Ryan Bell’s Three Sentences about Dropping Theism Demonstrate the Use of Ockham’s Razor — a Comment about the Utility and Occasional Disutility of Clarity

05 January 2015

There is intellectual virtue in clearly expressed reasoning

I like clarity for its own sake, even though sometimes being clear may be a bad idea.

I was struck, for example, by former (Seventh Day Adventist) pastor Ryan Bell’s concise interview explanation for why he left theism:

[T]he intellectual and emotional energy it takes to figure out how God fits into everything is far greater than dealing with reality as it presents itself to us.

[T]he existence of God seems like an extra layer of complexity that isn’t necessary. The world makes more sense to me as it is, without postulating a divine being who is somehow in charge of things.

For someone of rational mind, applying the simplicity tenet — usually called Ockham’s Razor — in this context is understandable, even if one may not agree with its result.

Equally interesting (to me) is Dr. Bell’s implied acceptance of some aspects of existential philosophy:

[H]uman beings, through their own consciousness, create their own values and determine a meaning to their life.

Although it was Sartre who explicitly coined the phrase, similar notions can be found in the thought of existentialist philosophers such as Heidegger and Kierkegaard.

Bell packed a lot into three sentences.

Clarity usually leads somewhere, often quickly.

What is Ockham’s Razor?

Ockham’s Razor expresses an intellectual preference for keeping explanations of causation as simple as workably possible.

From Wikipedia:

Occam's razor . . . is a problem-solving principle devised by William of Ockham (c. 1287–1347), who was an English Franciscan friar and scholastic philosopher and theologian.

The principle states that among competing hypotheses, the one with the fewest assumptions should be selected. Other, more complicated solutions may ultimately prove correct, but—in the absence of certainty—the fewer assumptions that are made, the better.

[S]impler theories are preferable to more complex ones because they are better testable and falsifiable.

Bertrand Russell offers a particular version of Occam's Razor: "Whenever possible, substitute constructions out of known entities for inferences to unknown entities."

There is [however] little empirical evidence that the world is actually simple or that simple accounts are more likely to be true than complex ones.

Most of the time, Occam's Razor is a conservative tool, cutting out crazy, complicated constructions and assuring that hypotheses are grounded in the science of the day . . . .

Notice a few things

First, Ockham’s razor originated in theological pursuits, and Dr. Bell used it to draw his anti-theistic conclusion in the same arena.

Second, Bell’s willingness to “shave” his spiritual thinking indicates that he is both:

(a) willing to overtly recognize his personal intellectual preference for living a less explanatorily complicated life

and

(b) accepting of the possibility that he might be wrong in doing so.

These two traits separate him from many other people, who arguably need:

(i) certainty,

(ii) perhaps immortality,

and

(iii) who are resistant to having to accept the loneliness and arguable arrogance of having to decide first principles on their own.

One can infer that the once pastor’s mind is constructed differently than those attuned to higher authority and to traveling more visibly marked roads.

The moral? — Clarity aids in understanding

But it may not eliminate interpersonal enmity. Atheists are reportedly despised by a lot of people. Which probably says more about the despisers’ levels of fear, doubt and existential anxiety, than it does about the state of the reviled. Perhaps more clarity as to the whys and wherefores of their own thinking would benefit some among the intolerant, as well.

PeteFree.com

Ryan Bell’s Three Sentences about Dropping Theism Demonstrate the Use of Ockham’s Razor — a Comment about the Utility and Occasional Disutility of Clarity