On a similar vein, just about every somehow understandable version of free market theory is based on the assumption of a steady state market. The theory does not include a temporal element. If you want to study those, you're bound for such a quagmire of stochastic nonlinear differential equations that you would not believe. Hence, the global stability of any reasonably realistic model of markets is practically impossible to guarantee with current mathematical tools. It is quite possible for such systems to behave badly enough to kill most of the participants in the market, for instance. Besides, the basic continuity assumptions behind mathematical economics practically guarantee that the theory does not take such possibilities seriously - I know of no models which take into account the discrete, limited number of people participating in the market.

All fine and dandy, except it's completely useless. I am an Austrian - the Austrians are dead set against "steady set markets", and dead set against equations in economics. You don't need fancy equations for anything in economics - look on www.mises.org Mark