The Plague, The Past and the Present: A Discussion

Hum, can't let such a subject without throwing in some thoughts ^^
Disclaimer: that's just quick thinking, some reasoning and feelings based on what I perceive with my average level of education. No fact, so completely questionable.
Starting by the obvious, present is a consequence of the whole past. That makes it, I think, worth studying. And it can teach us a lot. But it can also be a trap, because of the bias: same evenments in different contexts won't necesarily end up in the same way, so trying to use the past to predict the future is risky. Plus, contrary to "the past", which I would use to define "what really hapened", the vision we have of it, the History, is only an interpretation, at best. More of a mixup of numerous ones.
An interesting point being: the interpretation we make of historical data can reveal as much about us, about our present, as about the past. I would describe that as some kind of meta-level: you've the baseline, the work of studying data and make interpretation, and "above" (it's not a way to give more importance to one field, it's an above more in a micro/macro relationship) you have the study of History itself, or should I say Histories, comparisons between the different interpretations.
It's the same thing as writing anticipation novel: the "future" setting is often a way to describe a present reality with a particular point of view.
Does History repeat itself ? It looks like some kind of a tricky question for me, as some event taken at point A of time can be explained in a different way at point B than at point C. And even if B = C, the History's not always the same depending on the society you live in.
That's said, I think that if you put it at a more macro-level ("big" events on which most people agree), there are some recurrent patterns. I would say that some of them have a biological origin: we, who are still on earth, are the product of behaviors that leads to our survival as a specie, thus having a predisposition on reproducing those behaviors. (that's not to be taken as fact, it's pure opinion there ^^')
That's both a benediction and a curse, because in my opinion, evolution has both a big adaptative potential and a big inertia. I mean, the context often changes quicker and with a bigger impact than whan we can adapt to. Survival of the specie is submitted to having enough individuals with behavior currently working and enough other different behaviors to have surviving individuals in case of change in environment making current "lead" behavior inadequate.
Yeah, that's related to the original subject, I swear xD Because I think that History, in some way, allows us to see that phenomenon in action, and that teaches us a lot, or at least could, if we would like to take it into account: diversity is always the key.
I don't think our mindset has changed that much. The details may vary, but the patterns, the mechanisms, seems to remain. We change our figures of power, but we keep some, staying in a "pyramidal" society. We change our myths, but we still have a lot of them. And it's not only "urban legends". Science itself is kind of a myth. I mean, I have a scientific background, I have access to a lot of archives thanks to internet, and I can if I want use what I learnt to reproduce experiments and studies, collect the facts and see if it leads me to the same conclusions or not. But what is it for people who don't have had the luck of getting the same level of education, or just don't have the curiosity for it? They accept (or they don't) science facts as a rather dogmatic thing... I'd say like a religion: it's a conforting way to explain the world, and some "higher" people teach the "scientific truth". Context has changed, but not the behavior after all...
Those are issues adressed a lot by two of my favorite "classic" sci-fi writers, Isaac Asimov and A. E. van Vogt. Especially van Vogt, whose work is, in my opinion, underestimated.
So, hu, that's quite a lot, I'll stop there ^^' Sorry if things are not clear enough, I'm trying to think that in English and it's hard to reason when it's not your native language. And sorry for the opinionated melt and lack of depth ^^'
That's said, I'd like to read your thoughts on the topic. If you made it that far, thanks for reading ! (and if you don't, thanks anyway for trying )