The "market" is zero or negative sum on average - sure. Not zero...

The "market" is zero or negative sum on average - sure. Not zero or negative sum for individual participants - there will be winners & losers at the individual level. So I don't think the arguments help determine if FA or TA is more profitable for an individual - just over all participants on average.

BTW I read something very interesting today from Bob Arnott re. index investing. If we accept that at any time some stocks are overpriced and some underpriced, then investing as per the index, which weights investment by market cap, is not very smart, as the overpriced stocks are over-represented and the underpriced stocks are underrepresented. Anyway Bob reckons that investing in an index that is independent of market cap (eg. equal weight) adds 2%-4%pa on to your average annual return. This is a staggering amount.