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2 Here is a
description of Occam’s Razor, taken from George H. Smith’s "The Case Against
God". Named after the fourteenth-century theologian, William of Occam, "this
dictum states that one should never multiply explanations or increase their
complexity beyond necessity. An explanation should be as simple and direct
as possible, and any excess baggage should be discarded."
As formulated
above by Smith, I believe Occam’s razor is a reasonable rule of thumb in
pursuing truth. However, Smith goes on to quote Mortimer J. Adler to express
his interpretation of the dictum,
"…Occam’s razor is a two-edged instrument – one that
works in opposite directions. It eliminates theoretical constructs that
cannot be shown to be necessary for explanatory purposes; but it also
justifies the retention of theoretical constructs the need for which can
be shown* ."
Smith’s application of Occam’s Razor assumes that an explanation is
simple only if it incorporates constructs that are necessary. In
other words, if God is not necessary to explain the universe, then
any explanation incorporating God is unnecessarily complicated, and
therefore doesn’t survive Occam’s Razor.
To support his position, Smith develops a dialog in which use of the five
senses is an acceptable way to perceive reality. It has to be acceptable,
because anything else would leave us in a position that prevents us from
coping with the universe in any meaningful fashion. In other words, defining
the universe in terms of what can be perceived with the five senses is
necessary, so does not overly complicate the universe. Faith however seems
to be an incomprehensible sense, yet theists (or at least Christians) claim
knowledge from it. Here is how Smith ends the dialog, concluding that using
faith to acquire knowledge is not rational:
"If the Christian has discovered a new means of
perception, I am perfectly willing to listen to his claim, provided that
he is willing to argue for his assertion. Perhaps man possesses
perceptual powers of which he is presently unaware. I don’t see any
evidence for this, but I’ll grant the possibility for the sake of
argument. My argument with the Christian is that he claims to have
experienced God, but he refuses to explain the process by which he, a
physical organism, experienced this supernatural being. I won’t limit
him arbitrarily to the traditional five senses, but I will demand that
he present evidence for his new perceptual powers. Has he discovered a
new sense? Fine, then let him tell us about it so we can test it.
"No Christian has ever succeeded in explaining just
how he perceives his mysterious God. He claims to have knowledge of a
mysterious, unknowable being, having gained this knowledge in some
mysterious, unknowable manner. This is totally unacceptable.
"If the Christian wishes to be taken seriously, he
must explain, not only what he claims to know, but how he claims to know
it. If he did not acquire his knowledge through the senses, by what
means did he acquire it? The burden of explanation lies with him… The
atheist simply wants to know what the theist believes in and how he
acquired his knowledge. If explanations are not forthcoming, the atheist
will remain an atheist."
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