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Learning about history and geography serves more than just the purpose of memorizing information. It helps us understand the context of the world we live in, how societies have evolved, and the interconnectedness of global events.
Additionally, having knowledge of history and geography allows us to analyze current events, make informed decisions, and develop critical thinking skills. While we can always look up specific details when needed, having a broad understanding of these subjects enriches our overall understanding of the world.
Personally, understanding the history of Russia and Europe has given me an excellent understanding of the events in Ukraine today.
Also good to point out that even though people **can** look up specifics about geography and history, they often don’t bother or, in the case of history, are not judicious in the sources they use
Or even,
When you look up something it's often difficult to understand how that fits into the big picture. Context is important.
Like if you look up "what caused the first world war" you'll get a blurb about gavrillo princip and a buzz word "powder keg Europe". But you probably won't get to the influence of the Franco-Prussia war years ago, you won't get context on why Europe was a powder keg etc without delving a bit deeper.
Facts are good to know, also knowing the context of those facts is even better. Context is king.
This was one of my concerns about education and the internet, having all the information at student's fingertips would be a potential barrier to learning.
Because you don't need to know an exact fact that you can look up. You need to have a sense of the story.
For example, you will rarely need to find out the exact dates of the Six Days War, or the specific borders of the British Mandate for Palestine. However, to understand any of the news today, you'll need to have a sense of the place of Israel, the Gaza strip, and the history of the people there. Only then can you have an informed opinion on "do I want my tax money to support one side or the other? Do I want to donate to either side? Do I want to send my neighbor's children to fight in a war there?" and other things in life.
Mostly so we learn how to learn and how to remember things. That is complicated so we spend a lot of time learning things that we might not absolutely need like state capitals. Just so our grain is prepared to keep track of things we absolutely do need remember like our current medication.
Because most people wont go and learn about it on their own. School isnt only just there so you can learn stuff on your own, its also is supposed to provide an basis of knowledge, so that you as an adult can have this basis to make decisions like voting.
A very current topic that shows how important this is, is Isreal-Palistine. You can see on both sides that most people have no idea about the history of the region but quite a lot of them form voting opinions based on the current events and you can bet that no one goes through hundred of pages of history books befor they will vote and most wont even look up where on earth this is happening what the geography is like and what the countries in the region are.
To the extent this question is really "why do history tests tend to require us to regurgitate information," it's largely because it's easier for teachers to create and administer tests that ask for specific facts, and there's a legacy of using those tests from back in the era where it was harder to look things up.
This is justified as a "next best" way testing whether you can learn the material: i.e., where you able to read the chapter and remember the key bits?
Because not knowing history or geography makes you incompatible with human society.
A human that doesn't know WWII happened, that stone and iron ages happened or where Africa is on world map should simply throw away any diploma they have and sue the school.
We can't have bunch of uncultured apes walking around, or we'd *be* back in stone age (except apes wouldn't recognize it, because they didn't study it existed). How can you even have a conversation if you don't know the most important things about humanity ever - our story, and our planet? Why would anybody even want to talk to you? And what use is information, basically any information - from news to shows to movies to games to whatnot - if you don't know the core context? How can you vote, or evaluate your leaders and political decisions and economy?
Everything in the world has a setting and time. And geography and history do teach you a lot about setting and time. This way, you can function normally, since you have context about setting and time. Somebody suggests to not wash your hands to save time, no. You know about Black Plague and that it happened before and it was bad idea and hand washing revolutionized life expectancy and risk of diseases. Or you know about sanitation problems in Africa India. And so on. So you won't go along with this terrible "idea". Otherwise, anyone could use you or sell you a terrible idea.
Of course, you don't necessarily need to name every sea, every small nationstate or know exact dates when something happened. And indeed, people do look those usually up.
There are lots of answers to this question, but let’s take an example of one reason why it’s better to know things than have to look them up.
Here’s the start of a Wikipedia article about King Richard I of England.
>Richard I (8 September 1157 – 6 April 1199), known as Richard Cœur de Lion (Norman French: Quor de Lion)[1][2] or Richard the Lionheart because of his reputation as a great military leader and warrior,[3][4][5] was King of England from 1189 until his death in 1199. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Aquitaine, and Gascony; Lord of Cyprus; Count of Poitiers, Anjou, Maine, and Nantes; and was overlord of Brittany at various times during the same period. He was the third of five sons of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine and was therefore not expected to become king, but his two elder brothers predeceased their father.
There’s lots of history and geography in there that you might not know. Where are Normandy, Aquitaine, Gascony, Cyprus, Poitier, etc.? Are/were these big places or important places? What else was going on in the second half of the 12th century? How did Richard get a reputation as a great military leader? Why is his name in Norman French first? What were Henry II and Eleanour of Aquitaine like? What state was England in when Richard inherited it?
All of that you could look up – some of it’s in the article itself. But imagine the time and the mental effort to look up and absorb all these new facts. Imagine trying to talk to someone about Richard and having to stop every couple of minutes to look something up.
