The problem I see in using the past as evidence is that the further we go from our era, the more what we know is mostly made up.
True, we have documents and evidence and so on, but they only paint a relatively sketchy picture of what the society was, we mostly made up the details in a reasonable manner. Plus we don't get any statistical data on things like happiness, income, etc.
The risk of mistaking noise for signal is so high that it's probably worth throwing it all away, especially when the starting point of the conversation is "People were happier / sadder in xth century, so we should / shouldn't do as they did".
How can you possibly know?
The problem I see in using the past as evidence is that the further we go from our era, the more what we know is mostly made up.
Sure, quality of data degrades with distance, both in space and time. But I don't think it degrades to the point where it actually is worth throwing it all away.
How can you possibly know?
Is this a serious question, or a statement of anti-epistemology? (That is, all knowledge is uncertain, and so the right question is "how did you get to the level of uncertainty you have" rather than "how do you justify pretending that there is no uncertainty?")
If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.
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