History

"Those who do not learn from their history are doomed to repeat it."
                         -George Santayana

This quote by the poet and philosopher George Santayana is probably true.  But the problem as I see it is that people misunderstand the lesson; especially on a macro scale.

What do I mean?  Well, it is true that those societies and countries who do not learn from their history are doomed to repeat it.  But many people believe that the lesson here is to learn your history so that you are not doomed to repeat it.  But that is, unfortunately, not the case.  The fact is you're damned to repeat your history regardless.

I have my degree in History from the University of Georgia, 1998.  I have studied my history.  I have learned lessons from the past.  And when I see society making stupid as shit choices I raise my voice in protest.  I vote against the tide.  But guess what?  You cannot change the tide and you cannot control a frothy mouthed crowd.

When the IT financial bubble of the late 90s was growing financial advisers all around were giving warning.  Those warnings went unheeded and we had a small recession and suddenly there were thousands of computer programmers without jobs.  When the housing bubble of the early 2000s was growing financial advisers all around were giving warning.  Those warnings went unheeded and we had a very large recession, the likes of which we had not seen since the Great Depression.  And thousands of families, mine included, lost their homes.  And for the last 8 years financial advisers have been saying, "Maybe we should do something about this 0% interest rate."  But no one seems to be listening.

All through history historians have stood at the sidelines giving warning and being treated as the old-fuddy-duddy-coot.

"Hey..." he or she would say.  "Hey, guys?  I think we might have already tried this."
And the crowd would rumble and ignore the old coot.
"You guys remember, right?" s/he would shout.  "You remember how we kinda started a war?"
And the crowd would rumble and ignore the old coot.
"You remember that we kinda killed like... tens of thousands of innocent people?"
And the crowd would rumble and ignore the old coot.
"You remember that we lost thousands of our sons and daughters?  You remember that we ended the war worse off than when we started?"
And the crowd would rumble and ignore the old coot.

So yes, if you do not learn from your history you are doomed to repeat it.  AND if you do learn from your history you are doomed to repeat it.  So I think the very sad lesson George Santayana was teaching is, "Don't learn your history because you're doomed to repeat it.  But if you don't know you are repeating it you'll only be an ass.  You won't also feel like one."