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I’m your host, Michael Alan Prestwood and this is the column research for the

May 2026 edition

of the TST Column.

This is the expanded story mode edition.

We close the Understanding Philosophy series with truth in history and fiction. This column focuses on history. Next month, I’m appearing on the Audible River podcast, talking about spirituality. So next month, we’ll interrupt this series with Empirical Spirituality and the future of belief systems. In July, we’ll finalize this thread with fiction.

About how history works. If reality grounds truth, if belief requires justification, and if confidence comes in degrees, how do we handle stories — especially those about the past? History and fiction both shape our understanding, but they do not carry equal evidential weight. This issue explores how to evaluate narratives responsibly, distinguishing what likely happened from what merely resonates. The architecture only matters if we can live inside it.

With that, let’s frame the key idea.

Philosophy of History.

This week, we explore the idea of Philosophy of History.

History and fiction both tell stories; only one attempts to align with reality.

Now for the 6 research tidbits. The goal, to blend intersections into wisdom.

A tidbit may be small, but it does important work. It gives one claim a place to stand, a source to answer to, and a path back into the larger framework.

The key ideas are available on the home page, but this story mode is the only place to get the “rest of the story.”

A Philosophy Story.

From History:

Subject: Philosophy of History.

Book: The Idea of History.

1946

Published posthumously.

R. G. Collingwood’s ideas in his 1946 book The Idea of History helped recraft the philosophy of history. To understand the past, the historian must do more than collect evidence akin to reporting; the historian must also be like a journalist and think through the actions, purposes, and questions of those who lived before. The goal? To document the roots, intent, and influence of the facts of history.

Collingwood’s ideas align strongly with empirical narrative realism. His famous idea of historical “re-enactment” means that historians try to reconstruct the thought behind past human actions. The past is a retelling. The event happened in the material world, but the historical account requires rational thought. Collingwood supported the idea that history is indirect rational reconstruction, not direct empirical observation.

Collingwood treated history as a kind of science, and placed it near the center of serious academic inquiry. History deserves that seriousness, but it fits more specifically within journalism: a public-truth discipline that gathers evidence, investigates conflict, builds narratives, and calibrates confidence.

The surviving traces are empirical. A diary, fossil, photograph, or ruin gives history an empirical anchor. The narrative built from those traces is rational because it arranges evidence into sequence, cause, context, and meaning. This also gives us the language of confidence: some historical stories align with reality strongly, some are weak, and some collapse when reality pushes back. Historical writing becomes irrational when it outruns the evidence and drifts into unsupported speculation.

That Philosophy Story,

was first published on TST 4 weeks ago.

A Philosophy Quote.

From History:

Subject: Philosophy of History.

“The historian without his facts is rootless…the facts without their historian are…meaningless.”.

E. H. Carr.
1961.

Edward Hallett Carr was born in 1892. The British historian, diplomat, and theorist of international relations was best known for What Is History? and his fourteen-volume history of Soviet Russia. Carr challenged the older idea that history is simply a neutral record of facts. His full quote from 1961 captures his view on history well:

“The historian without his facts is rootless and futile; the facts without their historian are dead and meaningless”

Carr’s quote supports Empirical Narrative Realism because it holds together both sides of the historical process. The “facts” are the surviving traces. The historian supplies the story using them. The past happened in the material world, and the practice of history is reconstruction.

The Idea of Ideas sharpens that interaction into categories: the past event was empirical, the surviving traces are empirical, and the historical story is rational. It also adds the language of confidence. Some historical stories are strongly aligned with reality, some are weak, and some collapse when reality pushes back.

Carr’s quote also reflects his wider worldview. He embraced reality and rejected naïve objectivism. The idea that historians can simply gather facts, arrange them in order, and let “history” speak for itself. Historians do more than collect objective facts like stones on a path. History is an active dialogue between the present and the past, a phrase Carr himself used to define history. History is a story that must keep answering to evidence.

At his home in England in 1982, Carr passed into history at the age of 90.

That Philosophy Quote,

was first published on TST 4 weeks ago.

A Science FAQ.

Subject: Cognitive Bias.

Is science tainted by bias?.

Yes. Science is performed by flawed humans, so of course it is tainted by bias. Luckily, science is a process, not a static collection of facts. Human frailty regularly distorts observation, judgment, and interpretation, but the scientific method is designed to correct for that over time. In my writing, I focus on replication, peer review, and skepticism as key tools for pushing us toward more correct answers. Bias does not erase truth, but it can distort what we believe to be true until the evidence is tested more rigorously.

For example, take confirmation bias and anthropomorphism.

Confirmation bias occurs when scientists, often unintentionally, focus on evidence that supports their hypotheses while overlooking contradictory data. A researcher studying the health effects of a diet, for instance, might unconsciously highlight findings that fit their expectations while minimizing studies that cut against them. This is one reason science depends on replication, criticism, and peer review. The goal is not perfect humans, but a process strong enough to catch human weakness.

Anthropomorphism is the tendency to interpret the world through a human lens. We often attribute human-like traits to animals, machines, or natural phenomena, projecting our emotions, motivations, or logic onto things that may function in very different ways.

This bias often overlaps with anthropocentrism, the belief that humans are the center or measure of everything. Anthropocentrism has led to many flawed conclusions, from ancient geocentric cosmology to the underestimation of other species’ intelligence and intrinsic value.

