I agree that you have to make decisions somehow. My points were directed at the phrase “properly modeled”, rather than “very few queries that make sense”. I se

I agree that you have to make decisions somehow. My points were directed at the phrase “properly modeled”, rather than “very few queries that make sense”. I see the purpose of reporting within an organization is to allow someone, somewhere to evaluate things and make decisions. You can have an agreed upon report, but it doesn’t mean that the report itself will always lead to wise decisions. It can also become worse when those very decisions lead to forcing things around you to make things easier to report — that is the core thesis described in that essay, and the book, “Seeing Like a State” Another example — in the realm of strategic decision making, decisions will always be made with imperfect information. A core way of strategy is deliberately manipulating how the opposing force gathers and interprets information, this influencing their actions. (Example, OODA). So what is already messy gets incredibly messy. This is the kind of stuff that falls way beyond reporting, and not something I think can ever be adequately modeled.