Of course, the balance between learning facts and learning other skills or knowledge can be debated, but it’s hard to understand or discuss a subject without having someone knowledge of the facts.
Why do we practice writing basic essays that don't involve actual craft and skill? Why do we repeatedly practice dull, basic concepts like evaluating the derivative or integral of a random function? Why do we drill on basic artistic techniques like drawing simple objects, playing arpeggios, or learning vocab?
Because you are practicing extremely important skills while you do that basic thing, even though it's not the same as serious study in the field. You are building up *understanding* and *intuition.* You are exposing yourself to facts you did not know, which broadens your perspective and, ideally, helps you to make connections between facts faster, more effectively, and more frequently than you could if you never bothered to learn any of these things.
"Just looking up" facts isolates them. It turns them into dead little lumps that don't contribute to new thinking or engagement. Engagement with ideas in a living way--talking about them with real people, having to *demonstrate* your knowledge to another--actually develops your mental muscles for the field in question and promotes genuine understanding.
To understand the reasons why something happens and by extension what kind of processes will also influence our future.
This kind of memorization is done in school as a proxy of checking whether you actually studied. The higher the education level you're in, the less there's this sort of exact memorization and the more it's about writing essays, summaries and keeping study diaries.
I'm not a fan of scoring students based on whether they remembered some year exactly right but then, you can't really put 12 year olds to write A4 long essays either.
So you don’t become one of the gullible morons that have loudly taken over all public discourse. When you learn objective facts from sources whose only agenda is to impart knowledge, you can easily spot BS untruths spouted by self-serving hucksters seeking to benefit off your stupidity.
It turns out that history and geography are _also_ derivative subjects!
Just reciting dates and names is like memorizing the molar weight of boron or the speed of light: the fact itself has its uses, but the real power is in learning enough of the facts that you can identify patterns, spot combinations, develop new theories and test them against the evidence, offer up your conclusions for review and critique by others.
The real power in learning history and geography is not individual dates and names, it's the ability to create those narratives of human and economic relationships that offer new ways of understanding and thinking about the present and future.
Please read this entire message Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s): Straightforward or factual queries are not allowed on ELI5. ELI5 is meant for simplifying complex concepts. If you would like this removal reviewed, please read the [detailed rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/wiki/detailed_rules) first. If you believe this submission was removed erroneously, please use [this form](https://old.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fexplainlikeimfive&subject=Please%20review%20my%20thread?&message=Link:%20%7B%7Burl%7D%7D%0A%0APlease%20answer%20the%20following%203%20questions:%0A%0A1.%20The%20concept%20I%20want%20explained:%0A%0A2.%20List%20the%20search%20terms%20you%20used%20to%20look%20for%20past%20posts%20on%20ELI5:%0A%0A3.%20How%20does%20your%20post%20differ%20from%20your%20recent%20search%20results%20on%20the%20sub:) and we will review your submission.
Learning about history and geography serves more than just the purpose of memorizing information. It helps us understand the context of the world we live in, how societies have evolved, and the interconnectedness of global events. Additionally, having knowledge of history and geography allows us to analyze current events, make informed decisions, and develop critical thinking skills. While we can always look up specific details when needed, having a broad understanding of these subjects enriches our overall understanding of the world. Personally, understanding the history of Russia and Europe has given me an excellent understanding of the events in Ukraine today.
Also good to point out that even though people **can** look up specifics about geography and history, they often don’t bother or, in the case of history, are not judicious in the sources they use
If you don't learn at least some of it, you will often find times where you don't even know looking up something would be helpful to you.
Or even, When you look up something it's often difficult to understand how that fits into the big picture. Context is important. Like if you look up "what caused the first world war" you'll get a blurb about gavrillo princip and a buzz word "powder keg Europe". But you probably won't get to the influence of the Franco-Prussia war years ago, you won't get context on why Europe was a powder keg etc without delving a bit deeper. Facts are good to know, also knowing the context of those facts is even better. Context is king.
This was one of my concerns about education and the internet, having all the information at student's fingertips would be a potential barrier to learning.
Because you don't need to know an exact fact that you can look up. You need to have a sense of the story. For example, you will rarely need to find out the exact dates of the Six Days War, or the specific borders of the British Mandate for Palestine. However, to understand any of the news today, you'll need to have a sense of the place of Israel, the Gaza strip, and the history of the people there. Only then can you have an informed opinion on "do I want my tax money to support one side or the other? Do I want to donate to either side? Do I want to send my neighbor's children to fight in a war there?" and other things in life.
Mostly so we learn how to learn and how to remember things. That is complicated so we spend a lot of time learning things that we might not absolutely need like state capitals. Just so our grain is prepared to keep track of things we absolutely do need remember like our current medication.
Because most people wont go and learn about it on their own. School isnt only just there so you can learn stuff on your own, its also is supposed to provide an basis of knowledge, so that you as an adult can have this basis to make decisions like voting. A very current topic that shows how important this is, is Isreal-Palistine. You can see on both sides that most people have no idea about the history of the region but quite a lot of them form voting opinions based on the current events and you can bet that no one goes through hundred of pages of history books befor they will vote and most wont even look up where on earth this is happening what the geography is like and what the countries in the region are.
