Debate:Does History Matter?

2007-05-01T21:14:31Z

P3T3RK3Y5: /* Yes */

[[Henry Ford]] said, "I don't know much about history, and I wouldn't give a nickel for all the history in the world. History is more or less bunk. It is tradition. We want to live in the present, and the only history that is worth a tinker's [darn] is the history we make today." [[George Santayana]] said "Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Who was closer to being right?

==Henry Ford: "history is bunk"==
If ''"...the only history that is worth a tinker's [darn] is the history we make today"'', than who's to say the history we make today will be cared about by our children? ;-). If we don't care about history now, than none of our descendants will care about us. Of course even if we do care about history, there's still a huge chance they still won't care about their past. --[[User:Ymmotrojam|Ymmotrojam]] 18:22, 12 April 2007 (EDT)

==George Santayana: "condemned to repeat"==
The perfect example of this is the nation of Israel. Fortunately though, we've got a good God. Even when Israel was disobeying God and repenting again... over and over again, God was still faithful to His promises. And if we repent and put our trust in Him alone, we can avoid repeating those bad things in history. --[[User:Ymmotrojam|Ymmotrojam]] 18:35, 12 April 2007 (EDT)

==Napoleon Bonaparte: "a lie agreed upon"==
While this is the classic Wikipedia model, I hope Conervapedia can avoid being condemned to repeat this bunk. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 16:36, 14 April 2007 (EDT)

==Other Perspectives==
If history doesn't matter, why don't we just make it so this wiki no longer stores the history of the pages that are created and edited ;-). --[[User:Ymmotrojam|Ymmotrojam]] 18:30, 12 April 2007 (EDT)

==Nobody cares about history==
Hell, look at Afghanistan. You can go back to the 1700s or 1980s to see that nobody can win there. Or, re Iraq, you can go back to the 1970s and Vietnam and see that you can't "liberate" a country that (with substantial justification in both cases) sees you simply as a self-interested neo-colonial oppressor.

Or you can just go to the local library, fire up the microfiche machine and look at the past 50 years of gun crime in the US. At least Australian Prime Minister John Howard outlawed assault rifles after Martin Bryant massacred all those people in Port Arthur in 1996.

What's the next blast from the past we can look forward to from the US? Witch burnings, perhaps, or simply some good, old-fashioned lynchings (though they'd be Mexican illegal immigrants this time, no doubt). Perhaps California, Oregon and New York should secede. --[[User:AppalledBystander|AppalledBystander]] 06:29, 18 April 2007 (EDT)

:What does it mean to "win" in Afghanistan? [[User:RobS|RobS]] 11:48, 18 April 2007 (EDT)

::I think he means essentially "conquer". Obviously, if no outside country can "win", the Afghanis must be "winning" the wars of invasion/colonization/conquest etc. [[User:Human|Human]] 13:27, 18 April 2007 (EDT)

:::If that's the meaning, then the basic premise is flawed. The US and NATO are not trying ot "conquer" Afghanistan. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 15:15, 18 April 2007 (EDT)

== Everything matters ==
How will you know where your going unless you know where you've been. Archaeological history, the history of the sun, moon, earth, ...etc. How else could people plan for the future unless they knew the history of the past. Which is why any historian worth their salt will get their information from multiple sources, archaeological artifacts and/or sites, and anthropological studies. History most definately doesn't mean anything to those who try to rewrite it for selfish reasons. Such as political or assorted ideological purposes and used as propaganda to further their own agendas. Of which you will no doubt denote many examples of on this debate subject.--[[User:Roopilots6|Roopilots6]] 20:10, 25 April 2007 (EDT)

== Yes ==
We can learn from it.

Only from America could this question arise.
- of course context matters
- and of course we can learn from those who have gone before us

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Debate:Does History Matter?