To study the past in order to improve how we live in the present and the future. In studying the past, historians create narratives that are attempts to portray events as they actually occurred. When historical narratives are well constructed by historians, they can be used to improve human life.

A scholarly study of history can help us better understand complexities in issues and the merit in looking at issues from multiple perspectives. It can help us understand that change for the good often comes only in the long run. But it also helps us see that humans do not naturally progress as thinkers.

What happened during a given period of time? What caused these events to happen in this way? What were the conditions and forces that brought about these events? Are there patterns about past events that can be discovered? Do we need to rethink the way we have viewed the past in light of some new information? Have we treated as historical facts what have instead been misleading inferences or interpretations? Has some information, for the time period we are studying, been irretrievably lost? What is the most insightful interpretation of the data and information? What role does the interpretation of the "lived experience" of past peoples play in historical understanding, and how does the historian arrive at justified statements about this lived experience? Is it possible to arrive at justified interpretations of long-dead peoples, their mindsets, and their actions? How confident can we be in our statements about the past, about the features of past institutions, structures, and
peoples, and about the explanatory relations among them? How does it make sense to conceptualize the events of this historical time period? What human meanings and intentions underlie a given complex series of historical events?

Historians are generally focused on collecting, organizing, and presenting information about past events in narrative form. Information can come from, among other sources, articles, books, newspapers, magazines, scrolls, symbols, diaries, private communications between officials, letters, treaties, minutes from official proceedings, institutional reports, pictures, audio or video interviews, word of mouth, internet sources, and videos. Information may be in the form of either verifiable facts or probable facts. Often the only information available to the historian is that which has already been filtered through the interpretations of others. For instance, Socrates did not leave any written work of what has come to be known as the Socratic method. We know the thinking of Socrates only through the writings, and therefore interpretations, of others (most of which comes to us through the writings of Plato and Xenophon, both of whom were students of Socrates).

Historical knowledge depends on procedures of empirical investigation, and the justification of historical claims depends on providing convincing demonstration of the empirical evidence that exists to support or invalidate the claim. Historians should engage in good-faith interrogation of the evidence in constructing their theories of the past. But this should not be understood to imply that there is always one uniquely true interpretation of historical processes and events. Historical interpretations are often underdetermined by the facts. Interpretations of the past will vary in accordance with the specific historical question being posed about the same body of evidence. In short, historical narratives have a substantial interpretive component, and often involve substantial construction of the past.

Historians within different specialties and with differing viewpoints use differing and often conflicting concepts in their thinking. Here are some of the key concepts historians use or have used in the past:

1. Causation in history, which focuses on the causes of historical events.

2. The idea of past events being depicted in the form of a narrative.

3. The extent to which there is a grand design in human history. In other words, whether and to what extent human history follows an inherent deterministic process (largely obsolete).

4. The role of divine intervention in history (largely obsolete).

5. The role of the individual in determining history.

6. The role of the culture in determining history (focusing, for instance on the extent to which cultures are oppressive to certain peoples).

7. The role of the entire human species in determining events.

8. The role of class consciousness in history.

9. The role of social causation in history.

10. The role of powerful or important people in history.

11. The role of women in history.

12. The role of ethnic groups in history.

13. The significance of historical events.

14. The role of material circumstances in human affairs.

15. The role of economics in human history.

16. The role of sociocentric thought in human history.

17. The role of human psychology in human history.

18. The role of religion in human history.

19. Large, embracing patterns in history.

20. Seeking general laws in history.

21. Historical objectivity vs. historians interpretations as necessarily value-laden.

22. Historical causation (highlighting objectivity, truth and correspondence to facts) vs. historical narrative (highlighting subjectivity and multiple interpretations).

Other concepts historians focus on include: Invisible hand of the market, war of attrition, collateral damage, due process, just war, balance of power, inalienable rights, representative democracy, fair wages, human dignity, fair trade, and revolution.

Historians of different stripes will differ in the beliefs they take for granted, depending on their viewpoint, perspective and world view. But in general, here are some assumptions historians begin with:

1. That if we understand the past we can better understand humans and why they behave as they do.

2. That if we study the past, we can learn important things about people, which will help us make better decisions in the future.

3. That there is a potentially unlimited archive of information and facts that have to be sifted through and interpreted with respect to broadly-based historical questions.

4. That purported facts may not be actual facts, or may not be relevant facts.

5. That there is always the possibility that new information will become available with respect to a given historical question and when this happens, prior interpretations about historical events may need to be reconsidered.

If historians do a good job of developing and presenting historical reasoning, and if people take historians’ work seriously, the following implications may become realities:

1. People will be more likely see the importance in studying history as they will see it more relevant to their own lives.

2. People will be more likely to learn from the past.

3. People will come to recognize that all interpretations and narratives of the past are not of the same quality, and therefore they will think more critically about interpretations and narratives of the past (rather than uncritically accepting them).

4. People will be more likely to see themselves as historical thinkers and they will take greater command of the stories they tell themselves about their own past.

The points of view from which historians look at the past will vary depending on the concepts they use in their thinking— concepts which guide their interpretations of historical information. But in general, historians look at the past as essential to understanding who we are as humans and how we can improve human societies in the present and in the future. Further, a given historian’s point of view can be shaped by many potential factors: time, culture, religion, gender, colleagues, economic interest, emotional state, social role, or age group, to name a few. In addition, historians can look at the world from:

• a point in time (16th, 17th, 18th, 19th century)

• a culture (Western, Eastern, South American, Japanese, Turkish, French)

• a religion (Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Jewish)

• a gender (male, female)

• an orientation (gay, straight)

• a profession (lawyer, teacher, . . .)

• another discipline (biological, chemical, geological, astronomical, sociological, philosophical, anthropological, literary, artistic, musical, dance, poetic, medical, nursing, sports)

• their own peer group, or set of colleagues

• an economic interest

• an emotional state

• an age group