Golikov A.G. Objective and subjective in historical knowledge from the standpoint of source studies

Abstract: the article makes an attempt to answer the question of whether science can give an objective historical knowledge of past to the human societies from the positions of source studies. The author believes that while answering to this question three things must be kept in mind: not all information was recorded on the validity of the contemporaries, and even the information that was recorded, is not fully preserved, and for various reasons only partly available to scientists; historian forming the source base for the work in his own turn selects the study material that the most relevant to the goals and objectives of the study; the terms of the interests of the creators of the sources are always selective, so that historians use a subjective reference picture of the past left by his contemporaries as a research base. Overcoming this is possible on the basis of the totality of information on the events contained in the documents from the creators and publishers with different goals. Chances to recreate a more objective picture of real past increases with the use an interdisciplinary approach in the historical research and by inclusion to the source base both written and graphic materials. The task of the scientists in the search of historical objectivity is to minimize their own subjectivity.

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