TL;DR - Humans are quite predictable creatures; creatures of habit. As we control many parts of history, it is evident that things will repeat

There are only a finite amount of possibilities when it comes to human decision making. As much as we follow a general pattern of decisions, it is quite clear that as much as we preach “something won’t happen again” we are creatures of habit. As much as we try to remember, as generations pass, people forget history. Sometimes it doesn’t even need to be through generations, in December when a re-cap of the year in on TV, it is surprising that events that were at some point impactful were [just forgotten.] (https://dailynorthwestern.com/2019/05/03/opinion/thuillier-history-is-repeating-itself-right-before-our-eyes/).

There is something to the quote [“History doesn’t repeats itself, but it does rhyme] (https://medium.com/applied-history/does-history-repeat-itself-2a59f2aabb42). We may not see a carbon copy of a historical event, however if we look close enough, human decisions are similar throughout history. As rational beings, we can make the same mistakes but our rationale makes exceptions and reasons as to why it's okay this time. History does not repeat exactly but our decisions are similar.

TL;DR – Broadly speaking, history tends to repeat itself. To put it simply, similar conditions equal similar outcomes.

Repeats...rhymes...it's the same difference...

Of course, no two events can ever occur in exactly the same way. However, I do not think that the statement is supposed to be taken literally. From a broader perspective, it can be argued that history is generally cyclical, in that similar events will have similar outcomes. In my view, this is mainly down to the unchanging nature of human beings who, when operating within certain structures and environments, will react in relatively similar ways. For example:

• When opportunistic and self-serving individuals like Stalin and Mussolini are placed in high positions of power, the general consequence is that they conduct reigns of tyranny and authoritarianism.

• When the state does not provide their people with the basic amenities for life such as food, water, and security, then it becomes highly likely that there will be an attempt at revolution. Such examples include the 1789 French Revolution, the 1791 Haitian Revolution, and the 1917 Russian Revolution.

• Nationalism and populism generally breed violence due to a disdain for the “other”. Examples of this include concentration camps used in North Korea and Nazi Germany, and the more recent storming of the US Capitol by Trump supporters.

Ultimately, the fact that the study of history exists as a discipline indicates that it is capable of repeating itself as we can extrapolate the knowledge gained from the past to examine present day events.

So yes, history does repeat it. And yes, it also rhymes.

History contains some mistakes that are easily learnt from, these will not repeat, More complex mistakes will repeat themselves, as we seem to refuse to attempt to learn from them.

• To prove this statement, all we really need to look at are WW1 and WW2. WW1 killed over 20 million people, we did not learn from it, and perhaps we did not do everything that we could to prevent it happening again. Hence, it repeated itself, and we got WW2.
• If we look at history, we see the same story. We see a person becoming too ambitious, taking too much power, and then eventually they, or their successors comes to a horrific end. If history did not repeat itself then we would not be able to have ambition, for fear of recreating that exact story.
• However, I feel we have learnt from some history, and some history will not repeat itself because of this. Consider the Titanic, it killed [1500 people] (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Titanic). We have learnt from this, always watch out for icebergs. And, hopefully this will never happen again as technology has improved.
• Some aspects of history will not repeat themselves, but I feel like these are aspects with easy and simple lessons. However, other more significant things, such as to be careful of ambition and how much power is too much are harder things to learn it seems. Thus, history will continue to repeat itself.