" then any "trends or cycles" apparently observed in such series would be "illusory". [fact]
If it were indeed the case that "what looks like a purposive movement over a long period" in an economic time series was "merely a kind of economic Brownian motion," then any "trends or cycles" apparently observed in such series would be "illusory" (ibid., pp. 13, 18).
Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera, loc. 274