Religious and Scientific Faith in Simplicity
Abstract
Description
Both religion and science start with basic assumptions that cannot be proved but are taken on faith. Here I note that one basic assumption that is rather common in both enterprises is the assumption that in comparing different hypotheses that all equally explain the observations, the simpler hypotheses are more probable (Occam's razor or the law of parsimony). That is, explanations should be made as simple at possible (though no simpler, since then they would not explain what is observed).
16 pages, LaTeX, paper written for the 2008 November 21-22 session of the Science and Religion group at New York University
16 pages, LaTeX, paper written for the 2008 November 21-22 session of the Science and Religion group at New York University