I would answer it: Find the most complex way to give a full and complete explanation, then for each bit assign a necessity value for how important it is. Anyt

I would answer it: Find the most complex way to give a full and complete explanation, then for each bit assign a necessity value for how important it is. Anything less than a complete explanation is obviously going to leave stuff out, so then you can decide where you want to make the tradeoff by looking at all information above a certain necessity threshold (how ruthlessly you want to cut down the explanation). The quantification of each element of the explanation is going to be relative and arbitrary, but it's still easier to decide how far you're willing to go if you have numbers to base it on, even if they're made-up numbers.