Ibn Khaldun part 2: History and the Nature of Civilization

This is the second of a four part series on Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), the African Arab intellectual widely considered to be the founder of sociology and the philosophy of history. We will be reading from the introduction of his Muqaddimah ("Prolegomena"), and discussing his insights on historical methodology, some epistemological problems they raise, and their continued relevance in contemporary life.

In part two, we examine Ibn Khaldun’s assertion that scientific knowledge of the nature of civilization enables a critical investigation of history by which we can discern the true from false reports, and a potential problem raised by the question whether our ‘scientific’ knowledge itself ultimately depends on history.