>...Summary: Physics, the hardest of the "hard" sciences, has some
>very general equations that are known to be false in detail, no
>general equations that are known to be absolutely true, and an
>enormous collection of inconsistent approximations for every
>type of practical problem that anyone really needs to deal with.
>
>Compared to physics, every other field of science is a nightmare
>of special cases. And the social sciences haven't even reached
>the stage where any degree of precision is conceivable. As they
>say, economists are great in explaining why something occurred
>but hopeless in predicting it. (01)
Hopelessness at prediction is not at all the same thing as lack of
precision or paucity of theoretical foundations. If the dynamics are
highly nonlinear then prediction is hopeless regardless of how
well-understood the system is or how precisely things are stated
(given that initial conditions can never be specified with absolute
precision). (02)
K (03)
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