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> "We're in a simulation" fundamentally discard Occam's Razor in the fashion of the belief in God as controlling everything. And thus this belief has the same w

by IncRnd 5y ago

> "We're in a simulation" fundamentally discard Occam's Razor in the fashion of the belief in God as controlling everything. And thus this belief has the same weight as belief in the Flying Spaghetti Monster [1]. You are using Occam's Razor incorrectly. A preference for parismony in problem solving is not identical with parsimony being the only state of the world. As a side note, which directly applies to your comment, Occam's Razor was invented by Friar William of Ockham as a defense of divine miracles.

joe_the_user 5y ago
You are using Occam's Razor incorrectly. A preference for parismony is not identical with parsimony being the only state of the world. "Everything is really under control of invisible stuff" make it impossible to use parisomy under any circumstances. It fundamentally discards Occam's Razor. Occam's Razor was invented by Friar William of Ockham as a defense of divine miracles. While I wouldn't personally accept a God that acts in the world, the argument is about having some sort of evidence based interpretation of the world. Flying Spaghetti Monster is response to arguments like "God makes the rain fall" etc, not to a God that appears in the world but a God that can essentially be evoked for anything and in any fashion.
- mrkstu 5y ago
  "we're in a simulation" is at least something that might be ultimately testable with the right theory and experiment. FSM/God isn't w/o them choosing to 'reveal' themselves to everyone.
- IncRnd 5y ago
  > "Everything is really under control of invisible stuff" make it impossible to use parisomy under any circumstances. It fundamentally discards Occam's Razor. You are fundamentally misunderstanding Occam's Razor. It is not a law - Occam's Razor is a preference for how to view the world, not a law that was violated. [1] There are alternate rules-of-thumb, such as one by Ockham's contemporary, Walter Chatton. Chatton created Chatton's anti-razor in opposition to Ockham's Razor: "Consider an affirmative proposition, which, when it is verified, is verified only for things; if three things do not suffice for verifying it, one has to posit a fourth, and so on in turn [for four things, or five, etc.]. (Reportatio I, 10–48, paragraph 57, p. 237)" [2] [1] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ockham/#OckhRazo https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ockham/#OckhRazo [2] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/walter-chatton/#AntiRazo https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/walter-chatton/#AntiRazo
  - joe_the_user 5y ago
    You are fundamentally misunderstanding Occam's Razor. It is not a law - Occam's Razor is a preference for how to view the world, not a law that was violated. Yes, Occam's Razor isn't a law but a method of understanding reality. My point is that if you throw out Occam's Razor in total, not in one or another situations, you're left with nothing to understand the world with. The "God wants it that ways" and "because it's simulation" can be substituted for any proposition at all under any circumstances and there's not counter argument to such substitutions. This approach is also "the paranoid worldview" - "because they want to think that" also has this "insert everywhere" quality. And you're link describing the original ideas of William of Occam doesn't what you'd imagine. "Occam's Razor" is broad approach that's evolved over time and just takes that label for convennience. Virtually no one is evoking the authority of William of Occam or claiming to follow his Nominalism or whatever. The generally means that adding unneeded hypotheses should generally be avoided. If you can never follow that guide, you're in trouble.
    - ericb 5y ago
      The reason "magicians" succeed is because Occam's razor is a heuristic that we rely on intuitively. When the real explanation is super-complex, like "this magician spent 8 hours a day for months learning to hold a hidden card in an invisible way, followed by a year of engineering an under-the-stage lift hidden by mirrors, the reality isn't "disproved" by Occam's razor. Same thing if someone engineers a super complicated method to murder someone while appearing to physically be at a different place. It isn't the simplest explanation, but it can still be correct!
      - joe_the_user 5y ago
        The reason "magicians" succeed is because Occam's razor is a heuristic that we rely on intuitively. When the real explanation is super-complex, like "this magician spent 8 hours a day for months learning to hold a hidden card in an invisible way, followed by a year of engineering an under-the-stage lift hidden by mirrors, the reality isn't "disproved" by Occam's razor. Sure. But if the entirety of reality is created by magicians, then one's concept of reality collapses. The "simulation" view point is indeed pretty much the idea that magicians control everything. If you read the argument above, my point isn't that Occam's Razor is always correct but if you posit a world where it is generally/always incorrect, your ability to coherently understand reality collapses.

