Is Occam's Razor Better Than A Gillette Razor?

Nomenclature

Argument Topic: False.

The principle states that, when presented with multiple explanations for a phenomenon, one should select the explanation that makes the fewest number of assumptions. In other words, the simplest explanation is often the correct one. This principle has been widely adopted in many fields, including science, philosophy, and decision-making.

You're making a very common misinterpretation. Occam's Razor is an investigative methodology, not a conclusion. One first begins with the simplest explanation and then works outwards, ruling them each out in turn until the correct explanation is eventually identified. It says nothing about which explanation is the correct one and it was never intended to. 

However, it is important to note that Occam's Razor is not a guarantee of truth

It was never intended to predict the truth. This is exactly the point I'm making. It simply is a way to use the law of probability to save time and effectively organise any type of investigation.

JulesKorngold

Occam's Razor is both a methodology for conducting investigations and a conclusion-generating tool.

MayCaesar

The process of learning about the world around us is not that of seeking the truth, but of building and refining models of the world. The "truth" is somewhat ill-defined when applied to physical entities for what is true intrinsically depends on the employed models. Do electrons exist? As a part of the modern models in physics, yes - but those models, in turn, are based on certain assumptions that, in principke, do not have to be accepted.

What humans instead do is, by analyzing the observed patterns, they develop models of the world from which those patterns derive. If you see the Sun rising on the East every single day, it makes sense to suggest that it is not just a random coincidence happening over and over again, but that there are underlying laws generating this behavior - and building a model including these laws is the most natural way to try to understand the behavior.

Now, humans think about everything in causal terms: "Event X happened because of Y". Tracing these causal chains all the way back to their origin, we hope to arrive at a small set of the most fundamental laws of the Universe from which everything else derives. By the same token, whenever studying an emergent phenomenon far into the chain, we hope to connect it to something far up the chain, something that will allow us to understand an entire array of similar phenomena. Ideally, we hope to be able to explain every phenomenon in existence by starting with a single assumption.

Occam's Razor then can be understood as the strife towards tracing every logical tree up to the branch from which all phenomena of interest grow. On a more practical level, it can be seen as strife to prevent inefficient use of resources, in this particular case of time and mental energy. When going to a grocery store, it makes sense to take the shortest path available, rather than, say, do a couple of loops around the block and then head towards the store. The simpler the explanation of the phenomenon of interest, the less energy is wasted when studying its consequences and engineering tools based on it.

Occam's Razor also has a simple statistical justification: in the absence of knowing which of the considered assumptions are true or false, you are much more likely to be wrong when betting on a large number of assumptions simultaneously being true, than on a small one. If I tell you that you do not have a bank account with a billion dollars in it, then you do not have to make any new assumptions in order to agree with it, and for all you know, I am telling the truth - but if I instead tell you that yiu have a bank account with a billion dollars in it you were not aware of and you need merely to pay me $10,000 in order to unlock it, then supposing that I am trlling the truth would have you make a lit of not so easily tested assumptions, such as a) that I have your best interest in mind, b) that somehow all this time the bank has not notified you of it, contrary to the custom, c) that the amount is exactly as I stated and not smaller or larger... The more likely explanation is that I am a typical scammer.

It is, however, easy to misuse Occam's Razor by confusing the need for simplicity of the model of the world with simplicity of the world itself. A common argument against free markets, for instance, is that if they really worked as well as their proponents claimed, then they would be all over the place, and the fact that they are not means that they cannot compete with mixed economies. But that is just like saying that if Nazism was not awesome, then it would have never grabbed a hold in Germany. The "simple" explanation here is logically incoherent, because it involves a hidden assumption that what is best always wins over, the assumption that is demonstably false. If your model of the world is simple, but demonstrably false, then it is a poor model: simple or complicated, implications of the model cannot contradict the observable reality.

On a similar note, people who claim that socialism/communism are great systems and they simply have never been allowed to flourish properly have to rely on endless conspiracy theories involving various elites constantly plotting against the noble revolutionaries, brainwashing the general population, calling socialism/communism what they are not... Fun mental exercise, vut silly from the practical standpoint. A much more natural explanation is that there is something intrinsic about these systems that conflicts with inherent properties of human societies. And the same, of course, applies to free markets: however fantastic they can be once implemented, the available pathways there might be incompatible with modern human societies. It does not mean that they should be rejected as the ideal to strive for, but it does suggest that there is a phenomenon at play here to be carefully studied.

Nomenclature

@JulesKorngold

Occam's Razor is both a methodology for conducting investigations and a conclusion-generating tool.

Plain wrong, as I've already explained to you once. I'm not explaining the same thing to you twice.

JulesKorngold

Occam's razor states that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. To use Occam's razor to reach a conclusion, one could look at all of the possible explanations for a phenomenon and then choose the simplest one as the most likely explanation.

