Learning about history, as a narrative about the motivations of leaders and peoples and how they incorporated technology, culture, and coping with the environment into their lives is both immensely informative. The topics of math and science alone have rich histories that help to inform why we've ended up where we are today. For me, at least, having a grasp of the history of a thing (a place, an idea, a people, etc) helps me reason about it.

Ignoring history seems like a great way to fall into the classi "Why don't you just...?" trap.