George Santayana, a Spanish-American philosopher, is often quoted as having said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Winston Churchill put his own spin on this concept when he said, “Those who fail to learn from history are bound to repeat it.”

While a memorable cultural catchphrase, the premise that history repeats itself is false. What makes it false is the word history. History does not repeat. History only exists as collected fragments of memory and records of all occurrences leading up to now, but which do not presently exist. The correct phenomena to identify, learn and remember are patterns. To know and understand the truth of anything, before we can hope to change it, we must first find its pattern.