Judging past thought as mere folly is itself a metaphysical error

Evidence

To judge the whole of past philosophy as delirium and folly is not only an anti-historical error in that it makes the anachronistic claim that people in the past should have thought as we do today; it is also a real hang-over from metaphysics in that it presumes a dogmatic form of thought, valid at all times and in all countries, in the light of which the past can be judged. Methodical anti-historicism is sheer metaphysics. The fact that philosophical systems have been superseded does not exclude their once having been historically valid and having performed a necessary function. The fact that they fall by the wayside is to be considered from the point of view of the entire development of history and of the real dialectic. That they were worthy of falling is not a moral judgment nor one of mental hygiene, made from an objective point of view, but a dialectical-historical judgment. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1595

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the alternative: philosophical systems must be judged dialectical-historically — as having performed a necessary function in their time — not by an anachronistic metaphysical standard.
• XREF: This historical-validity principle for superseded systems parallels how the Islamophobia reading list treats Orientalism and colonial frameworks as historically produced rather than as errors to be condemned outright.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1595