RE: Are Atheists using Intellectually Dishonest Arguments?
March 10, 2018 at 10:07 pm
(This post was last modified: March 10, 2018 at 10:08 pm by GrandizerII.)
(March 10, 2018 at 9:37 pm)RoadRunner79 Wrote:(March 10, 2018 at 9:01 pm)Succubus Wrote: Didn't we have a brief exchange yesterday on this subject where you agreed that your understanding of the BoP was flawed? And here we are again.
No I don't believe so.... where do you think it is flawed?
Quote:You're equivocating! As the man just said, and I quote:
"Well, I don't think you understand the difference between "simplest" and "most parsimonious".
The words parsimony, and simple, are not synonymous.
Ockam's Razor is often stated as "all other things being equal the simplest explanation is most like the best". Now I might agree, that sometimes people misunderstand simplest in this context, however it makes me wonder again; what it is you are taking issue with?
I would say "among competing explanations of otherwise equal explanatory power, the explanation [of the observed evidence/phenomenon/whatever] with the least number of assumptions is the most reasonable explanation". That's theoretically, of course. Practically, it means that among competing explanations, the explanation with the least number of assumptions is more likely to be the correct one, but parsimony is just one among many criteria to look out for when judging explanations.
The issue is that you showed a misunderstanding earlier regarding Hammy's use of the word "parsimonious".
