DoWeNeedHistory

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One major argument is, of course: "Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it"

But is this really true? After all - similar circumstances can often produce different results. Isn't knowing how people tend to react (and that does change over time, a bit) enough?

Mind you, the only places I've seen 'history should be done away with' is in the texts of those professing belief in fascist control - removing knowledge of alternatives from the people in order to keep them from wanting it. --Vitenka

: By controlling history, you (as a government) ultimately control public opinion and can bias it towards yourself or against your opponents, as described in 1984. By doing away with history - if past actions cannot be taken into account when making a decision - you (as a democratic party) can get away with atrocities / incompetence and still get reelected in order to get away with more. - MoonShadow

DR writes: Consider the following scenario:

The earth is doomed for some reason. Mankind's only hope for continued existence is to colonise the stars. In the last remaining years a vast engineering effort produces a starship consisting of a two-part solar sail, an artificial womb, a storehouse of genetic material, and enough automation to land the package at the far end on a (hopefully) hospitable planet, raise children and feed them until they are old enough to run things themselves, breed and spread out.

You can choose what historic and technological data you send along on the star ship. You can send a complete data-dump of the internet if you like, storage is cheap. Or you could choose to leave out the history (or parts of it). Would our successor society be better off if we never gave them Marxism? White supremacy? Unlucky 13? A place in heaven if you die killing God's enemies? Breakfast television?

On the one hand, it would be better if they could see the wide range of things that have been tried. On the other, it might give them ideas. I'd plump for the first though. --B

: Personally I'd be tempted to leave them with a small custom designed spoken language, a clean computer language, operating system and network protocols, every bit of maths available and an edited subset of science (strong on green technology, medicine, psychology and sociology, weak on nuclear physics and fossil fuels). I'd leave out literature, movies, music and the arts. Especially religion, politics, business and economics. Just leave them a short note: "Sorry we screwed up the last world. We spent too much effort on learning how to kill each other and not enough on understanding and helping each other. Hope you can do better. PS We've left an archive of all our artistic heritage, for what it is worth, orbiting around a star at the following coordinates." --DR

That one of the great things about fossil fuels though. They're so easy to work out all by yourself!--King DJ

: What a great opportunity for ex-cathedra rules. You could even command the robots to carve them into a stone slab ten feet high. So if "Thou shalt not burn that which does not grow." is going to be your first, what would your other 9 pieces of sage advice be?

Can I have another option? Sabotage the project in the hope that we will never infect another planet with our stupidity! --Tsunami

Might I add...
There is much debate into the validity of history. The first cliche, which I think MoonShadow alluded to slightly, is that history is written by the victors. Not only that, but it is constrained by the limited perspective of its author. Regardless of one's political/religous/flavour preferance, history is limited by what its author has Seen. Ignore the issue of second hand information for a moment and consider the amount one person or even a group of observers can physically 'See'. Our perception is limited by physical constraints and subconscious ones. Cliche number two; a tree falling in the woods, we all know that one. No one witnessed the fall but we know that it once stood, tall and proud and that it is now broken and defeated. The part inbetween is coloured by our beliefs, expectations ect. Likewise, are not the small insects and fungi now beneath the fallen tree, also worthy of historical note. History is doomed by our, man's, attempt to archive it. Our continous archiving of information creates a perpetual present with questionable validity and merit; News broadcasts used to begin with statements such as "Today is the day that..." at 6pm, Gossip taking up more space than 'News'.
What will we have to look back on, to learn from? only time and our personal archive will tell. History does not change, that is the key fact and possibly the only truth there is here. When new information is discovered, only our perception of the past changes. Therefore there is no point to History, in the man made, communal sense. The alternative... well here is the crux of the matter, do we accept History as the lesser of two evils, the best we can offer. Or subscribe to individual histories.
Here endth my diatribe. (too much literary critisum and orange juice make me a very ramblly girl x) Hoshi-Chan

: AlexChurchill responds: I'd feel like I had to include at least some morality or ethics. In fact, including some will be inevitable, since you're including computers/robotics to "raise the children" (!). Assuming you include discipline as some part of that, where you draw the line for behaviour needing disciplining will include some ethics. Or if you don't include any discipline at all, that too is imparting a particular set of ethics: choosing not to impart morality is itself choosing a particular morality to impart. Personally, I'd be inclined towards teaching them how to apply moral principles to a range of situations.
: As to what history to teach, I'd go for teach it all as clearly as we can. with particular attention to explaining why the bits of history that are generally regarded as mistakes were so bad, and what led to them, and how that can be avoided. Also those bits that are regarded by some as mistakes but not others - explaining why each of these groups hold those views. Humanity isn't great at learning from its mistakes, but I think it's got to be better than not knowing about them in the first place. --AC

A society without history would be as helpless as an individual without memory. -- Arthur Marwick

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