Ockham’s Razor: what is it and how is it used in scientific research?

This concept proposed by William of Ockham is important in science. Let's see why.

Ockham's razor or the principle of parsimony is a principle that prioritizes the simplest explanations of all possible explanations to explain an event.

It seems simple, but this concept, coined as early as the 16th century, has accompanied human reasoning for hundreds of years in fields as diverse as medicine and statistics, as well as psychology, biology and music, among other disciplines.

Although it may not seem so, people inherently apply the principle of parsimony at almost all times without realizing it.. For example, when a person is not at home when we wake up, we think that he or she has gone out to buy something, instead of wandering about whether he or she has traveled to another country in search of a new life.

As much as it requires an exercise in abstraction and looking at the term "outside of itself," we can see that Ockham's razor, or rather, the simplification of thought, is a defining characteristic of human beings at many times. If you want to know more about this fascinating topic, read on.

Ockham's razor: simplifying reality

William of Ockham was a pioneer scholastic philosopher who lived from 1286 to 1347.. To spare us a history lesson, we will limit ourselves to say that at this time the thoughts of Ancient Greece had been recovered through Al Andalus (Spain), which influenced various thinkers and philosophers in their postulation of methods and theories.

In addition to the golden rule of Ockham's razor or principle of parsimony, which is that the simplest explanation is usually the most probable one, William of Ockham also was also governed by four iron dogmas in his works.:

• It is futile to do something with more when it can be done with less.
• When a proposition is true for two facts, to assume a third is superfluous.
• Plurality must not be assumed without necessity.
• Plurality cannot be assumed unless it is proved by reason, experience, or infallible authority.

Although we have presented these principles to you as a rudimentary translation from Latin, the general idea is clear. According to the principle of parsimony, in most cases less is more. It should be emphasized that, even so, this postulation does not defend to the hilt that the simplest hypothesis must be true in all cases.. Rather, it argues that this is the most probable and that among a set of theories to explain a fact, the best starting point is the simplest of all.

Examples of its application in the sciences

Although this methodological principle can be very useful to lay the foundations on which to build knowledge, it is clear that it is not infallible. Several sources refute it, because as obvious as it may seem, sometimes reality cannot be reduced simply to the simplest processes. Below you can see examples of the use of Ockham's razor in different areas.

Parsimony and evolution

In the world of phylogenetics (the branch of science that explores the relationships between species and taxa of living things) the principle of parsimony is widely used.

When making phylogenetic trees, i.e., detecting the ancestors and the branching of species from them, in most cases, the best hypothesis is the one that requires the least evolutionary change.. Let's take an example:

If we look at insects and the presence or absence of wings in different taxa, we can ramble on about various evolutionary mechanisms that explain this difference. Two of them could be the following:

The first is that common ancestor for all of them had wings. Fossils show that at some evolutionary point insects lost them, so at some point certain taxa regained them. This would imply three steps (wings-not wings-wings-wings again).

The second is that the common ancestor for all of them was wingless. Fossils show that at one time no insects were winged, but over the course of evolutionary history, some evolved them from primary structures. This would imply two steps (wings-no wings).

According to the principle of parsimony or Ockham's razor, the second option is the most likely, as it requires fewer steps to explain the current evolutionary situation. Of course, these postulations are merely speculative in order to explain the principle presented here and at no time do they conform to reality. We simply try to simplify the complexity of this method.

2. The razor and creationism

Just as this principle has been widely used to generate evolutionary trees, creationist branches of thought have historically appropriated it to refute the natural selection postulated by Darwin. postulated by Darwin.

After all, according to several theologians, supposing the existence of an omnipotent force that creates everything is a simpler explanation than trying to understand a Biological selection force that modulates the adaptation of all living beings over the centuries.

In counterpoint to this thought, zoologist Richard Dawkins postulates that if the universe has been created by a God, it must also be explained. An entity capable of creating the universe must be infinitely more complex than the universe itself, therefore, explaining this very same entity must be infinitely more complex than the universe itself.Therefore, explaining it is a much more difficult task than understanding the origin of life without his intervention. This, as you may have guessed, would violate the principle of parsimony.

3. Parsimony and chemistry

In chemistry, the principle of parsimony can be applied when taking into account that the minimum "metabolic pathway" is between the precursor compounds and the products of a reaction is the most likely to yield those products.

This principle can be interpreted in places as far-fetched as the chemical compounding industry. For example, it is in the best interest of a paint manufacturer to follow the minimum number of steps necessary to obtain a particular color, as this reduces costs, time and labor.

Even so, it is necessary to recognize it is necessary to recognize that Ockham's razor does not apply to many physiological chemical pathways at all.For example, the synthesis of many compounds in the human body and the environment can be manifested in different routes. For example, the synthesis of some boron compounds shows at least three different chemical routes to the same end. This reality goes against the principle of parsimony, since in this case a more complex explanation dominates the set of reactions.

4. The knife in psychology and medicine

Again, this reductionist principle can be applied, with caution, in psychological and medical fields. In psychology, this methodology is often used to opt for the simplest description of the processes underlying a task.

Even so, caution must be exercised, as the lack of knowledge about the mechanisms and the lack of objective criteria as to why one thought is simpler than another may provide an intuitive and biased approach to the subject matter..

In medicine, the jackknife is used in a heuristic procedure, i.e., physicians and practitioners must explain in the simplest way the patient's symptoms and thus achieve a clinical reasoning under heuristic on the basis of heuristics (concrete things).

Conclusions

As we have seen, Ockham's razor or the principle of parsimony is a principle that has been with us for hundreds of years for the simplification of the tremendously complex world around us. To understand, in many cases, reducing is the first step, even though in this process we omit essential information. You can't start building a house from the roof up, can you?

Yet, despite all the uses we have seen for it, this principle cannot explain, by any stretch of the imagination, all the events that occur on Earth. Complexity is also in its own way the basis of modern society, so not everything boils down to "a single, simple explanation."

Bibliographical references:

• Hoffmann, R., Minkin, V. I., & Carpenter, B. K. (1997). Ockham's razor and chemistry. International Journal for the Philosophy of Chemistry, 3, 3-28.
• Rodriguez-Fernandez, J. (1999). Ockham's razor. Endeavour, 23(3), 121-125.
• Kluge, A. G. (2005). What is the rationale for 'Ockham's razor'(aka parsimony) in phylogenetic inference. Parsimony, Phylogeny, and Genomics. Oxford University Press, Oxford, Oxford, 15-42.
• Ockham's razor in formulation, Starandpaint.com. Retrieved August 18 from https://starandinapaint.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/La-navaja-de-Ockham-en-la-formulacion_Inpra-16-4-2011.pdf.
• The parsimony principle in cognitive science today: Risks and solutions, cienciacognitiva.org. Retrieved August 18 from http://www.cienciacognitiva.org/files/2013-10.pdf.