A jump to the beginning - chaos and market forces

You'd better think this way: HOW CAN I GET ACCESS TO THAT POWER?!

this animation is superb, it explains a lot....very good!!!!!!!!

In honor of Gann

=============================
@ JR97: Thanks for this .gif I was aware of this long ago when in my early days of trading and it is a big part of my trading knowledge.

=============================


Firstly, let's make it clear that Gann died with not much money from trading. Despite this unfortunate event, this doesn't objectively prove that his methods were a failure. With limited science and knowledge, access and information in his era, he simply wasn't able to finish what he started. It is like trying to make an atom bomb, but you haven't discovered E=mc2 yet. It comes to a halt. No different from the countless of Men and Women of Science who's work wasn't acknowledge simply because technology and knowledge haven't caught up yet. Just like Faraday's ideas wasn't proven after 50 years or so since the missing sciences wasn't available yet. Some of Einstein's work took many years (even past his death), until it was proven due to delayed technology and science. Gann was no different from these remarkable men and women. He's life work wasn't finished, because he was born at the wrong time. He wasn't selling and teaching his works so to rake in the money from trading, but simply to put his work out there to the world and hopefully someone will pick up and continue his work. His works has great implications to mankind and simply not just for trading.

I give great respect for Gann as he pave and laid the foundation for traders like me. His works was a big impact for my trading. But don't get me wrong, I'm not using his system because it is incomplete. But part of my trading was also built upon his foundations. And that's the great debate about his system, because if it was profitable and working, then he would have retired rich. I'm simply here telling you that it is not working because his work is incomplete and not yet finished. Through conspiracy, I'm sure some smart people out there have continued his work and kept the secret. If you find conspiracy a bitter taste, well by sheer probability alone, there is some people who have simply by chance (or hard work).

When that baton dropped, I picked it up and ran as far as I can with it. I've discovered several things and there are even more unanswered questions. I've gone very deep down the rabbit hole, but it is far deeper still. Let me give you an example: When Newton told the people about things falling to the ground, it wasn't really that fascinating and the people replied "how is that going to feed my family?". When Fibonacci told the people that if you add 1+1=2 and you continue to add the last digit of the sum to the total, the people replied "how is that going to feed my family?". What if I told you that I discovered that you can transcribed ANYTHING to a candlestick, people would reply "how is that going to feed my family?" You can take ANY RANDOM ANYTHING Tangible or Intangible (BASICALLY EVERYTHING) and you can transcribe it to a candlestick. The interesting part is that it also has an uptrend and a downtrend.

Whenever I see people do Gann analysis, it's a remnant of Gann's unfinished work. I shake my head and because people blindly don't know that it is incomplete. It is like hearing someone trying to sing and you end up cringing. This is what I believe Gann was missing and halted his progress; Multi-Dimension, Quantum Theory, Chaos Theory, and our current understandings and discoveries. Gann's work's needs to be taken to higher and multi-dimensions. His works are 2 Dimensional, we don't live in a linear world. Whenever I see this drawn to any chart... I cringe. Look at the chart below.



In 2012 at CERN, the hadron collider made new discoveries and validated scientific theories going back 20-30 years ago (Noble prize goes to Higgs). What is also interesting is that result came back and the long debate whether a Multiverse exist or not... well, it exist. What does this have to do with trading? (If you can't keep up at this point, just switch off and don't pay attention to me).

Back to higher Dimensions and Gann. Here is an example below of higher dimensions:


"You can put a boundary wherever you want."
"You can put a reference point wherever you want."
~ CrucialPoint

This statement of mine fucks with people's mind. People can't get around this concept because they are working and have been taught in 2 dimensions. I can illustrate this, but then going to screen shots and editing, it's a lot of work (fuck that! I got better things to do). So how would you see Gann's work on 3D :nerd:

1. Grab a 2 pieces of string.
2. Stick 1 end of the string (sticky tape) on the bottom left corner of you computer screen and stick the end of that string onto the top right of the screen.
3. Stick the second string onto the top left and stick the end of that string onto the bottom right of the screen.
4. Open your chart on the same screen with the strings.
5. Grab the chart with your mouse and simply move it around.

