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Human short sightedness is our hubris.

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http://ehistory.osu.edu/world/articles/ArticleView.cfm?AID=9
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/malexanderlibrary.html

One thing Sagan says (or so I gather) is that people didn’t think it applied to them or that it wasn’t important enough to save or protect. In the centuries that have passed civilzations seems to have, for the most part, advanced to the point where knowledge is more valuable and worth preserving. But again, it’s a matter of perspective.

Look at our travels into space for a modern example. There’s a lot of people who wonder why we bother sending shuttles into space, launching satellites and performing expiriments miles above the planet. Most of it doesn’t directly apply to a lot of people. But without the stuff we’ve learned over the past three or four decades, we would be without a lot of stuff we live with – or rely on.

Another place to look is the Bible, or rather the texts that didn’t make it, for some reason or other. They provide more of an insight into life from an earlier time. But some of it (or rather, a lot) doesn’t fit in with what organized religion wants to offer, what they choose to offer us. Some of it’s merely interesting, while some could change the way we see the Bible, our history, and how civilization grew. Much of this has been lost over time too, either due to the ravages of time and environment or being deliberately destroyed.

I would say that history is as important as science, and losing either is a serious blow to who we are and how we got here. While it’s impossible to know everything that’s happened in the millenia since Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt and the others, the more we do have, the better.

How much of what we now have will remain even a century from now? 500 years? 1000 years? Will it matter then, will it be worth having?

Hopefully it will never happen again – science is a considerbly stronger institution today. But there are very powerful forces arrayed against it. One has to remain on guard.

While I can’t see the video (no longer available), I would have to agree that the loss of the library in Alexandria is one of history’s greatest losses. Maybe it was a case of no one caring, maybe it was a sense of there being nothing worth saving, maybe there was stuff in there that some might consider dangerous to leave intact (part of why it was burned in the first place).

Knowledge is power, and too much of it can be seen as a threat by some. Without knowing just how much was contained in Alexandria or what all was within its halls, we can only speculate on what has been forever lost. Surely, there has to have been at least one scroll, one book, one tablet that may have significantly changed things had it survived.

Could the same ever happen again? Possibly. There are texts seen as obscene, some seen as heresy, some as possibly even dangerous. We have had book burnings and bannings in libraries. A museum or library could be a target for someone at some point, possibly giving us another unrecoverable loss.