by IncRnd 5y ago

joe_the_user 5y ago

You are using Occam's Razor incorrectly. A preference for parismony is not identical with parsimony being the only state of the world. "Everything is really under control of invisible stuff" make it impossible to use parisomy under any circumstances. It fundamentally discards Occam's Razor. Occam's Razor was invented by Friar William of Ockham as a defense of divine miracles. While I wouldn't personally accept a God that acts in the world, the argument is about having some sort of evidence based interpretation of the world. Flying Spaghetti Monster is response to arguments like "God makes the rain fall" etc, not to a God that appears in the world but a God that can essentially be evoked for anything and in any fashion.

mrkstu 5y ago
"we're in a simulation" is at least something that might be ultimately testable with the right theory and experiment. FSM/God isn't w/o them choosing to 'reveal' themselves to everyone.
IncRnd 5y ago
> "Everything is really under control of invisible stuff" make it impossible to use parisomy under any circumstances. It fundamentally discards Occam's Razor. You are fundamentally misunderstanding Occam's Razor. It is not a law - Occam's Razor is a preference for how to view the world, not a law that was violated. [1] There are alternate rules-of-thumb, such as one by Ockham's contemporary, Walter Chatton. Chatton created Chatton's anti-razor in opposition to Ockham's Razor: "Consider an affirmative proposition, which, when it is verified, is verified only for things; if three things do not suffice for verifying it, one has to posit a fourth, and so on in turn [for four things, or five, etc.]. (Reportatio I, 10–48, paragraph 57, p. 237)" [2] [1] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ockham/#OckhRazo https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ockham/#OckhRazo [2] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/walter-chatton/#AntiRazo https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/walter-chatton/#AntiRazo
- joe_the_user 5y ago
  You are fundamentally misunderstanding Occam's Razor. It is not a law - Occam's Razor is a preference for how to view the world, not a law that was violated. Yes, Occam's Razor isn't a law but a method of understanding reality. My point is that if you throw out Occam's Razor in total, not in one or another situations, you're left with nothing to understand the world with. The "God wants it that ways" and "because it's simulation" can be substituted for any proposition at all under any circumstances and there's not counter argument to such substitutions. This approach is also "the paranoid worldview" - "because they want to think that" also has this "insert everywhere" quality. And you're link describing the original ideas of William of Occam doesn't what you'd imagine. "Occam's Razor" is broad approach that's evolved over time and just takes that label for convennience. Virtually no one is evoking the authority of William of Occam or claiming to follow his Nominalism or whatever. The generally means that adding unneeded hypotheses should generally be avoided. If you can never follow that guide, you're in trouble.
  - ericb 5y ago
    The reason "magicians" succeed is because Occam's razor is a heuristic that we rely on intuitively. When the real explanation is super-complex, like "this magician spent 8 hours a day for months learning to hold a hidden card in an invisible way, followed by a year of engineering an under-the-stage lift hidden by mirrors, the reality isn't "disproved" by Occam's razor. Same thing if someone engineers a super complicated method to murder someone while appearing to physically be at a different place. It isn't the simplest explanation, but it can still be correct!
    - joe_the_user 5y ago
      The reason "magicians" succeed is because Occam's razor is a heuristic that we rely on intuitively. When the real explanation is super-complex, like "this magician spent 8 hours a day for months learning to hold a hidden card in an invisible way, followed by a year of engineering an under-the-stage lift hidden by mirrors, the reality isn't "disproved" by Occam's razor. Sure. But if the entirety of reality is created by magicians, then one's concept of reality collapses. The "simulation" view point is indeed pretty much the idea that magicians control everything. If you read the argument above, my point isn't that Occam's Razor is always correct but if you posit a world where it is generally/always incorrect, your ability to coherently understand reality collapses.