WALLA!!!... Gann's angles on 3D :nerd:

"CrucialPoint you idiot!... there is no difference from drawing those lines on the chart versus those strings on the screen!!!"
ROFLMAO That's because I haven't explained it.


Peace,
CrucialPoint

Concur about Gann. Also agree that he died broke or didn't make money from trading, who cares. Didn't that Elder guy or whomever everybody worships also die broke? Someone's financial state has no bearing on the principles or theories.

I've been railing against the gann "gurus" and gann charting platforms for years that they've got it incomplete. It all boils back to price-time equivalence. Which Gann says is key. Then he demonstrates it wrong. Which I think he did on purpose. Make the student figure it out and correct him. As I stated in another post, most people are trying to measure the area of a square with inches on one side and centimeters on the other. Once you set a unified standard of measurement, it all falls into place. The easiest way to do that is set the measurements to the object being measured. Proportion, ratio, blah blah blah. Square the range as Gann would say. Ranges of price, ranges or time, ranges of price-time... whatever suits your fancy. It should work out for creating a decent grid. Knowing how to trade the grid is another story.

I've done years of work with Gann squares/fans, etc. In my journal here at FF and in other people's posts I've shown how accurate a Gann Square can be for price-time targets. Sexy shit. But totally unnecessary. It's not a holy grail. If someone can't make money trading pull-backs, break-outs, etc, they won't make money diving into the esoteric.

My work of the last 3 or 4 years has been related to the wave-->particle concept. If we look at a price point as a particle, then wouldn't it mean that it's a collapsed wave? At first I analyzed previous price to get an idea on wave properties. Over time I realized I could pull any number out of my ass to generate a composite waveform that could fit a price chart. I even took the UPC numbers off of a local brewery IPA and mapped it to the Dow. Zero relation but a high correlation. What does that tell you? I've got my theory, but I'd like to hear other people's theories.

It tells that there is no escaping φ

Everything is connected

Speaking of particles, they change as soon as we look at them, so we cannot know how they were before.
The consequence is that we create our reality and this phenomenon should somehow apply also to a trading chart, for everything in universe has the same structure and is governed by the same laws, i.e. there is no difference between a price wave and a sound wave; draw Gann's grid on a chart and then take a picture of a crystal snow and most of the times they will match almost perfectly.
Personally I've tried in the past to trade the Gann's grid and by itself it meant me nothing; but looking at the grid within a reliable system it can tell something or nothing again, it depends on how you look at your chart.
Does this make sense to you?

Certainly does. Ponder this. When we interogate the environment, we always exclude our own reference from that context. We seperate that which is external to ourselves and then analyse that 'portion' of the system's behaviour. By self exclusion we avoid getting into self-referential Godelian knots....but therein lies the problem. We need to view things from inside out to see the relationships and interdependencies. An outcome of this process of self-exclusion results in the need to define relationships between what is being observed and the observer. Relativity spells out in bold that the description of a systems behaviour is only valid from a unique frame of reference. When you start merging other points of view into a description of a universe, the kaleidescope of other viewpoints start's making things ill-defined and non-sensical. It is only when we define a system's behaviour (such as a pattern) in the context of the coordinates assigned to the frame of reference that is observing it, that we have a valid desciption that can then be translated by a transform into another obersver's frame of reference. The dillema faced with this form of analysis is that we each interpret patterns differently arising from the context that we view them......this lack of complete information results in uncertainty from a single frame of reference which is therefore a fundamental property inscribed into a classical universe.....because we are classical objects. We are participants in this universe or 'symptoms' of this universe....not gods that stand outside it and interrogate it. As a result don't confuse the head with things we cannot fathom such as quantum entanglement as we 'literally cannot be in two places at the same time to observe it.' Each observer has their own interpretation of their particular universe and the things that appear from their vantage. We see particles, the marching forward in time and causation because we are all constrained in physical form to see it that way. A bit like flatlanders who describe their physical reality by the constraints imposed on their existence.

