Rise of atheism: 100,000 Brits seek 'de-baptism'

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donathos said:

appolose said:

It's the principle in Occam's razor I find to be wrong.  It's not necessarily true that the simplest explanation that works as well as the others is most likely because it's unknown how complex the explanation really is.

I know, I know, I said I was going... :)

Just wanted to briefly jump in about Occam's Razor, because I think there might be some confusion about it.

Occam's Razor pertains to epistemology, not metaphysics.  What I mean is, Occam's Razor does not insist that the "simplest solution" is the correct solution--it insists that we have no call to believe anything beyond the simplest solution that accounts for the evidence.

Meaning, there may well be a Matrix (metaphysics), but unless we have evidence of it, there is no reason to posit it (epistemology).

 

ETA: What I always take as a necessary corollary of Occam's Razor is that a proper theory must account for all of the evidence; there are theories that are "too simple," just as the Razor would cut away any needless complications.

Oh now here's a rarity...someone else who actually understands Occam's Razor.  Most people tend to miss the "all things being equal" bit =P  And of course once you've missed that it is pretty easy to misstake the phrase "tends to be" to mean "absolutely must be".

Even that is somewhat of a lamen's definition though, we can blame Matthew McConaughey for that I suppose.