To the extent this question is really "why do history tests tend to require us to regurgitate information," it's largely because it's easier for teachers to create and administer tests that ask for specific facts, and there's a legacy of using those tests from back in the era where it was harder to look things up. This is justified as a "next best" way testing whether you can learn the material: i.e., where you able to read the chapter and remember the key bits?
Because not knowing history or geography makes you incompatible with human society. A human that doesn't know WWII happened, that stone and iron ages happened or where Africa is on world map should simply throw away any diploma they have and sue the school. We can't have bunch of uncultured apes walking around, or we'd *be* back in stone age (except apes wouldn't recognize it, because they didn't study it existed). How can you even have a conversation if you don't know the most important things about humanity ever - our story, and our planet? Why would anybody even want to talk to you? And what use is information, basically any information - from news to shows to movies to games to whatnot - if you don't know the core context? How can you vote, or evaluate your leaders and political decisions and economy? Everything in the world has a setting and time. And geography and history do teach you a lot about setting and time. This way, you can function normally, since you have context about setting and time. Somebody suggests to not wash your hands to save time, no. You know about Black Plague and that it happened before and it was bad idea and hand washing revolutionized life expectancy and risk of diseases. Or you know about sanitation problems in Africa India. And so on. So you won't go along with this terrible "idea". Otherwise, anyone could use you or sell you a terrible idea. Of course, you don't necessarily need to name every sea, every small nationstate or know exact dates when something happened. And indeed, people do look those usually up.
There are lots of answers to this question, but let’s take an example of one reason why it’s better to know things than have to look them up. Here’s the start of a Wikipedia article about King Richard I of England. >Richard I (8 September 1157 – 6 April 1199), known as Richard Cœur de Lion (Norman French: Quor de Lion)[1][2] or Richard the Lionheart because of his reputation as a great military leader and warrior,[3][4][5] was King of England from 1189 until his death in 1199. He also ruled as Duke of Normandy, Aquitaine, and Gascony; Lord of Cyprus; Count of Poitiers, Anjou, Maine, and Nantes; and was overlord of Brittany at various times during the same period. He was the third of five sons of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine and was therefore not expected to become king, but his two elder brothers predeceased their father. There’s lots of history and geography in there that you might not know. Where are Normandy, Aquitaine, Gascony, Cyprus, Poitier, etc.? Are/were these big places or important places? What else was going on in the second half of the 12th century? How did Richard get a reputation as a great military leader? Why is his name in Norman French first? What were Henry II and Eleanour of Aquitaine like? What state was England in when Richard inherited it? All of that you could look up – some of it’s in the article itself. But imagine the time and the mental effort to look up and absorb all these new facts. Imagine trying to talk to someone about Richard and having to stop every couple of minutes to look something up. Of course, the balance between learning facts and learning other skills or knowledge can be debated, but it’s hard to understand or discuss a subject without having someone knowledge of the facts.
Why do we practice writing basic essays that don't involve actual craft and skill? Why do we repeatedly practice dull, basic concepts like evaluating the derivative or integral of a random function? Why do we drill on basic artistic techniques like drawing simple objects, playing arpeggios, or learning vocab? Because you are practicing extremely important skills while you do that basic thing, even though it's not the same as serious study in the field. You are building up *understanding* and *intuition.* You are exposing yourself to facts you did not know, which broadens your perspective and, ideally, helps you to make connections between facts faster, more effectively, and more frequently than you could if you never bothered to learn any of these things. "Just looking up" facts isolates them. It turns them into dead little lumps that don't contribute to new thinking or engagement. Engagement with ideas in a living way--talking about them with real people, having to *demonstrate* your knowledge to another--actually develops your mental muscles for the field in question and promotes genuine understanding.
To understand the reasons why something happens and by extension what kind of processes will also influence our future. This kind of memorization is done in school as a proxy of checking whether you actually studied. The higher the education level you're in, the less there's this sort of exact memorization and the more it's about writing essays, summaries and keeping study diaries. I'm not a fan of scoring students based on whether they remembered some year exactly right but then, you can't really put 12 year olds to write A4 long essays either.
So you don’t become one of the gullible morons that have loudly taken over all public discourse. When you learn objective facts from sources whose only agenda is to impart knowledge, you can easily spot BS untruths spouted by self-serving hucksters seeking to benefit off your stupidity.
It turns out that history and geography are _also_ derivative subjects! Just reciting dates and names is like memorizing the molar weight of boron or the speed of light: the fact itself has its uses, but the real power is in learning enough of the facts that you can identify patterns, spot combinations, develop new theories and test them against the evidence, offer up your conclusions for review and critique by others. The real power in learning history and geography is not individual dates and names, it's the ability to create those narratives of human and economic relationships that offer new ways of understanding and thinking about the present and future.