1. This argument seems to be off the rails because:
You guys are incorrectly defining technical analysis. The simplest definition of TA in trading is to trade based on what happens Price and Volume alone.
That is you exclude fundamentals, the stars, what your dog did yesterday and tips. It doesn't have to mean patterns, it doesn't have to be linear, it basically differentiates price/volume based decisions from fundamental analysis.
So, buying support and resistance, using market profile, using volume at bid vs ask analysis and using indicators or patterns are all
examples of technical analysis. Choosing targets, analysing MFEs and MAEs to determine stops and targets, points for tightening stops and determining RR of potential trades are
all Technical Analysis.
2. Jerry is right that most traders are losers at any one time (some climb out of it) but its not because of TA. Most traders are losers because their brains are wired wrong. A trader may know what to do (semantic memory) but do the wrong thing repeatedly (procedural memory). It doesn't require FA, TA or any analysis at all ---- most traders will be losers just because
3. It is true that market price doesn't have a normal distribution but that doesn't prevent approximations to nds from being effective (otherwise why bother with market profile?) But other than market profile and statistical work most of technical analysis doesn't care what the distribution is - it doesn't give a flying xxxk!
Most TA that works with trends benefits from the fat tail distribution - we get an unreasonable number of long moves! Most TA that works with edges also doesn't care. TA is based on crude robust statistical assumptions and doesn't assume a distribution. And one of the differences between a long term winning trader and a burning star is that, rather than expect the distributions to stay the same, they adapt when the markets actions change in such a way that their method slips out of alignment.
If TA is useless then by definition Market Profile is useless!
TA (making trading decisions based on price and volume analysis) works for those that can make it work. I can't make MP work. Soultrader couldn't make patterns work. But that doesn't mean they don't work, it usually means we didn't do the work or get the teaching to make them work. It might also mean our brains have been wired incorrectly. But, TA can work for those that can make it work. That's my 2c