Fischer establishes in his first chapter what any good historian, or even a good journalist should know, the importance of the asking the right question.
Fischer intones darkly that any project that starts without a question is bound to fail even before it starts. There could be debates about the virtues of one type of question over another. Would an open ended question yield more results or a focused question yield a more exact response? But would it be really be more beneficial to bring no preconceived notion to research like Fustel suggest?
As appealing as the idea of having no preconceived notion sounds, it is hopelessly impractical in application. Besides, as Fustel himself pointed out, the "opportunities for error are innumerable", and without a hypotheses how does one keep from simply being buried in the avalanche of information?
Fischer suggests that this search to find out an eventual truth can take on other forms, none of which would be achievable goals. It is more fruitful to limit search to some information on 'something' than a concept as elusive as the eternal truth.
Since the method relies on relentless data gathering, where and how does one decide to begin the process of deducing a meaning out of the raw data? While a hypothesis could change upon occurring something that offers empirical data to the contrary, starting without the direction of a well framed question, or even just a question would be like wandering in the dark with all the senses alive, but no way to process the stimuli.
Manasi Khedlekar
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