https://archive.rustgeek.me/categories/history/ Recent content in History on A Geek's Life Hugo en Thu, 02 Sep 2021 13:07:51 +0000 https://archive.rustgeek.me/2021/09/02/between-theorists-and-empiricists/ Thu, 02 Sep 2021 13:07:51 +0000 https://archive.rustgeek.me/2021/09/02/between-theorists-and-empiricists/ <p><img loading="lazy" src="https://notesofalostson.files.wordpress.com/2021/09/fork-in-the-road-unsplash.jpg"><em>Image Source: <a href="https://unsplash.com/@gcalebjones?utm_source=unsplash&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=creditCopyText">Caleb Jones</a> on <a href="https://unsplash.com/s/photos/fork-in-the-road?utm_source=unsplash&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=creditCopyText">Unsplash</a></em></p> <p>**</p> <p>It seems to me that the central distinction in <a href="https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/445/445716/the-bomber-mafia/9780241535004.html">Malcolm Gladwell&rsquo;s latest offering - Bomber Mafia</a> - is that between <em>theorists</em> and <em>empiricists.</em> To boil it down to a binary choice is of course an oversimplification, but it is one that helps frame the difference between <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haywood_S._Hansell">Hansell</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_LeMay">Le May</a>, the two figures from either camp who loom large in the book. At stake here, as it turns out, were the lives of hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians who met a fiery fate in the aftermath of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_raids_on_Japan">extensive fire bombings</a>, topped off by the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In Hansell, we have the theorist who believed against the evidence - or bad luck - that precision bombing was the way to execute a war that limited deaths. Le May on the other hand comes across as an empiricist who allowed the evidence lead him down the paths it did, albeit with disastrous outcomes for those concerned.</p>