There once was a library at Alexandria. It contained knowledge gleaned from all around the world. It contained books and information on all sorts of subjects, such as medicine, philosophy, math and science. The library was public and people were encourage to glean as much as they wanted to from its rich resources.
Through fires and war, much of the libraries' books were lost, stolen or destroyed.
The world soon fell into the Dark Ages...it is too large a subject to tackle here, but in each society where the rule has been led by men claiming religious reign, rights are trampled on, knowledge is suppressed, war is justified in order to force others to believe. The result is poverty, the limiting of who can have access to knowledge and a regression in rights, liberties and societal advancements.
Here is one quote:
To see to what depths the human mind is currently devolving, we must understand the true history of what has been called the Dark Ages. Only by going behind the falsifications of historians prejudiced by their Christian beliefs is it possible for us to understand how degraded people's minds had become during the fifth through sixteenth centuries in Europe: the earlier Dark Ages.
Europe languished in intellectual and cultural retrogression during the Middle Ages, while the light of wisdom was preserved and advanced by those they labeled "the infidel Saracen." The reintroduction of the Classical (Greek) Tradition and the Perennial Tradition through the confluence of European and Muslim thought, beginning around 1000 CE, revitalized earlier conceptions of knowledge as derived from experience--participation in reality.
As d'Alembert states in his introduction to the French Encyclopedia,
"most of the great minds during those dark ages . . . were preoccupied with a thousand frivolous questions about abstract and metaphysical being instead of thoroughly investigating Nature or studying man."http://www.hermes-press.com/DAtruth.htm
Today, public libraries and universities encourage the same sharing of information and collaboration on issues, ideas and problem solving. We have been able to advance medicine, science, technology and ideas on so many areas because of the sharing of information.
Knowledge builds upon knowledge. Once someone has an idea (often gleaned from something they read, heard, or discussed) they think about it, problem solve and come up with solutions. This is sometimes done in solitude, but often with a group or organization. Once a new idea or discovery is formed, then a new idea is formed, a new discovery is advanced, etc. This is how societies are able to progress in medicine, economy, science and technology.
How much further would society be IF the library at Alexandria hadn't been destroyed? How much further would society be IF wars and religious fighting hadn't plunged us into the dark ages? How further would society regress IF a secular government were once again replaced with a religious government who restricted ideas and the dissemination of information?
Society is saved by knowledge...so let it be.