Why Does History Sound Like a Story Book?
What is it about the past that makes people feel that things were heading towards a particular outcome? Why does history feel like a story book with a clear causal link between events? After all, we don’t feel that the same can be said about “our times”. We feel our future is rich with uncertainties, that our tomorrow is not already decided by our yesterdays and our todays. Is there really something unique about our period because of which our future is unpredictable? But everything before our time was moving in a direction, towards a particular outcome? Not likely. Time after time, mankind’s feeling that he is unique has been proven to be just an anthropic illusion (arrogance?): we thought that the earth was the center of the universe, that the sun revolved around the earth…and we were wrong on all counts. Similarly, each generation thinks it is unique. That it’s different. Sounds like a generational illusion (arrogance?) to me. Take the major events over the last century. It’s ...