Time Accuracy

I wanted to touch on an idea we discussed in class about history and how it gets changed and remembered over time. I believe it was Terry Eagleton who stated that the longer the time is between events and when we remember it, the more accurate the recollection becomes. So in essence, he is saying that we (this whole "we" I speak of is the educated) know more about, say a day in the Vietnam War, then we did when it happened. While on some levels this makes sense however as a general theory I would have to disagree. I agree that for a main events in history this idea can be applied becasue "we" can go back and interview different accounts and compare them against one another to see what the best truth is. But I feel this will only work on big events. To take the Vietnam war example again, I'm sure that veterans still remember some of the events that took place but none of those memories/histories will ever be as real and vivid as the day the happened. While killing another person may not be a world event, it was for those people at that time in history and no amount of time will ever make that action more real or more accurate then it was at that point in history.

I feel that time distorts events and actually makes events less accurate. People are able to generate opinions and incorporate their own beliefs in the time after an event takes place. With so many people incorporating a different account of an event, the event itself looses its accuracy. It all comes back to the individual and their own interpretation of the event. People know what they saw or experienced and it is accurate to them. Time allows for doubt and a lapse in the memory that cant ever be re clarified. Right now I am writing on a blog and I know that it is accurate, ten years from now this point in history will not be more accurate becasue time has passed and we have been able to asses the situation. I know it is accurate now and I wont really remember what I was doing at this point much less if it was accurate or not.