Is trading more of an art than a science?

I believe trading is far more an art than a science. For one thing, if trading were a science, then we should all be able to enter the same trade at the same time, and exit at the same time getting identical results. We all know that just isn’t so. Yet if trading were scientific, we should be able to get identical results doing the same thing. I believe such expectation describes the “scientific method.”

In addition, if trading were scientific, we should be able to come up with a “get rich” formula that would work all the time. We could then all retire and never have to work again. We all now this isn’t so either.

When we as traders make a trading decision, most of the time we never fully know why we are making that decision.

You look at a market, you think about taking a trade in that market, and at some point you pull the trigger. You have thought of dozens of things in the time interval leading up to your entry. If I were to ask you, ‘Why are you exactly why you are buying or why you are selling, you will probably not be able to give an accurate answer. You may be able to give a few reasons, but it will most likely not be the full answer. A lot of your decision to enter is subconscious. You do not really know why you entered, especially if you are daytrading. To that extent it is more an art than a science, because you cannot fully demonstrate why you are doing what you are doing.