virus: Re: Randomness of Markets

David McFadzean (dbm@merak.com)
Tue, 4 Jul 1995 14:51:41 -0600


Duane said:

>I would agree that it is more like predicting the weather but in a
>different way. Weather can be predicted with some degree of accuracy in
>the short term but the forecast is less accurate the longer the time
>frame examined. I think that the markets exhibit the opposite behaviour.
>They are unpredictable in the very short term but patterns may be
>recognized that have longer term implications. (eg Government debt,
>market manias).

Actually there was a recent article in Sci.Am. about a coupel luminaries
at the Santa Fe Institute that formed a new company (Prediction Inc. or
something like that) that will try to make money on the market with
short term predictions using non-linear dynamical models.

>How much refinement of weather forecasting has there been over the last
>several decades? Over the last few years? Would a model such as the one
>presented at Extro by Bart Kosko work to predict the weather. Not
>definitively but with a usable degree of accuracy.

I don't know but I read that the Farmer's Almanac is as good as anything.

>Here we are running into a fundamental premise of mine. That reality is
>just. Opportunities may occur by chance or luck but the skill and effort

What do you mean that reality is just? Surely not in the traditional sense.

>required to make them real are not luck. There are probably many
>opportunities to become billionaires that are overlooked every day. BTW I
>think Idea Futures is such an opportunity. Does this throw my revenue
>projections off? :-)

I don't disagree.

--
David McFadzean                 dbm@merak.com
Memetic Engineer                http://www.merak.com/~dbm/
Merak Projects Ltd.