as far as the risk discussion is concerned, after 6 years trading full time I'd have to side in the risk is good camp. Most of succesful guys I know (disgressionary here, not system based) take on large levels of risk pretty regularly. Key is they never lose their heads in extreme situations. I think a lot of people confuse risk with reckless behavior. If you have a system that has strict risk control..and proceed to do away with such controls, that's not taking on risk, that's just moronic. However if you are a disgressionary trader with positive returns, at some point you have to realize that to make great returns at times you have to take on risk. Course if you can't make money in the first place then forget it, you shouldn't even be trading. Perhaps in the end it's all a semantic debate.