Occam's Razor: Simple Makes Efficient

Everyone should have heard the story of the Bermuda Triangle, the Devil's Triangle. This triangle in the southeastern part of the Florida peninsula in North America often happens some things that people cannot explain with existing scientific and technological means.

In 1502 AD, Columbus experienced a series of bizarre events in the waters near Bermuda when he traveled to the Americas. Not only was the sky stormy and the sun was not seen, but the navigation instruments on the ship also failed, and the direction of the magnetic compass pointer was deviated.

Since then, author EVW Jones has reported and recorded a series of mysterious disappearances of planes and ships here in the Associated Press cable service, and the Bermuda Triangle has gradually entered everyone's sight.

There are many hypotheses about the bizarre events of the Bermuda Triangle: vortex theory, sea cave theory, geomagnetic anomaly theory, black hole theory, supernatural force theory, aliens theory and so on. How can we judge for so many reasons?

According to Occam's razor principle, we can simplify this problem. If two hypotheses have the same explanatory and predictive power, we should use the simpler hypothesis as the basis for discussion.

For example, some people think that Latest Mailing Database there is an alien base on the seabed of the Bermuda Triangle. When we need to use this thinking to explain the problem, we need to presuppose a premise: Aliens really exist, and they are still on the earth, and they are established on the seabed of the Bermuda Triangle. an alien base.

Then we think that such a hypothesis is too complicated relative to other explanations and can be excluded first.

In fact, a simple explanation is most likely the answer that is closest to the truth. Now some people think that these bizarre times are not mysterious enough in themselves. For example, they may be caused by hurricanes, ship hull damage, etc. Each event has its own reasonable explanation.

Earlier we mentioned the principle of "Occam's Razor", so what exactly is "Occam's Razor"?

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"Ockham's Razor" (Ockham's Razor, also known as "O'Connell's Razor" , was developed by William of Occam, a 14th-century English logician and Franciscan monk, about 1285-1349 )Proposed.

Medieval scholasticism gave rise to two schools of nominalism and realism in the heated debate about universals and reality .

Nominalism denies that universals have objective reality, and believes that individual perceptual things are the real existence, and universals are just a subjective name; while realism believes that universals have objective reality and are the essence of things, and experience things are the opposite of reality. The imitation and sharing of universals.

William of Occam was a representative of the nominalists against realism represented by Thomas Aquinas.

Occam's razor is actually his principle of ontological simplification. He was very tired of discussing universals and reality, so he proposed " Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily".

He only admits what does exist, and all entities without solid basis should be eliminated. William of Occam said: "Nothing should be presumed without reason unless it is self-evident (literally, known by itself), or knowable by experience, or by biblical authority." (Sent. I, dist. 30, q. 1)

Today, when we use the term "Occam's Razor", it is extended to mean to reduce the complex and simplify, to remove the useless miscellaneous items from the problem, and to favor the simple solution.

But instead of blindly simplifying the problem, "when two hypotheses have exactly the same explanatory and predictive power, we use the simpler hypothesis as the basis for discussion."

Occam's razor principle has become a widely used methodology today due to its practicality and is cited in various industries.