When I was in school I studied biology. I learned that in making their experiments scientists will take some group - bacteria, mice, people - and subject that group to certain conditions. They compare the results with a second group which has not been disturbed. This second group is called the control group. It is the control group which enables the scientist to gauge the effect of his experiment. To judge the significance of what has occurred. In history there are no control groups. There is no one to tell us what might have been. We weep over the might have been, but there is no might have been. There never was.
Cormac McCarthy reflects on the concept of control groups in scientific experiments, where a group subjected to conditions is compared to a control group that remains unchanged. This comparison is essential for understanding the effects of the experiment. In contrast, history lacks such control groups, making it impossible to determine what could have happened differently.
This absence of a control group in history leads to a sense of loss over potential outcomes that never occurred. McCarthy suggests that while we may mourn these "might have been" scenarios, they ultimately do not exist, emphasizing that the past is immutable and devoid of alternative paths.