The complexity to this universe is a feature of this access to partial information and unfortunately we are going to have to live with it. Let the ego go and forget about 'controlling it' or totally understanding it. The beauty of this universe is that we will never completely get to understand it as we are participants in it. We can model away with new ways to abstract away this universe and define new technologies that result from peering into expanded domains, but remember these are just models. Simply go with the flow like a whirlpool goes with a stream. Uncertainty (as opposed to vibration) is the only true fundamental for classical observers such as us. From uncertainty comes resonance attributed to broken symmetries that apply to an observer when they cannot access the whole.

But is it possible to find a possible/probable wave set that collapsed to form the particle? The common theme is that the quantum field is the infinite possibilities and depending on the situation will collapse to a particle which we can them observe and know certain properties. Having said that, if in an infinite quantum field nothing is impossible, there is quite a bit that is improbable and therefore wouldn't it make sense that the properties of the particle leave clues as to the highest probable wave sets? Like in chess. While it seems there are an infinite possible moves/outcomes, by the time you remove illegal moves and flat out erroneous moves, the number of the most logical moves at any given moment will boil down to less than a handful. Of which the experienced player could deduce the most logical lines depending on the opponent.

The example I gave the girlie friend was that the probability of my straight as an arrow brother who doesn't drink, smoke, engage in activities, or associate with anybody who does narcotics, all of a sudden dying of a heroin overdose are pretty much zero. But while extremely improbable, it's still remotely possible. The odds of pulling out a spoon and needle are damn near impossible. But it's remotely possible some dude in the cubicle next to him could go postal and jump on my brother and shove a syringe in his neck. Ninjas could drop out of the ceiling and attack him and force heroin in him. Crazy and extremely unlikely, but theoretically possible. However, under normal circumstances I can pretty much rule out my brother dying of a heroin OD. I've narrowed the possible wave set down from the infinite wave set substantially.

In trading terms, the chances of price moving x amount of points in y amount of bars outside of the statistical deviations gets lower and lower as the deviation levels go up. Outliers will and do happen. Extreme outliers will and do happen. But the most probable wave set will be within x standard deviations. Therefore, is it not possible to map out the possible and most likely waveset that created a given price? This has been work for the last 4 or 5 years and the results are uncanny.

I'll post some screenies when I get back to my trading computer this weekend. Some of my older work is in my journal here at FF. http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=42407. Go to the end and work backwards.

Nice JP97. Statistics is the tool to measure uncertainty as we are always limited by our 3D and 1T context in trying to fathom how something that exists in a wider domain (namely a quantum field in hilbert space) is mapped to (or bound by) that lower level geometry we call spacetime. As 3D and 1T classical objects, we are constrained to understand this wider domain on our own limited terms and as a result, we each interpret it differently. In poetic terms we only see shards of a greater unifying underlying symmetry. What we see as complexity is a shard of a deeper simplicity. The best we can do in trading terms, as the market is a complex system of participants of which we have one point of view, is use a broad sample set via statistics or repeatable patterns to peer into this deeper simplicity. We are unequipped through our limitations to understand it..... so trade what you see and use statistics as your friend....and avoid attempting to predict it.

Simple Simplicity



Question: "How would you find a needle in a haystack?"
Ironman: "I would use a magnet."

There are 2 types of people who reads the above statement:
1. A person reads it and they learn something new. It may come handy in the future and that's about it (IQ boosted by 2 points).
2. A person reads it and they realize that it is not about the magnet. It is about understanding the problem and then arriving to a solution (IQ boosted by 10 points).

