Re: Colander and NK <UNICOLL@ccm.UManitoba.CA>

["Alan G. Isaac" <AISAAC@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 18 Jan 1994 06:10:52 -0700 <UNICOLL@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> said:
>That rest position may have nothing to do with 'equilibrium' as
>referred to in standard terminology, which I take to be
>an agent-preferred (therefore optimal) position which also
>appears to have gravitational force, drawing the system to
>itself 'more often than not', and with some speed to boot.
>
Nash equilibria are generally not optimal, but are certainly
equilibria in one well defined sense. I think we ought not try to
restrict the term equilibrium until it only describes outcomes
in an Arrow-Debreu setting.

>And now  I ask: besides equilibrium methodology,
>does anyone know of some method that could help look at states
>that maintain their features for a while? It is this question
>that prompted me to reply to Brad Cox's comment, implying
>perhaps that I subscribed to the equilibrium method. Frankly,
>give me another way to look at the stuff and I will run away
>from equilibrium immediately.
>
That's exactly the point, though. Positions of rest are naturally
described in equilibrium terms. Other positions are almost always
described with an implicit or explicit reference of a position of
rest; these I would also lump into equilibrium methodology (e.g.,
"slow  adjustment toward equilibrium" models-- note that models
of economic chaos are almost always equilibrium models in a
stronger sense than this).