The Birthday of Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. (1917) – History and Mathematics

Schlesinger was a historian, but his work involved cliometrics – the quantitative analysis of history. Using statistics, historians test hypotheses about economic cycles, wars, and social change. For example, the ‘Atlantic slave trade’ dataset (millions of records) uses network analysis to trace shipping routes. Historical demography uses life tables and population projections. Mathematics does not replace narrative, but it provides evidence for patterns that would otherwise be invisible. History is a data science, too.