> From
> <http://www.humanism.org.uk/site/cms/contentViewArticle.asp?article=1475>:
>
> | But just suppose, for the sake of argument, that there was no more evidence
> | for God¢s existence than there was against. What would it then be rational
> | to believe? Many would say: you should be agnostic. The rational thing to
> | do would be to suspend judgment either way. You should remain neutral on
> | the issue of whether or not God exists. But this is a mistake. In the
> | absence of good evidence either way, the rational position to adopt is
> | to believe that there is no God. Why is this?
> |
> | William of Ockham (1285-1349) points out that, where one is presented
> | with two hypotheses that are otherwise equally well-supported by the
> | available evidence, you should always pick the simplest hypothesis.
> | In particular, we shouldn¢t gratuitously introduce any superfluous
> | entities. This principle, known as Ockham¢s razor, is very sensible.
> | Take, for example, these two hypotheses:
> |
> | A: There are invisible, intangible and immaterial fairies at the bottom
> | of the garden, in addition to the compost heap, flowers, trees, shrubs,
> | and so on.
> |
> | B: There are no fairies at the bottom of the garden, just the compost
> | heap, flowers, trees, shrubs, and so on.
> |
> | Everything I have observed fits both hypotheses equally well. After
> | all, if the fairies at the bottom of my garden are invisible, intangible
> | and immaterial, then I shouldn¢t expect to observe any evidence of their
> | presence, should I? Does that the fact that the available evidence fits
> | both hypothesis equally well mean that I suspend judgement on whether or
> | not there are fairies at the bottom of the garden?
> |
> | Of course not. The rational thing to believe is that there are no fairies.
> | For that¢s the simplest hypothesis. Why introduce the unnecessary fairies?
>
> I understand the gist of what's being said here, but I always thought that
> Ockham's Razor couldn't be used against unfalsifiable hypotheses, in which
> case we *would* have to withold judgement on the fairy thing, even though
> that's undesirable. Am I wrong?
>
> Also, assuming that I *am* wrong and that the razor takes out the fairies,
> would it be possible to make an inductive argument against the fairies: an
> argument concluding that probably there are no fairies in the garden?
>
> Thanks!