Moderator: Only_Humean
Flannel Jesus wrote:That being said, I actually have a point to make here that I take quite seriously: I'm very much annoyed that you're promoting the myth that sentence length has anything to do with Occam's Razor. 'Simplicity' in the sense of Occam's Razor has nothing to do with natural language sentence length. One can compress any amount of complexity into a single word. The word 'cube' and the word 'human' are both only one word; the concepts are not of equal complexity. This is part of the power of words -- the ability to wrap up complex concepts into easy-to-say/write/read symbols/sounds/etc. A sentence of 100 words may be less complex, in the Occam's Razor sense, than a sentence of 3 words.
Eg take the explanation for thunder, of 'Thor did it', with a full explanation of Maxwell's Equations. Maxwell's Equations take much more time to explain, but in the end, they're much much less complex than the mind of a god. Word count is not a good measure of complexity.
Ierrellus wrote:Say what?
Human thought has physical underpinnings.
Stuart wrote:Ierrellus wrote:Say what?
This:Human thought has physical underpinnings.
That's one way of saying it.
That's not the OR, though it is a pretty common misinterpretation of it.Maia wrote:Stuart wrote:Flannel, I've been running across debates on Occam's Razor, and yet don't know what it's about; I realize here and now is a very ideal time to ask for a short explanation of the term.
The simpler the better.
Ierrellus wrote:Curiosity expands statements.
John shot a bear.
Who's John?
Did he kill the bear?
What kind of bear was it?
Why did John shoot the bear?
Did John use a bow & arrow? A shotgun? A rifle?
Maia wrote:No verb, no sentence, no meaning.
Amorphos wrote:Metholodological = methodological ^^Ierrellus wrote:Curiosity expands statements.
John shot a bear.
Who's John?
Did he kill the bear?
What kind of bear was it?
Why did John shoot the bear?
Did John use a bow & arrow? A shotgun? A rifle?
That is asking questions endlessly, not answering them in the shortest way possible. It is true though that you can do that. So are both statements true even if conflicting? What if the world has two or more truths about a thing? That perhaps just gives us categories of truth rather than absolutes ~ I quite like that philosophy.
Maia wrote:I never use just one sentence.
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