A cursory study of history from any period will confirm that life is full of chance events and that human folly is as common as human brilliance. There is no straight line of progress morally or ethically, improvement comes in fits and starts and sometimes goes backwards. Memories are short and for any lesson to be learned, it must be repeated over and over again. Even then, a few generations passing can induce a kind of amnesia.

So it is little wonder than 2020 is widely touted as a kind of super annus horribilis, one that has wreaked havoc on the human experiment. To be sure, Covid 19 was and is a clear threat to the health of millions. It is a huge economic cost, particularly to the less well off, who typically bear the brunt of any change for the worse. It has generated much anxiety.

This plays out almost endlessly in the media and on social media, where anyone and everyone has a platform for comment and opinion, for better or worse. I think that is kinder to say nothing than moan about the loss of personal liberty, the inability to carry on a particular lifestyle or to support outlandish conspiracy theories. I have talked about freedom and license before and don't want to go over old ground.

Which brings me back to the study of history. You can set your mind better at rest if you have an idea of what has come before and how, for the most part, there is nothing new under the sun. Technology may challenge that maxim but it is unlikely that unmediated human nature will ever attain the kind of higher plain that lets us ignore the past, or make it somehow irrelevant.