For example, if one noticed that their car wasn't running properly, they could consider that it could be a number of different issues. They might think the problem could be with the engine, the brakes, the tires, or any other number of things. However, using Occam's razor, they would look at all of the potential explanations and then choose the simplest one as the most likely explanation. In this case, the simplest explanation could be that the car simply needs more gas, and so this would be the conclusion reached.

MayCaesar

JulesKorngold said:

Occam's razor states that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. To use Occam's razor to reach a conclusion, one could look at all of the possible explanations for a phenomenon and then choose the simplest one as the most likely explanation.

For example, if one noticed that their car wasn't running properly, they could consider that it could be a number of different issues. They might think the problem could be with the engine, the brakes, the tires, or any other number of things. However, using Occam's razor, they would look at all of the potential explanations and then choose the simplest one as the most likely explanation. In this case, the simplest explanation could be that the car simply needs more gas, and so this would be the conclusion reached.

I think you are missing the point of Occam's Razor. It does not at all rely on the assumption that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one - in fact, this is a patently false assumption, and virtually all simple explanations that people gave to natural phenomena 2,500 years ago eventually were proven to be wrong. In fact, there might not be such a thing as "correct explanation" at all, for any explanation has to rely on incomplete information and is going to be wrong/incomplete in some fundamental way.

The point is that needless overcomplication of our models serves no purpose other than make acquisition of further knowledge unnecessarily difficult. Whatever possible explanations you have on your plate are likely to all have to be revised eventually, but for now picking the one relying on as few assumptions as possible makes most sense.

Let us say you just baked a really nice pie. You want to understand what made this pie particularly good and start thinking about what you did differently from the last time. The most obvious and relevant difference you notice is that you put in twice the amount of honey that you usually do; failing to find any other major differences, you conclude that adding an extra amount of honey makes for better pies. You bake your next pie accordingly, but it does not come out as well as the last one. You try two more times and cannot repeat your past success. Now you conclude that the extra amount of honey was not what made that pie so good and proceed to exploring other possibilities.

Were you wrong about your honey theory? Yes and no. You were wrong in that your explanation proved to be false, but your methodology was sound and your knowledge improved as a consequence of following it. You now know that adding extra honey in this recipe does not make for a better pie. Had you instead employed some extravagant explanation such as five random things you did a week before, it would had taken you much more time to falsify that theory, and the utility of this all would be negligible: not adding extra honey is a very simple and actionable takeaway, while "do not do those five things within a single week before baking a pie" is a huge waste.

Barnardot

@JulesKorngold This is not entirely right really because where I work we knock off thousands off chickens and we use the simplest ways to knock them off and get them in to the stores so that nower days they dont cost a lot. Except that what we do is now more sophisticated but it all comes from occams razor because thats where you start. In the old days the women used to sit around and cackle to each other just like hens while they pulled out the feathers because they did the easiest thing then when the husband comes along and accidentally spilled his coffee on one of them youreaka some feathers dropped out. But I suppose it is still pretty simple any way and you dont want to get to complicated other wise the KFC would get to expensive and all the poor dum fat people could not a ford there fix every day.

Barnardot

@JulesKorngold And that picture you put up there is so ironic any way like sure its a razor but it is one of those electric razors with a motor and a battery and all the other stuff inside it then what about all the design genius wanna bees in the gillete factory sitting around all day in meetings and doing think tanks and doing long lunches and spending millions of dollars on re search just so they can get the blade to swing around and pivit. Like what the and even then the blade is not simple oh no they put 2 in then they put 3 in then they put 4 in then they have some more lunches and think hay lets put some platinum on them. Then it becomes more complicated because where I live they keep those blades locked behind the counter because there so small and expensive that all the hoods will steel them if they were on the shelf. And what the any way because what they do is put them in a packet that is so complicated and hard to open you have to get the angel grinder out to open the packet. So what I'm saying is that you should put a more simpler picture there.

JulesKorngold

Here are some common criticisms of Occam's Razor:

1. Over-simplification: Sometimes, the simplest explanation may not be the correct one. Occam's Razor may lead to oversimplification and neglect of important details or complexities that might be relevant to a particular phenomenon.

2. Ignores evidence: Occam's Razor can ignore evidence that contradicts the simplest explanation. This can lead to incorrect conclusions if the evidence is not considered or if the explanation is not adjusted to accommodate the evidence.

3. Not always applicable: The principle of parsimony may not always be applicable to all situations. In some cases, it may be more appropriate to consider multiple explanations or to allow for complexity when it is required to accurately understand a phenomenon.

4. Ignores prior probabilities: Occam's Razor does not take into account prior probabilities of different explanations, which can affect the accuracy of the conclusion.

5. Leads to conservatism: Occam's Razor may lead to a conservative approach to problem-solving, where new or unconventional ideas are not given proper consideration.

In summary, while Occam's Razor can be a useful tool, it should not be used as a hard and fast rule, but rather as a guideline to help inform decision-making and problem-solving.

Barnardot

@JulesKorngold
So what about the razor then like how come you put up a picture of the most complicated razor you can get because it is a mistake to do that and flies on the faces of what you just said.