Where should a beginner begin?

Do you care to explain what you mean by this?

http://www.cmegroup.com/education/developing-your-trading-strategy.html

 

The market has a "way" of behaving... buying and selling. Our objective as traders is to figure that out and get our bet in line with whatever the market is doing. Whatever "philosophy" anyone has about "the market anything... other than how it really works", is bogus distraction. IOW... you should not have a "philosophy about how it works" or "is supposed to work". You either "get it"... how it works, or you don't.

The market is more of a physics problem than a philosophical one.

As soon as someone says, "my philosophy of the market is ___________", I immediately understand he doesn't know what he's talking about.

 

How does the market work then? Let's say, index futures...

 

I don't mind informing you as to "where to fish", but I'm not going to bait your hook and cast your line for you, too.

 

In conclusion...everyone is full of stuff currently at the present moment. -- But we all hope we get lucky and win the trade. and feel proud. and wise. and successful.

 

Disagree. More like "hope we don't get unlucky"... otherwise, we're supposed to prevail.

 

A slightly more poetic way of saying a coin has two sides.

 

Not a good analogy. A coin with its "2 sides", is always a 50-50 proposition. Trading the markets properly is more like a 98-2 proposition.

 

That CME video I posted above is a very basic example. I think you've misunderstood what I was saying. Let's just leave it at that.

 

Something that comes before the above is understanding the microstructure of markets based on factual information.

Trading and Exchanges by Harris is an excellent text on the subject.

By understanding the various participants, why they participate, when they participate, and how they participate, a map of the territory is differentiated. With this map one can navigate in the most efficient manner toward their goals and what unknown yet knowable obstacles (that exist inherent in market structure itself) that are in their way.

However for a true beginner, there is nothing like the Wiley's series "The little book of,..." They are introductory, short, broad strokes in a variety of investing/trading/writing styles that one can digest very easily without being overwhelmed.