4 ms·
> Economies are chaotic systems, but the long term trends are predictable. A nitpick: these are contradictions in terms. Chaotic systems are precisely those sy
by dwohnitmok 5y ago
> Economies are chaotic systems, but the long term trends are predictable.
A nitpick: these are contradictions in terms. Chaotic systems are precisely those systems which are not predictable in the long run. Perhaps you mean stochastic?
- WalterBright 5y agoYou are pedantically correct. But it's like the weather. We can predict long term climate reasonably accurately, but we can't predict next week's weather.
- dwohnitmok 5y agoI was pedantic earlier, but this is wrong in a more profound way: > But it's like the weather. We can predict long term climate reasonably accurately, but we can't predict next week's weather. No we can predict medium term (decades) climate reasonably but over even longer timescales even general predictions about climate can break down (centuries or millennia), as is the nature of chaotic systems. This is true as well of economic "laws" and why I agree that economics is chaotic. Those laws that hold at the millisecond level are different than those that hold at the second level, which are in turn different on the time scale of years, which are different from those of decades, and in turn centuries and millennia. There are general patterns whose efficacy and predictive ability are more resilient than the rest but those too are eventually worn down by the relentless march of chaos.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]