Occam’s Razor: The simplest position is the most likely position

The argument

Materialists often cite Occam's Razor in support of their position, and the appeal is methodological rather than empirical: it is a claim about which of two unproven theories a reasonable person should prefer, not a claim to have settled the mind-body problem by evidence. Occam's Razor is the argument that in any given argument, the position with the most metaphysical simplicity is the more likely position. At its core, it means that the simpler the position, the more likely it is to be true. Simplicity here is not stylistic economy but metaphysical economy — a count of the kinds of thing a theory must assume exist before it can work at all. A theory that requires fewer basic kinds of entity makes fewer commitments that could turn out to be mistaken, and so, all else being equal, stands a better chance of being right. Applied to the mind-body problem the comparison is straightforward. Materialism rests on the existence of just one world, the physical one, rather than hinging on the existence of two components. Dualism must posit a second kind of thing alongside the physical and then explain what it is and how it relates to the first; materialism does not incur that commitment at all, which on this measure makes it the simpler argument. The conclusion is deliberately modest. Both dualism and materialism are unproven theories, and Occam's Razor does not prove either of them — it is a principle for ranking explanations, not for verifying them. What materialists claim is only that when two competing accounts of the same phenomenon are equally unproven, the one that posits less is the more likely explanation. By that standard materialism is the more likely explanation due to its simplicity, and the burden falls on dualism to show why the extra component it requires is one the world cannot do without.

Context

William of Ockham (or Occam) was a thirteenth-century scholastic philosopher. His principle gives preference to simplicity in cases where there are competing explanatory theories.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Ockham's Razor does not mean materialism is true. It simply states that in cases where there are competing claims, the simpler claim is more likely to be true. In science and history, the more complex explanation has frequently been proven true. Alfred North Whitehead summed up the dangers of relying heavily on Ockham's Razor as evidence for one argument over another. He said, "the aim of science is to seek the simplest explanation of complex facts. We are apt to fall into the error of thinking that the facts are simple because simplicity is the goal of our quest. The guiding motto in the life of every natural philosopher should be “Seek simplicity and distrust it.”

Rejecting the premises

That doesn't mean materialism is true.