A lot to the things discussed in this thread may sound mental masturbation, esoteric pseudo, redundant dribble, useless, call it what you like... but there are people who gets tremendous knowledge a lot from it.

I'm all for simplicity. You don't need to know how a combustion engine work to benefit from a car. If it gets the job done, what's all the fuss?

There are 2 categories:
1. Simple approach and is making profit
2. Simple approach and is losing money

If you tried the simple and is losing money... the question is "Now what?".

With people who tried simple approach and is making profit, there are 2 outcomes:
1. the person wants to dig deeper, understand and investigate (it's human nature and its what propels our advances)
2. the person is satisfied, puts his feet up and sip some cold drink

So what separates one's simple approach working and not the other's simple approach?
How can one's simple approach given to another may not work?


========================
Just a tip for constructive debate, constructive conversation, constructive criticism, healthy conversation:
You can't go to a heavy metal concert and tell people there that there is a jazz music across the street. No matter how polite you are with no ill-intentions... it is not constructive at all. Everyone at that metal concert knows about other music. I'm pretty sure most people on this thread knows what it is and what it is not. On a side note, I thank everyone who has been participating keeping this thread clean without personal attacks.
========================


Peace,
CrucialPoint

I see some contradictions, someone says we should use statistics but we shouldn't predict, someone says that our intentions creates our reality and this should be applied to trading.
What do I see about trading? That in order to understand its nature its necessary to find the unification of some theories as CP said.
About statistics, do clouds analyze their statistics to decide when to release the rain? Do bees analyze their statistics to decide when to create new cells? Do you analyze your statistics to decide when to eat/sleep/run/love/fight?
Even if a snow flake is never the same you can analyze its structure.
Statistics is take a bunch of data and find patterns.
Do you know how a plant grow? There is only one thing that is relevant, and that is define the base and from this base everything will come. Do a plant know where was last leaf or branch? It doesn't need to know in order to grow in harmony.
Do you need to know when you ate last time in order to eat in harmony? You don't.
When you are walking, do you need to know how you walked 10 minutes ago in order to walk properly? You don't.
Radio waves, I really would like to go to space and send a message and look how far it will go and for how long it will exist. I would bet it will go for "eternity".
There are other things that affect our present moment and they are not the past.
If the past was so destructive why life is still present? Why do plant always know how to grow? Do they look at their past? What past? If a plant is not born, what past should it look for?
Even in a world of infinite possibilities a snow flake follows a structure, your body cells follow a structure.
So the question, do infinite possibilities match with a finite possibilities when dealing with a structure? Answer is yes.
If our present moment is the result of our past, think about that, what past is relevant for our present moment? Yesterday? 5 min ago? Last year? What?
What is the point that we can use to connect our past to our present?


Alex

I saw your work also in the past, very interesting. Unfortunately my maths and coding skills won't ever allow me to do something similar. I'd like to see your recent improvements anyway.

Some mathematicians made an interesting experiment about statistical deviations.
They took a glass jar and filled it with little balls, they wew a sum total of 16.525.
Then they asked to around 200 persons just met around to tell which could be the exact number of balls inside the jar, just looking at it.
Ofcourse no one guessed and they all were very far away from the right number; then they summed all the numbers expressed buy those persons and made the average, just the simple average, and the result was astonishing for the average was the exact number of balls inside the jar with an approximation of 0.09%.
The interesting thing is the behaviour of those people: some of them overestimated and some others underestimated the real value, and this could be not a surprise, but here is the incredible: none of them received any indication, none of them was either aware of the numbers expressed buy the others, but 50& of them overestimated and the other 50% underestimated.
So it has been a natural distribution.
They repeated the experiment more and more times and the results have been always the same.
This is a great food for thoughts.
It is impossible to forecast what one person will do but you can forecast what a mass of people will do with extreme accuracy.
So the same must be true with price, don't you think so?

