Some philosophical scholars understand the Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Aim of 1784 as Kant's most explicit formulation of his “philosophy of history.” Put differently, they understand this essay as his attempt to uncover the fundamental laws of the historical development of humanity, similar in intent to the efforts of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx, and others, who offered compelling accounts of what they took to be the meaning and direction of history. But there are many reasons why such an interpretation should be rejected. The English word “history” is just as ambiguous as the German word “Geschichte.” It can refer either to the totality of events that we call “history” or to the way in which history is conceived or written. In the latter sense, we also speak of “historiography” (“Geschichtsschreibung”), and use the terms “history” (Geschichte) as a mere shorthand for the former. The Universal History presents and defends an “idea” and a “point of view” for the writing of such a universal or world history. In other words, Kant was addressing in this essay Geschichtsschreibung or historiography, advocating and giving reasons for a certain way of writing history from a philosophical point of view that introduces a “plan” or a “purpose of nature” into the historical account we give of human events. He claimed that such a plan must concern the progress of human abilities toward their full development or perfection.