Knowing about the past cannot help people to make important decisions today.Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the statement and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and supporti

Knowledge of the past has been emphasized throughout human history. Man has documented history before the invention of language. Cave paintings give us insight on the history of our ancestors many years before the invention of language or paper and pen. Since the invention of paper and pen, and more importantly the printing press, the history of civilization has been documented extensively. Knowledge about the past can give insight as to what the future may hold and improve peoples’ ability to make decisions.

With knowledge about the past people are more equipped to make better decisions in the future. Learning from past mistakes can enable people to avoid them in future endeavors. For instance, knowledge of past successes and failures in business can help a person to make decisions that will lead to success and prevent them from repeating past failures. Experts can evaluate trends in the economy so that they can make predictions about when to invest in things such as stocks or property. Trends are commonly used in the stock market trade, aiding investors in their decisions of when to invest and when to sell stocks. Additionally, the economy behaves in a somewhat predictable way that can be determined using past information. Such knowledge can be used to make important decisions.

Additionally, history classes are taught in hopes that the same mistakes will not be repeated in the future. Awareness of a civilization’s history can help it’s future citizens make more informed decisions such as how to behave in international affairs, how policies will affect the public and how to maintain the vitality of the economy. Current politicians must be well versed on previous affairs before making decisions on how to shape and implement current policies with other nations. If a new policy is proposed history must be evaluated first in order to predict the possible consequences. With out knowledge of the past it would be impossible to prevent history from repeating itself.

With knowledge of the past, people are better equipped to make informed decisions. Due to changing conditions, some may believe that knowledge about the past cannot be used to make informed decisions. Although conditions may not be identical, knowledge about the past can be used to make useful predictions and aid in making important decisions.