Hi Alex.....obviously my philosophical interpretation leans towards science (as my handle Copernicus suggests) but what is clearly evident is that the state of science today is so much closer to delving into that terrain of philosophy or metaphysics. I understand the biases that exist from a Westernised scientific viewpoint towards a counterproductive philosophy of reductionism and the contrary viewpoint of eastern philosophy's which look at the entire system...and the associated roadblocks placed by these different perspectives in determining how this universe operates....but have been swept up in euphoria by some of the novel approaches now being adopted in methods of further unification seeking answers to quantum gravity. One of these approaches referred to Causal Dynamic Triangulation is being progressed by relativists in the Loop Quantum Gravity Camp and is intriguing in what it is suggesting. Namely that each observer occupies their own universe. This is a radical departure from a popular contemporary theory referring to a 'multiverse'. Just refer to the works of Raphael Bousso or Fotini Markopoulo if you are interested in these intriguing ideas.

Within this context of each observer occupying their own universe, how an observer perceives their hubble volume (the observable universal scope of an observer) is dependent on how they interact with it. For example it is theorised that with black holes, an accelerating observer who seeks to prevent free fall towards a possible singularity actually sees an 'event horizon' with 'real particles' spewing forth from that event horizon. However for an inertial observer who is in free fall in the same location, no such event horizon exists and they simply passively move along the geodesic towards the singularity. How can such different interpretations arise of 'reality' based on simply a different point of view. The answer seems to relate to the fact that the way the vacuum (zero point energy) is interrogated or interacted with which in turn determines the way in which it is physically manifested.....which is certainly suggestive of the notion that 'reality' is what we make of it and is a personalised viewpoint.

This is also evident in quantum mechanics where an observer (say Observer A) who interacts with a quantum superposition collapses the wavefunction of probabilities to determine the nature of classical particle (such as an electron), however from the point of view of another observer (observer B), the wavefunction never collapsed at all but now Observer A's wavefunction is entangled with the original superposition, until of course Observer B interrogates that new superposition ....and so on and so forth.

Both interpretations (one from relativity and one from quantum mechanics) point to the notion that our reality is 'self-determined'.

As discussed earlier, the problem we face however is that when we assess our universe, we always exclude ourselves from this assessment and interpret what we see as the ultimate reality....but what we don't see is what John Wheeler (a famous physicist that spawned Penrose, Feynman, Thorne etc.) used to get himself in knots over...namely the problem of godelian self-reference that arises when we insert ourselves into the picture. You might be aware that we find it impossible to assess our own character from within (and need a psychiatrist to do that), but we clearly can assess the characters of others from our point of view. We also cannot interrogate our own brains and make sense of it but we can interrogate others. This symptom reveals itself as a fundamental bias that exists in the way we interpret this universe.

On a deeper philosophical level we are artifacts of this universe but we simply don't see it due to our inability to 'peer within'. We grow from a pluripotential cell by absorbing the external environment in accordance with a roadmap that has been shaped by our forebears that determines the limits within which this can be achieved (namely our DNA) and are true products of this universe. Wheeler realised this in his expression "the boundary of a boundary is zero'. What this means is that we are the 'cast' of the universe that is external to us. The information we have 'absorbed' from our hubble volume and is represented in our code and form can be theoretically fourier transformed to depict the universe we perceive. What is described on the boundary also describes it's contents. .......In the same way, 'what we are' is really simply products of our environment or an expression (symptom) of our universe. The information we ingest as food and stimuli about the external environment is not lost and actually is used to 'grow' our form so in a sense we are a representation of the universe albeit in a different form. We are not created by componentry. We are as Alan Watts describes, an organism as is any complex system, and that organism can only be described faithfully as a system as opposed to a seperate thing within it.

Now given that we occupy our universe, how do we interpret the universe of others. We can only transform our point of view into theirs and vice versa and with this transformation, concepts of spacetime emerges to allow this transform to take place as I am not you and you are not me.... and it takes time to render my appreciation of your viewpoint. In order to avoid a jumbled up mess of a universe and ensure the results of the experiments you perform are the same as mine, their are very specific ways in which this transform can take place. These specific ways represents the 'laws of physics' but it is a relational notion and not necessary for me to appreciate my universe...only yours.

