Those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
By
D'Archangel
on September 22, 2009
-- not George Santayana
Irrespective of the specifics of the inspirant, I find the general pattern it repeats very interesting. As a pattern, mind -- the actual behaviors are so cliche as to bore an autist. We've seen quite a few folks who seem to be convinced that they alone hold The Truth -- that they are Uniquely Original Thinkers rather than cheap knock-offs of each other. And so they keep retreading the same tired old arguments that the rest of us settled ages ago. The examples that spring to mind at the moment are early bignose, Logical Dog's douchier moments, everything penned by anon ever, and the various fly-by missionaries.
The inspirant, of course, is an aggressive and defiant refusal to learn anything about the prevailing culture. Very American. The best interpretation I can come up with is that it was engineered to make *me* feel humble, which would be very salutary. But I kind of doubt it.
D'A
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Discussion (4)
Pretty good rant, but I've seen better. B+
I disagree on the basis that refusing to learn from history does not necessarily put the latter person in the same circumstances as those of the past. It is more likely that those who refuse to learn from relevant history are doomed to repeat it, but even still this is not a guarantee. There is the still the potential for the spontaneous generation of historical solution without having known of that history.
All of that disagreement said, I agree that the majority of people who belief themselves to hold the One Truth are doomed regardless of learning from history.
I also disagree. Humans do not merely repeat an error, they tend to go way beyond the previous historical example.
One cannot repeat the Fall of Rome. It is not possible. The same political, religious, and social factors are not in play and never will be. The "climate" of the fall cannot be duplicated. It can come close, we can mimic it, we can even emulate it, but doomed to repeat it? nope. Hair splitting? Yes, it is.
"I disagree on the basis that refusing to learn from history does not necessarily put the latter person in the same circumstances as those of the past."
If we accept as an axiom that there are very few new things (and I do)[1], it follows that most situations actually fit some relevant historical pattern. If one refuses to learn history, one will have failed to learn this piece of history.
D'A
[1]: I work in a field where people are constantly convinced that they are working on really new things. A lot of my educational effort is expended convincing them that, no, they are not the daring trailblazers they imagine themselves to be.