology, historicism claims that some of the characteristic methods of physics cannot be applied to the social sciences, owing to the profound differences between sociology and physics. Read the first page

Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
historicist moral theory, piecemeal technologist, piecemeal technology, other classic titles, principia media, inverse deduction, methodological essentialism, historicist argument, sociological laws

Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Professor Hayek, Logic of Scientific Discovery, Professor Toynbee

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Citations (learn more)

This book cites 32 books:

Methods of Social Study (1931) by Sidney Webb on page 79
The Road to Serfdom: Fiftieth Anniversary Edition by F. A. Hayek on page 147
A Study of History, Vol. 1: Abridgement of Volumes I-VI by Arnold J. Toynbee on page 101
Madness and Civilization (Routledge Classics) by Michel Foucault in Back Matter
A Short History of Ethics: A History of Moral Philosophy from the Homeric Age to the Twentieth Century by Alasdair C. MacIntyre in Back Matter

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100 books cite this book:

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Books on Related Topics (learn more)

The Open Society and Its Enemies, Vol. 1 by Karl Raimund Popper

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The Great Philosophers From Socrates to Turing by Ray Monk

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Popper by Frederic Raphael

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	10% buy Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge (Routledge Classics) 4.6 out of 5 stars (10) $11.37
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44 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Gives inspiring ideas and insights into the history., February 23, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Poverty of Historicism (Paperback)

This book is not your easy bedtime reading -- it's serious and requires a reader's thought to travel along the author's walks and remember his points. But the rewards are big -- Popper comes close to defining the method of the field I would call "societal engineering".

Popper's main points to me are:

1. You can't plan and carry out a reform of the whole society. Reason - the people who carry out reforms are themselves changed by reforms. They loose relative objectivity and can no longer see clearly the original plan of reform and follow it.

2. You can plan and carry out changes in a relatively small sector or in a narrow field. Reason - it's possible to receive objective feedback and act on it to steer the reform into the objectives of the original plan.

Examples from Soviet history that startled me:

1. A failure of Lenin and Bolsheviks to change society. They created a plan and did they try -- but the resulting system (in which I was born) instead of changing according to plan, just fed them the data their plans required. Even more almost all the originators of changes were destroyed by these changes.

2. A relative success of the NEP (New Economic Politics) initiated by Lenin and his associates. It dealt with relatively narrow field - small to middle businesses and it had definite goal -- to feed hungry country of the post-World War I Soviet Russia. And it did succeed! The NEP was stopped by Stalin, who unsuccessfully continued to implement plans to change whole society.

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26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The fallacy of Utopian Engineering, October 18, 2002

By	Esther Nebenzahl (Cascais Portugal) - See all my reviews

Sir Popper is considered one of the most important thinkers in the area of philosophy of science. "The Poverty of Historicism" despite its complexity, carries a fundamental simple message: prediction over the course of history (its social and economic implications) is nothing more than a fantasy, an illusion. And this assertion is based on the principle that the events/persons responsible for changes are themselves affected by these same changes. It is Heisenberg's principle of uncertainty applied to social sciences!
Historicism is the theory that history develops itself according to pre-determined, inexorable laws with a fixed objective or end. Fascism and communism were laid upon these presuppositions, and the course fo history has proven the fallacy (therefore poverty) of such assumptions. The attempt to have a holistic approach by eliminating individual differences through "brain washing" is incompatible with critical thought, and although it will bring about a concentration of power it will also cause an erosion of knowledge. The Poverty of Historicism becomes a poverty of imagination, of the ability of critical judgement and analysis. Historicism, according to Karl Popper preposterously assumes the postion of having discovered the problem of "change," but revolutions are not unique to our modern era and the metaphysical speculation of what constitutes "change" has been addressed since the time of Heraclitus.
The goal of applying scientific methods with the same accuracy and predictability as those in theoretical physics is bound to end in failure when it concerns the course of history. The influence of the prediction upon the predicted events is here being termed as the "Oedipus effect." Physics can arrive at universally valid uniformities, whereas sociology must be contented with the intuitive understanding of unique events, and of the role they play in particular situations, occuring within particular struggles of interests, tendencies and destinies. If sociological laws determine the degree of anything, they will do so only in very vague terms, and will permit, at the best, a very rough scaling.
Karl Popper who was a fierce advocate of democrary and social critiscim, dedicated this book to all of those who have been victims to the fascist and communist belief in the inexorable laws of historical destiny.

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13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a demolishing critic to the Ideological Marxism, August 16, 1996

By A Customer

This review is from: The Poverty of Historicism (Paperback)

Karl Popper is one of the best thinkers about philosophy and Political theory. Two of his greatest merits are, in order: The first is his coherent life (congruence between thougths and acts) and the other is that when this book came up first (it took about 18 years to be translated from German to English), the historycal timing (1950's) was the worst: Everybody thought that the Marxist theory regarding the history was right and scientifically proven. Sir Popper demonstrated all errors of the Marxism from the ideolodical point of view, and that's why the name of the book. Also, Mr. Popper was the only deep critiziser of Karl Marx.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Non expert summary of the book
1. Historicism is a term that was invented by Karl Popper. He did it on purpose to prevent confusion with any other existing term.
2. Read more

Published 1 month ago by Sudipto Sarkar

5.0 out of 5 stars He sees a fundamental truth of the human situation
Popper's argument here and his general view are somewhat surprisingly in synch with that of American Pragmatic philosophy. Read more

Published on August 25, 2007 by Shalom Freedman

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazon reader
Do you have a deep down, hard to enunciate, disquiet with the level of debate in the broad area of social theory and "social engineering"? Read more

Published on May 3, 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars The Poverty of Anti-Historicism?
This classic little work is a must read for any theorist of history and evolution, which is not to say that one agrees altogether with Popper's formulation. Read more

Published on May 8, 2001 by John C. Landon

5.0 out of 5 stars A slim volume with a powerful punch
I read this book, and several of Karl Popper's other books then available in English, while still a graduate student in anthropology at an American university. Read more

Published on June 23, 2000 by Mark J. Ross

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