With this plethora of different viewpoints, how can we trade in a way that at least recognises this plurality of definitions given that the market we trade in comprises a host of participants whose fundamental objectives are derived from how they each perceive their universe. That is where statistics comes in. It is assessing past interpretations of the participants and seeking to find some consistency that might endure for the future. We are not saying with certainty that a future event will happen (predicting), but using past behaviour as a guide of future possibility provided there at least is some shared consistency in these different interpretations.

With your example of a cloud.....if we were a cloud we could not predict the future of ourselves for that would need entail a detailed self-referential analysis, but observers of a cloud using statistics can estimate the likelihood based on past bahaviour whether it is going to rain or not.

....anyway I will leave my philosophical musings here for the moment as the beat of boredom associated with a material existence is beckoning me. Interesting discussion by the way :-)

Hi Cpernicus, you have described very clearly, accurately and precisely all the principles of the topic we are talking about, excellent work.
About the experiment of the jar I was talking in my previous post, I've found some important clues that can be applied to understand price and how to trade it; very simple things...I said one but there are some more....I'd like to see if someone here will find them.

WISDOM!!

understanding the problem and then arriving to a solution.......

.......This is the real Crucial point

Attached Image

Hi strongtrader. Your post was very interesting and in terms of price being an imprint of the collective behaviour of it's participants, this is symptomatic of the study of systems and namely thermodynamics of complex systems. Statistics is the tool used to measure gross behaviour of complex systems by virtue of the fact that it uses aggregated estimates (within a defined confidence interval) to understand the collective motions of it's component parts when the detail of the specific mechanics of it's constituents becomes 'intractable'.

In essence we as humans are very capable of determining the mechanics of very simple systems such as binary systems, but when complexity is added, we quickly run out of calculation power. For example in Newtonian Physics, the mechanics of the motion of two billard balls on a table are easy to determine but in a more complex system such as all the billard balls on the table, determining the exact system mechanics of this more complex system is exceedingly difficult. In the same way that calculus is a tool to assist complex calculations, statistics is a tool that enables us to analyse very complex systems, but what is lost in the process is accuracy which is replaced by a degree of uncertainty.

Thermodynamics was developed as a tool (originally developed to undertand heat transfer in steam engines based on principles of thermal molecular agitation) to allow us to make statistical approximations of the gross behaviour of the componentry of that system to determine how that system evolves in time towards a state of equilibrium.

Thermodynamics as a science subsequently has evolved as a tool to examine an array of different systems and has also honed in on the fundamental root of enquiry for complex systems which relates to information theory. Namely, how a complex system can be defined in gross terms by it's 'state'. The state of a system essentially defines the configuration of that system. The more complex the system, the greater amount of information needed to define it's state so you can perhaps see why information theory uses this principle especially when dealing with digital computers where the amount of binary code needed to define a state grows with increasing system complexity.

With the markets, thermodynamics again is an excellent tool to describe the average behaviour of its components which includes an assessment of how that behaviour varies about it's average which in essence represents market equilibrium and is a moving feast with continual undershoots and overshoots as additional inputs/changes occur to a system such as additional money supply or a change in participants. The chief unit of statistics when applied to market dynamics is price itself as price represents the collective imprint of the behaviour of a systems participants at a discreet point in time. The Price movement represents how that system state evolves in time about market equilibrium and is a reflection of where market consensus lies at any periodic snapshot. That's why we use statistical tools to measure price excursions and mean reversions about average price over time as it provides clues to where price should head in the future provided that the system is stable enough to trend towards equilibrium.

