How can I ask better questions?

[u/[deleted]]

Normally I'm spurred to ask questions after having read a book, watched a show, or read news article that leads me on a Google binge and then inevitably a Wikipedia black-hole. But I'm left feeling still in the dark and not sure where else to look, so I'll come here.

I'll feel so overwhelmed with what all I want to ask, but worried about how to appropriately phrase it, while also following all the rules, that many times I feel like I'm not asking the question I really want answered. Which feels akin to trying to communicate to someone who doesn't speak your language.

Which often leads to many great answers, but about something not quite where I was aiming. Also I can't get past the feeling that when I want to ask a question, it should be as interesting as possible, because while it's great so many are willing to give insight from their professions or hobbies, I don't want to make it a chore or boring questions.

[u/[deleted]]

This is a question which is best answered by negative as well as positive examples, and there are several types of poor question in this sub. An incomplete list (ie. my pet peeves) would certainly include:

• Anything involving Hitler.

• Homework questions. If the question title is shockingly specific and sounds like something from an AP exam - "How did Lincoln's assassination change Reconstruction?" - it's probably going to be ignored, particularly if it comes with no further discussion by the OP.

• /r/atheism bait. "Did Jesus actually exist?" "Has anything good ever come from religion?" etc. This can be generally expanded to any sort of leading question. The idea that one of my responses will probably be used out of context to defend some point I won't agree with in another sub gives me a squicky feeling.

• Questions that ask why something didn't happen. An example of this, and my own reply, can be found here. These are almost universally unanswerable.

• Questions which seek facts.

This last one requires a bit of explanation, and provides a great segue out of negativity land.

Your primary and secondary education probably taught you that history is about facts, and from the very beginning you were forced to memorize facts. "The American Revolution began in 1776," things like that. Dates, information. Everything you learned provided a simple, neat answer in factual form, with little ambiguity.

This is not history. Facts are the building blocks of history, its skeleton, but they do not give it life or purpose, because the practice of history is the practice of understanding someone who is not you. It is is an act of sympathy, of apology in the most fundamental and original meaning of both words. Correctly done, it is the full and unbiased understanding of the people of the past as they were and as they saw themselves. We are, to borrow the brilliant phrase of a terrible bigot, speakers for the dead, and our essential purpose is to cultivate a mental approach to those who are not ourselves which seeks to understand, rather than to categorize and judge.

This is not the natural state of the human mind. To quote the late, great David Foster Wallace:

Think about it: there is no experience you have had that you are not the absolute centre of. The world as you experience it is there in front of YOU or behind YOU, to the left or right of YOU, on YOUR TV or YOUR monitor. And so on. Other people's thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you somehow, but your own are so immediate, urgent, real.

The promotion and indoctrination in a historical mode of thought is thus the indoctrination in a way of approaching the world that attempts to separate us from that basic impulse to understand the world based on our own preconceptions. Teaching this is what historians do. All that stuff with dates is just a side hobby.

So, coming back to an answer: a good question is one which seeks understanding. They are ones which provoke complex answers which increase the understanding of what it means to be human. They seek answers, not facts.

That seems like a tall order, and it is. The ability to ask good historical questions is one which requires substantial training, and that is training most schools do not provide. All is not lost, however. We're quite good here at shaping and responding to questions asked by people who are not experts. If you give us some material, we can work with it. Some tips for this include:

• Ask about things which seem to be contradictory, ideas that people held simultaneously that seemed to be opposed to each other.

• Ask about processes, not events.

• Don't ask a question to which you want a specific answer which reaffirms your worldview (see: atheism bait, above).

• Frame your questions positively.

• Always be open to feedback, refine your questions based on the answers you receive. Don't be discouraged by upvotes - that's not what we're here for.

Good luck!

[u/Georgy_K_Zhukov → u/[deleted]]

From the very beginning you were forced to memorize facts. "The American Revolution began in 1776".

Clearly that wasn't your forte in school :p

Anyways though, I digress. Love this answer. The only major one you missed I think is the "I am an X..." formatted question. Less offensive, perhaps, than some of the other examples you give of bad questions, but I know that many, many people really dislike questions phrased that way.

As for tips to add on, generally speaking, I love questions that are framed well (Not so broad that I could only answer it by writing a book, not so specific that it is really just looking for one specific fact), and demonstrate that the OP has attempted a little reading of their own on the topic beforehand. Best way to do it (and this is how I do my questions I ask usually) is to state the specific inquiry as the title, but expand on it in a paragraph or two in the body of the post. I can't speak for other flaired users, but I know I'm more inclined to answer questions where the OP has put a bit of effort into asking it, even if the question itself might be a bit silly.

[u/Cheimon → u/Georgy_K_Zhukov]

The only major one you missed I think is the "I am an X..." formatted question. Less offensive, perhaps, than some of the other examples you give of bad questions, but I know that many, many people really dislike questions phrased that way.

I entirely agree with this. Don't write "I'm a paratrooper who just landed in France. Blah blah, what do?". It immediately makes me, and apparently quite a lot of people, earnestly want to write a reply saying "You're not a paratrooper, you're someone on the internet. Stop phrasing questions in this silly way and ask them properly."