Vol.III, No.9
www.renewssource.com
May 1, 2017
Counterfactual Or “What If” By Pat Farrell
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While trying to find a meaning for the expression “what if” I learned that it often refers to what is known as either counterfactual thinking and/or counterfactual history. Counterfactual thinking is when we have made a decision to do something a certain way and then wonder what the outcome of our actions would have been if we had done it in another way. In counterfactual history many will consider some event that occurred in the past and will speculate about the overall results, had that particular historical event had a very different outcome. The literal meaning of “counterfactual” is “contrary to the facts” and though we may expect it to be so, this type of thinking is not a new phenomenon as philosophers as far back as Aristotle and Plato were known to explore alternatives to the known facts of their time. It is thought that normal, everyday events in one’s life do not seem to lead to counterfactual think-
ing, but exceptional events like great successes or failures do. Suppose for example, that a young man, competing in the Olympics is awarded the silver medal at the completion of his particular ski event – is it not unreasonable that he might later think, “what if I had been able to get more push off from my poles,” or, “if only I had applied more pressure to the poles in the beginning, I might be wearing the gold instead of just silver!” I expect that everyone reading this has at one time or another thought “what if I had just ….. I would have had better luck,” or perhaps on a positive note one thinks “I really loved getting an A in that exam but what would I have gotten if I hadn’t taken the time to read over that particular chapter last night?” While counterfactual thinking is an interesting subject, because we can all relate to it, I find the concept of counterfactual history, also referred to as virtual history, to be absolutely mind stimulating. Most true to fact historians find outpourings from those who like to explore potentially different outcomes as nothing more than entertaining at best. However, it has been noted that virtual history has increasingly piqued the interest of scholars in the fields of philosophy, psychology, history, political science, economics, law, marketing and epidemiology, to name a few. Counterfactual history as an exploratory exercise has been around for a while now and there have been many books published over the years that speculate about how our lives today might have been altered if some factual event in history had had a different result. The number of books generated by those addressing these issues has seen a major increase since 1990. While there is counterfactual history, there is also alternate history and it is important that the two not be thought of as the same thing. Counterfactual history results from an interest in the very incident that is being impacted by the
counterfactual, and seeks to evaluate the event's relative historical importance, and will include arguments for each change. If the alternate outcome, based on an in depth analysis of what is actually known, would be so impactful in terms of how significantly our lives would be affected, then the event would be considered to have been of historical importance. On the other hand, looking at a variety of possible alternate historical outcomes to these same events is usually not a true analysis of the event itself, but rather a fictional take, possibly by someone who really did not sufficiently understand the facts of the event, that may lead to a series of alternate possibilities to the event that then becomes a work in one of the various forms of fiction. Alternate history has been likened to plucking imaginary scenarios out of the air. Many of the attempts to “reimagine” the outcomes of historical events have led to a proliferation of books of fiction telling the alternate version of history. One example being “Napoleon and the Conquest of the World: 1812-1823,” published in 1836, that explores Napoleon’s being able to overcome and destroy the Russian Army. Some later descriptions of Napoleon’s historical prowess take a look at the aftermath of conditions in France and England soon after Napoleon supposedly wins, rather than loses, the Battle of Waterloo. A collection of essays in a 1931 publication titled “If It Happened Otherwise” contains one authored by Winston Churchill who examines the Battle of Gettysburg and comments on what might have happened had Robert E. Lee won that battle. But like most of the other narratives in the book that are authored by many who are considered to be serious historians, including the one by Churchill, they provide little or no analysis as to how they reached the scenarios they offered, falling short of modern standards required to be considered seriously.
Some of the books that look at alternate history have produced works of science fiction from scribes who had hitherto not ventured into that arena. Gore Vidal, who in addition to his many works of fiction was also well known for his political commentaries, in 1995 authored “The Smithsonian Institution” in which a young math genius is able to go back in time to 1939 to try to learn the cause of World War II. From there the book’s resulting scenario was that had Woodrow Wilson not been elected president of the United States, his vision for the League of Nations would not have been set forth. Since Vidal had considered the League to be responsible for the unrest and upheavals occurring in Germany in the 1920s, he felt that it was the actions of the League that ultimately led to the successful rise of Hitler. Much of the examination of history seems to be directed toward how a specific person may have had such a major impact on the world today. So, if the assassination attempt on Kennedy had not been successful, how committed to the Vietnam conflict would the United States have remained? If Hitler had been assassinated in 1933 would there have been a World War II? If Gavrilo Princip had not killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand would World War I have started when it did? What if Bill Gates or Steve Job had not been born? What twist and turns would our current technology have taken? How would our music scene look if Frank Sinatra had not been born or if the Beatles didn’t make it to the Ed Sullivan Show? And, if Martin Luther King had not been assassinated, how long do you suppose it would have taken for Fair Housing to become the law of the land? There are a whole host of what ifs and it can be very interesting to contemplate all the alternate possibilities that one could conjure up, and many have already done so. But I want to leave you with what I consider to be the “biggie.” What if Jesus Christ had not been born?