> economists generally don't understand anything I think this is taking hyperbole literally. The world is not at all completely unpredictable; it's highly susc

> economists generally don't understand anything I think this is taking hyperbole literally. The world is not at all completely unpredictable; it's highly susceptible to reason and science - in a way, that's the entire enterprise of the Enlightenment and its child, science. Predictions aren't perfect, but they are hardly useless. Your world is built on them; your alarm will go off; the train will be roughly on time and won't collide with other trains; investors invest based on economic and business predictions; software developers develop based on market predictions and predictions of user psychology; we can predict how well UI's will work, hardware failure rates, etc. The list goes on forever. In particular, economics has provided, especially since WWII, a period of economic growth that is orders of magnitude beyond what humanity ever experienced before. Depressions used to be a regular occurrence; they have stopped. Systemic bank failures no longer happen, we know how money supply works, and the impacts of various policies much better than throwing darts at a graph. Recessions are not as bad; sustained growth is a norm, which is a miracle. The growth of the world economy, lifting billions out of poverty for the first time in history, is beyond all but the most visionary dreams of a century ago. Do economists and economics get it wrong sometimes and to varying degrees? Absolutely. Unfortunately, there is nothing perfect in the world.