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What is Skepticism? What does it mean to be a skeptic? Some people believe that skepticism is rejection of new ideas, or worse, they confuse "skeptic" with "cynic" and think that skeptics are a bunch of grumpy curmudgeons unwilling to accept any claim that challanges the status quo. This is wrong. Skepticism is a provisional approach to claims. It is the application of reason to any and all ideas -- no sacred cows allowed. In other words, skepticism is a method, not a position. Ideally, skeptics do not go into an investigation closed to the possibilities that a phenomenon might be real or that a claim might be true. When we say we are "skeptical," we mean that we must see compelling evidence before we believe. When we hear a fantastic claim or position of belief we say, "That's nice, now prove it." See The Skeptic's Manifesto by Michael Shermer |
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Ockham's Razor William of Ockham (1284-1347) was an English philosopher and theologian. His work on knowledge, logic and scientific inquiry played a major role in the transition from medieval to modern thought. He based scientific knowledge on experience and self-evident truths, and on logical propositions resulting from those two sources. In his writings, Occam stressed the Aristotelian principle that entities must not be multiplied beyond what is necessary. This principle became known as Occam's Razor, a problem should be stated in its basic and simplest terms. In science, the simplest theory that fits the facts of a problem is the one that should be selected. This rule is interpreted to mean that the simplest of two or more competing theories is preferable and that an explanation for unknown phenomena should first be attempted in terms of what is already known. A real life example of Occam's Razor in practice goes as follows: Crop circles began to be reported in the 1970s. Two interpretations were made of the circles of matted grass. One was that flying saucers made the imprints. The other was that someone (human) had used some sort of instruments to push down the grass. Occam's Razor would say that given the lack of evidence for flying saucers and the complexity involved in getting UFOs from distant galaxies to arrive on earth (unseen, traveling faster than the speed of light, etc.) the second interpretation is simplest. The second explanation could be wrong, but until further facts present themself it remains the preferable theory. As it turns out, Occam's Razor was right as two people admitted to making the crop figures as a lark. Despite this fact, some people still ignore Occam's Razor and instead continue to believe that crop circles are being created by flying saucers that have travelled from millions of light years away. The simplest model is more likely to be correct -- especially when we are working with unusual phenomenon. Another idea of testing phenomena grew out of Ockham's Razor and that is when confronted with an inexplicable phenomenon first try to determine it's most logical cause. If that doesn't hold up, then examine the idea of it's second most logical cause, and so on. In the example above, the most logical cause would be that human beings were making the crop circles, the second most logical cause would be that it was the result of other natural phenomena (wind, rain, animals, insects, etc.). The bottom-most logical cause would be peevish extra-terrestrials. The idea of the "razor" in Ockham's Razor is to peel off layers of logical explanations starting with the most logical and working down (sort of like peeling layers off an onion) in order to derive a reasonable cause of phenomena. Another example: are a person's religious "visions" better explained by an imbalance in brain chemistry, improper or synergistic drug use, psychosis, fraud and deceit, or some other natural cause, or to the direct intervention of an anonymous, invisible, and unidentifiable supernatural being? |
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Skepticism Links |
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Secular, Humanism, Agnostic, Atheist, & Freethinker Links |
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Sum Ergo Cogito — I Am Therefore I Think |