So yes, science is tainted by bias, but that is not the end of the story. Science remains our strongest public tool for separating belief from truth because it is built to test claims against reality, revise them when necessary, and slowly correct for the biases of the minds using it.

That Science FAQ,

was first published on TST 1 year ago.

A Philosophy FAQ.

Subject: Epistemology.

Debating History: Should We Say “Dark Ages” or “Middle Ages?”.

The correct term to use for the worldwide period is “Middle Ages,” or the adjective medieval. The term “Dark Ages” has largely been retired in scholarly circles or narrowed to focus on the religious oppression in Europe. Now, I’m actually in the minority on this issue. I think the adjective “dark” was well deserved worldwide, Not just in Europe.

Historically, the term Dark Ages was used to describe the period between the 5th and 14th centuries, a religiously draconian time marked by economic, cultural, and scientific stagnation. The primary historical marker was a shift to organized religions worldwide.

I am not advocating for the return of the label “Dark Ages,” as I believe labels naturally evolve. This is particularly important when labels carry negative connotations. My argument for adding the adjective “dark” stems from the idea that the worldwide spread of organized religion caused a regression in human thought. Many well-known facts were lost.

Today, when scholars use the term “Dark Ages,” they are usually referring to a period within medieval Europe between 500 CE to 1500 CE. In western Europe, the Church became the dominant gatekeeper of education and acceptable knowledge. Illiteracy was used to control the public. Teach inside the approved framework and you might preserve approved texts. Teach against the approved framework and you could be branded a heretic. At times, that meant prison, torture, or death. That is the darkness I mean: not stupidity, but enforced de-education—the narrowing of public thought under religious power.

Although one force rarely explains a thousand years of history, just as the printing press later changed the world by expanding access to knowledge, organized religion changed the world by controlling the flow of knowledge.

That Philosophy FAQ,

was first published on TST 2 years ago.

A Critical Thinking FAQ.

Subject: Preservation Bias.

What is the preservation bias?.

Preservation shapes perception! Our understanding of the past is deeply influenced by what survives. Fossils and artifacts tell a story, but it’s incomplete, shaped by what was preserved. Recognizing preservation bias helps us question the gaps and dig deeper.

Yes, even science, our most rigorous tool, isn’t free from biases. Preservation bias subtly skews our understanding of history, evolution, and nature by favoring what endures over time. Bones and stone tools, for example, outlast fragile materials like fabric, wood, or flesh, leaving us with an often skeletal and incomplete picture of ancient societies.

Take the “caveman,” for example—a name that itself arises from preservation bias. Early archaeologists discovered fossils, tools, and art in caves, which led to the stereotype of prehistoric humans dwelling in these dark enclosures. In reality, they were more like hut people, living outside in the open air, in wood huts and grass shelters. For the most part, their daily life decayed into oblivion.

Preservation bias goes beyond ancient humans. Consider the fossil record, which heavily favors species with hard shells or bones, leaving soft-bodied creatures like jellyfish grossly underrepresented. Similarly, our understanding of ancient climates is often built on tree rings and ice cores, materials that only form under specific conditions, leaving gaps for vast regions. Even written history suffers: the accounts that survive are often from the literate elite, meaning the voices of the common people, minorities, and women were frequently lost. Preservation bias reminds us to approach all evidence critically, aware that much of what existed faded into the sands of time.

That Critical Thinking FAQ,

was first published on TST 1 year ago.

A History FAQ.

Subject: Public Belief.

Did Einstein’s driver really give one of his early talks?.

No — sorry. I really wish I could say this wonderful tale is true, but it’s not. Let’s use it to demonstrate the historical category of ideas.

First, the story.

Early in Einstein’s career, after giving the same lecture many times, he complained to his driver about how repetitive it had become. The driver, having heard it over and over, joked that he could give the lecture himself. Einstein, amused, took him up on it. For one event, they switched places. The driver delivered the talk beautifully while Einstein sat in the audience. Then someone asked a difficult question. Without missing a beat, the driver replied that the answer was so simple even his driver could explain it. Einstein then stood up and answered.

I love that story. It makes Einstein humble, playful, and brilliant. It also supports a wonderful idea: if you understand something well enough, you can explain it simply. And others can too. No wonder the story spread.

But stories can have charm and life lessons, and still not be true. Historical stories are true only when they align with reality. In this case, the support is missing. Einstein nor his driver left us this story. No one in their families or in the audience either. No friend or reliable third-party source either. As history, that matters. A lot.

So the calibrated answer is simple: it is probably fiction. Not useless fiction. Not bad fiction. Just fiction. Fiction can still teach real lesson, but they cannot be treated as public truth.

Some stories feel true because they fit what we want to believe. They carry meaning. But confidence must rise only as high as the evidence allows. For now, unless something turns up, Einstein’s driver story belongs in the charming legend category.

That History FAQ,

was first published on TST 2 years ago.

That’s it for this issue!

Join us again next month. A new set of ideas lands on TouchstoneTruth on the first of the month, and emailed the next day.

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Ideas here are not treated as disposable content. They are revisited, clarified, and strengthened as understanding deepens.

Thanks for listening.

The end.