I think you’re missing the point of the article. His original theses was that we aren’t good enough at estimation. And in fact much hand wringing over estimation has been done in this industry over the last 6+ decades.
Now he’s amending his opinion to state that estimation is not really the core issue. The core issue is that projects are doomed from the start by mismanagement. Issues such as: racing to catch up with a competitor (giving the s/w group an impossible deadline), or starting a project whose business value is so low that minor time and cost overruns reduce the actual value to below zero (at which point people start blame shifting to try and hold on to their jobs).
Now he’s amending his opinion to state that estimation is not really the core issue. The core issue is that projects are doomed from the start by mismanagement. Issues such as: racing to catch up with a competitor (giving the s/w group an impossible deadline), or starting a project whose business value is so low that minor time and cost overruns reduce the actual value to below zero (at which point people start blame shifting to try and hold on to their jobs).