Historians should strive for fairness through explicit awareness of their own biases

Evidence

I adhere to a different view: that the historian owes it to himself and to his readers to try, to the best of his ability, to be objective or at least to be fair— to be conscious of his own commitments and concerns and make due allowance and, where necessary, correction for them; and to try and present the different aspects of a problem and the different sides to a dispute in such a way as to allow the reader to form his own independent judgment. Above all, the historian should not prejudge issues and predetermine results by the arbitrary definition of topic and selection of evidence, and the use of emotionally charged or biased language. As a famous economist once remarked, “Complete asepsis is impossible, but one does not for that reason perform surgery in a sewer.” — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 103

Categorization

• APHORISMS: Complete asepsis is impossible, but one does not for that reason perform surgery in a sewer — describes the standard worth aspiring to despite inevitable imperfection.