My Thoughts on Science (& a Bit on Religion, too)
I always have such a tough time explaining how I think to other people. No one ever seems to be able to follow my train of thought no matter how hard I try to explain myself, and I consistently end up thinking that maybe there's some part of me that is crazy in a way that is obvious to others but is completely invisible to me
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There is, simply put, no good reason why a simpler theory is better than a more complex theory. Believing that simpler is better feels rather like blind belief to me.
That said, in physics, it has increasingly been the case that the simplest explanation generally gave the best results over time. There are many examples where a physicist would come up with a simplified way of looking at phenomena (schrodinger is a good example) that they at first considered as just an oversimplification only to later realize that the simplification brought testable hyptheses which were then verified.
But no matter how many times a simplification has led to better understanding of results, I still maintain that a simpler theory is not necessarily any better than a less simple theory, or even an extremely complex one. I fear that that, as scientists, we are being deluded by selective bias here: because no one does studies using complex theories except crazy people who never studied science fully in depth, we only see the 'hits' of good results from using simple theories. I venture to make the prediction that using complex theories would progress science just about as often, though in different directions (but I will admit that by using simpler theories, we make things easier for theorists to grasp in their merely human minds, and so perhaps any increase in scientific results from using simpler theories would be attributable to this ease of use).
I admit that I am not really presenting a good amount of proof for this, but the only way to get data on this is to have two groups of scientists, each with equal convictions and capability, with each group working under a different model--one simple, and one complex. Performing this experiment is not feasible, nor if it were would I recommend going through with it. I freely admit that using simpler theories will produce more results; but only because simpler theories are easier to hold in the mind during complex thought experiments. I truly think that using a more complex model to work from would produce approximately equal amounts of progress in science.
Occam's Razor, famous though it may be, feels rather like an instrument of faith, not science.
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