Things that bother me about the financial/economic discussion world

Everybody has an opinion. Everybody writes in complex abstract language. Most arguments take effort to understand and the effort is not guaranteed to pay off. On account of these things combined, most arguments go unheard. Many arguments are useless, academically, pragmatically, financially, or, most commonly, all three.

How to set yourself apart? Get used to this: you can't. Assume you go unheard. Assume you are seen as an idiot unworthy of attention. From there, dose your energy wisely.

You can be right and not get a hearing. You can be right and fail to convince anyone. You can be right and mess up your explanation. You can be right but irrelevantly so. You can think you are right, but be blatantly wrong. This happens to the best of "us". To be right, acknowledged and rewarded is the far off exception that may as well be ruled out.

Are you sure you want to be in this spot? Is this what you want to squander a lifetime on? Am I sure? I ponder this as I write this blog. All the time. I must overcome this skepticism with every post I write. A part of me refuses to be so autistic.

Economists of various persuasions split off into different schools, each claiming to be uniquely privvy to the truth while alleging the others stumble aimlessly in the dark. Do they take themselves seriously, I wonder? They must know that when 10 schools claim 10 different things that only one can be right on, a die roll's chance renders one's own odds rather unenviable. But even this omits something. There is no guarantee that any school is right.

I have always held that finance/economics is fundamentally a Nietzschean world. The Socratic mind can not orient in chaos like this. All Socrates has to say is "get out", for there is no truth to gain here. To keep going in the world of monetary abstraction requires a drive more sinister than one towards "knowledge". I want to say it is a mere drive to deceive, but this is too simple. It is a form of deception that at times shows a constructive face. To assert a false theory is open it to the attacks that transform it into a more truthlike shape. The process is not corrupt at its core. But it is insidious.

Is it worth learning the trade? Where is this supposed to lead me, exactly? And what alternative do I have?

These existential tangles beset me. I must ensure not to be a slave to my intellectual drives. This mental obsession should be a tool, not a master. I can not let myself be like them.