LA Times Op-ed: Islam gets concessions; infidels get conquered

[Utah]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I consider who conquered who hundreds or thousands of years ago a sunk cost.

[/ QUOTE ]

History is the great poisoner.

No, correct this : Unique history is the great poisoner.

Since, out of a myriad of myriads possible denouement, only one historical development actually did take place, we are stuck to gaze upon, fixate on and shape our sentiments around those actual, yet inherently rather chancy, eventualities.

Quantum physics might have the solution for us : MWI. The many-worlds interpretation.

We must, as soon as possible, flood our kids' minds with as many as possible historical developments leading to the current state of the world. There should be nothing left untouched on account of it being improbable or far fetched.

When we have enough MW's, the importance of one world would cease to seem so important. And we shall, perhaps, grow up a bit.

Mickey Brausch

[/ QUOTE ]

I think yours is a very interesting concept and I think the MWVs idea is ultra cool in general. However, in this case, I think you may be wrong. The reason is that at the end of the day you only have one record (the currect state) and even if you could define the entire paramater set leading to this state and even if you knew the exact value of each parameter you are still in no better position. The reason being that you cannot know how the parameters interacted to lead to that state. Thus, you cannot determine the best course of action because you do not know what will happen in you change parameters X,Y, and Z. The whole model may come tumbling down.

Additionally, if you focus only on a singular problem (eg, the Palestinian problem) and understand the entire history and you can measure some of the effects of the change in variables you still may be screwed because you may "overfit the curve".

I think what you need is a tons of records with a sufficient variable set to make smart decisions. The only way to do this is to step out of the unique problem and grab from a wider bucket of info.