Ockham's Razor (also known as "Occam's Razor", the "law of parsimony", "law of economy" or "law of succinctness") is a very useful idea named after William of Ockham, a 13th century Franciscan friar. (Friar's are like monks who live in the world serving others rather than hidden away in monasteries.) William apparently did not create the idea, but he did use is often in his writings on philosophy, theology and politics.
The basic idea of Ockham’s Razor is that when trying to explain something, without evidence to the contrary the hypothesis (explanation) with the fewest new assumptions is the one that is recommended. Or, put into more common terms: “all things being equal, the simplest explanation tends to be the correct one”. In practical application, this means that if there are two explanations for something, we should choose the simpler one unless there is proof to that the more complicated answer is more likely the correct one.
This idea is actually common sense, just put into philosophical terms. Say, for example, that a parent hears a loud crash from another room. They run in there and see a broken lamp on the floor and their son standing there with a basketball in his hands. When asked, the child says that the wind blew the door open and knocked over the lamp then blew the door shut again. The parent then has two choices: to accept either A) the wind broke the lamp, or B) the child did with the basketball. For A to be true, they would have to accept that 1) the door wasn’t latched, 2) the wind blew it open, 3) the opening door didn’t bang into the wall (or they would have heard it), 4) the wind blew hard enough to knock the lamp over, 5) the wind did not blew hard enough to blow anything else over, 6) the wind then reversed and closed the door and 7) the closing door made no sound. For B to be true, they would have to accept that 1) the child broke the lamp and 2) he is now lying to protect his backside since he was told not to play with the basketball in the house. So, accept the explanation that requires believing 7 things, or accept the explanation that requires believing 2? The parent cannot know with 100% certainty, but I would hazard to guess that the boy in question would be grounded and/or dealing with a sore backside in the very near future.
Ockham’s Razor is nice philosophical idea, and actually common sense, but why, you ask, do I bring it up on an apologetics blog? Good question! The answer is that it is necessary idea when we study apologetics, or even just read Scripture for that matter. If a given passage of the Bible has two or more possible interpretations, then we should tend to the simpler one unless there is good evidence that one of the more complicated interpretations is the correct one. Expect to see our friend from Ockham appearing in later posts.
ybic (Your Brother In Christ)
KevinS
Generous Apologist in training
Ockham’s Razor - the idea that all things being equal, the simplest explanation tends to be the correct one..
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