The human brain loves to observe everything in paterns and there is no denying that history keeps repeating itself simply because humankind has not really changed in the past 2000 years.

A linear line to history may exist in certain events, but in most cases it is something that has happend before. Politicians love linearity because they can always promise a "new age" around the corner when all they care and have cared throughout history is the live they live and never about future generations .

Based on the 10,000 hour rule I am still away from being considered an expert, but based on all the history I have read, it is a very reperative patern that only shifts colours and perspectives, but the ideologies at heart are the same.