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Originally Posted by aceventura3
It is both. The ability to develop predictive formulas is calculus.
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I'm thinking you mean calculus in the more general sense.
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I will re-read this line of discussion but it seems that some are taking issue with the ability to predict behaviors and forecast with accuracy. I think it can be done and is not a guessing game even when the behaviors of people are involved.
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Nobody is saying that it can't be done accurately. It is difficult to do accurately precisely because there is typically a significant amount of guesswork required in predicting the behavior of groups of people. It is always a guessing game, even if one is unwilling to admit that guesswork is involved.
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Rational behaviors do not always result in correct behavior or the most logical behavior. Correct behavior may require information that a rational person does not have or an analysis that a rational person does not do. However, given consistency, rational behaviors that do not lead to correct behavior can be explained and predicted.
Las Vagas, given the odds of winning games of chance against the house, should not exist based on what one would consider rational behavior in the context of correctness. But it does, and the folk who build and operate casinos, very easily predict the behaviors of their visitors.
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I think you're speaking your own language here.
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There is certainly obsessive, compulsory and addictive behaviors, but there is also a person who makes a choice between the benefits of immediate gratification and the long-term costs.
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Right. I was just pointing out that people frequently don't have their own best interests in mind when making decisions and that any economic theory that ignores this fact is inadequate when it comes to predicting human behavior.