The reason why systems move towards equilibrium (maximum entropy) is attributed to dissipative force laws which relates to a simple and powerful principle of physics, that potential energy always seeks to minimise itself. Potential energy inhabits ordered systems and a state evolves from maximum order to maximum disorder (the least probable to the most probable state). You can harness energy from ordered systems (reduce their PE) but you cannot harvest free energy from maximum disorder. Life uses this principle to harvest energy from their enviornment to go against the tide of entropy and create organised subsystems and this sets living things apart from inanimate things. This principles applies to any physical system be it a classical system or a quantum system and mathematics that describes this tendency is Lagrangian Mechanics. Once upon a time Newtons Laws were used as a basis to determine mechanics but a far simpler method of determining mechanics today is Lagrangian Mechanics as it's application is applicable to all complex systems. Thermodynamics and the second law are the reason for the Arrow of Time of this universe and why we perceive time as marching forward. Time is a measure of change associated with a state of a system and how it evolves in time in specific ways to preserve causality. Causality is the reason that we all agree on a chosen sequence of events and can be directly traced back to this principle of directed action (namely entropy).

All closed systems through thermodynamic principles evolve towards maximum entropy (or equilibrium). Provided the system remains stable (closed) then statistical mathematical principles can be exceedingly accurate in defining how that system will evolve in time, from order to disorder, eg. from grouped to diffuse. Of course when for example monetary supply is added to a system, or when new participants enter the system the state of the system immediately correspondingly reduces it's entropy from the increase in supply of money or change in participants and then begins again the process of equilibrating over time or re-distributing this money supply throughout the system. Other factors such as news events can provide sporadic 'fast' entropy unwinding (turbulence) in the markets which further assist in re-distributing money supply.

I hope this makes sense strongtrader. Long winded I know..... but I hope it is at least interesting and piques the brain as I have found that science and it's application are a wonderful way to approach problem solving and in particular this market. :-)

WOW!!
Sure it makes sense....I've gotten all this in a simplier way with my intuition, observation and logic thinking, I do not have any scientific knowledge; you explained it perfectly providing "the why?".
Great stuff.
So the problem is that market is not stable at all, it changes constantly from trend to range and to trend again; at each phase changing it changes also the frequency or the amplitude of its waves and that depends on the strength of the impulse it receives (money flow) at the begining. The same occurs when you throw a peeble in the lake or a big rock.....the waves each of them will produce will be very different.
This makes me think that the conclusion I came up with time ago is correct: and that is the best way to trade is trading in the moment, looking for what the market is doing now and simply follow it....well it is not that simple but it is the only way I've found - BTW: this does not mean I am a scalper, usually my trades lasts hrs -.
There is only one constant we can rely on and you mentioned it in your post: everything should start from that one.
However I'd like to go deeper on your scientific knowledge applied to market...if you'd like too.
Ale

That's exactly right strongtrader. Science basically confirms your intuition. The reason why I love my science is that it gives me confidence in my decisions. It is my guiding benchmark for sanity. :-)

PS The reason that I trade the longer term timeframe and keep away from scalping is the phenomenon of uncertainty (or noise). I don't won't to put you off in any way but thought I should mention why I deliberately use the longer timeframe. In terms of statistics, we attempt to define the gross behaviour of a system which means we are uncertain about the exact behaviour of every participant. The only way we can achieve this is through using a large sample size that attempts to define the entire population (or market). Statistical interpretations therefore require data, and the more data, the more accurate it defines the total population or the behaviour of the masses. Using short timeframes, we have a very small data set that may/or may not be accurately representative of the entire population. To reduce uncertainty about collective market behaviour we therefore need to extend the timeframe and subsequent data set. For example in a cloud I have no way of determining what the entire cloud will do based on a small sample of the water molecules but with a larger sample, uncertainty reduces and I can estimate more reliably the overall cloud behaviour.

....anyway, this is why I trade the longer term timeframes and interrogate past history over an extended timeframe to gauge what I feel is the most likely future action of how the 'state' of the market will evolve.