Occam's Razor, Tool of Deception

I was originally going to entitle this post something else – something cuter and more grandiose about “my life-long sword-fight with Occam’s razor“.  Hence the opening image.  However, that goal was WAY too big for a blog post.  I could literally write a book on it.

The fact is, I have MANY issues with Occam’s razor in science and other forms of investigation, and most of them don’t deal with deception.  They deal with progress in science, more than anything else.  Although the modern intrusions of leftist deception politics into science are changing that balance very rapidly. 

Some scientists tend to shave too closely with Occam’s razor.  Nothing grows.  There is no imagination – no progress.  It is easier to sit tight on a small set of highly validated principles, and not reach out to try something new.

Others don’t shave at all, and “fluffy” no-way-in-hell theory grows with abandon.   Such theories approach the ad hoc nature that Occam’s razor was specifically intended to prevent.  Instead of angels on pinheads, embarrassing numbers of never-to-be-found particles and whatnot are predicted, proposed, or just rumored.

Those are big topics.  Addressing all of that, plus the use of Occam’s razor for deception, would be a tall order.  Best left for our wonderful commenters, already discussing these things just on the rumor of my finally posting this piece.

While sleeping on this post (earlier), I realized that I needed to keep things simple, and ONLY talk about how Occam’s razor behaves under deception.  Thus, I came up with a much simpler and more powerful statement of the principle at hand.  Then, I decided to pound that statement into people’s heads, by repeating it, over and over.

Occam’s razor is a tool of deception.

Wolf Moon

Actually, that’s not giving credit where credit is due.

Occam’s razor is a tool of deception.

Anonymous author of KGB-CIA manual read by various people Wolf Moon has known

Actually, that’s not big enough.  It needs to be a nice big headline.

Occam’s razor is a tool of deception.

There.  That’s better!  And THAT is why I changed the title.  If I’m going to repeat a headline over and over, why not just make it the title, too?  That way people won’t have to dig for it.  The conclusion is RIGHT THERE.  To review for the big picture, people don’t even have to re-read this post.

Now, I can’t tell you ALL of the reasons why I believe this, but my motto serves as a kind of proof that the opening image and would-be title are justified – that I’ve had to FIGHT Occam’s razor all my life.  Indeed, I chose my motto carefully, after years of fighting my way up from a state of blissful ignorance, to one of satisfied but battle-scarred awareness.

It is better to be right than to be believed.

Wolf Moon

Being right does not come easily in this world, because DECEPTION is everywhere.  And deception is everywhere for a beautiful reason, which a better understanding of OCCAM’S RAZOR makes clear:

Occam’s razor is a protector of deception.

Yeah.  You’re going to hear that a LOT of things linking Occam’s razor not with FINDING truth, but rather with HIDING truth.

So what the hell IS Occam’s razor?  Other than a tool of deception?

OK – that’s not really Occam’s razor.  This is more like it.

When we are faced with more than one hypothesis that explains the data equally well, we choose the simpler explanation.

Occam’s razor

Now, the fact that many CORRECT answers ARE complex, and so many simple ones fail, or at least it sure SEEMS that way, makes the following cartoon funny.

We see in the cartoon an idea that LOOKS like Occam’s razor because it deals with simple versus complex, but also seems to say the opposite.  Yet the cartoon seems to say something intuitively obvious and wearily true – that many answers are simple but wrong, and the fewer that ARE correct, are generally complicated. 

This seems at first to be at odds with Occam’s razor, but it’s not – because it’s NOT Occam’s razor, nor is it a derivative thereof.  It just looks like Occam’s razor.  Stop for a moment and think about that.  The cartoon is talking about the fact that it sure seems to us humans that REAL answers tend to be few and complex – while too-simple and WRONG answers seem to abound.  That is MUCH DIFFERENT from saying that for TWO OR MORE theories that explain the same set of facts, the SIMPLEST theory tends to be correct.

In fact, if you CONFUSE these two principles, then you have just seen why

Occam’s razor is a tool of deception.

That is worth an explanation.  You see, there is an old saw about simple versus complex.  It’s called Occam’s razor.  When people talk about simple versus complex, they ALMOST ALWAYS cite Occam’s razor.  So if a person does a cartoon about simple versus complex, and they say something that seems to be both TRUE and the OPPOSITE of Occam’s razor, it looks like a paradox – like Occam’s razor is “wrong or something”. 

Well, it’s the “or something”.  The cartoon has successfully, without trying very hard, mimicked Occam’s razor.  And MIMICRY is a form of DECEPTION.  You were led into a mistake by a cartoon.

Thus, in a very ironic way, the ubiquity of Occam’s razor ITSELF was used to deceive.  The SIMPLEST answer – “a person talking about simple versus complex is talking about Occam’s razor” – was used to deceive you, and then lead you past deception to paradox, at which point you do a “WTF” and laughed.

Now – there are MANY WAYS to express the principles underlying the fact that

Occam’s razor is a tool of deception.

One of the simplest is the one that our own wheatietoo uses all the time.  This is the idea that

Occam’s razor can fail when you don’t have all the information.

And if somebody WANTS it to fail for you, this is WHY

Occam’s razor is a tool of deception.

As an example, let’s consider the “Bigfoot” example above. 

If you see an upright, bipedal, very hairy creature in the woods, you have almost certainly seen a BEAR.   We have an ordinary explanation.  No need to state anything fancy.  THAT is Occam’s razor, right there.

But what if the “hairy creature in the woods” had a flat face and no snout – basically a hominid face – and this was seen with extreme clarity, so there is almost no possibility for error?  If that is the case, then the simple explanation of a bear goes out the window.  There is the possibility of a highly deformed or accidentally de-snouted bear, but such a thing will not live long in the wild.  A truly flat-faced bear is pretty much DOA at birth.  HOWEVER, we can switch to the SIMPLER theory that it’s a GORILLA – possibly escaped from a zoo – and we have basically been rescued by Occam’s razor.

But let’s not stop there.  Let’s say that the thing was seen with extreme clarity.  The witness KNOWS what a gorilla looks like, and it was NOT a gorilla.  Let’s say that we have a clear enough view of it that it looks exactly like “Bigfoot”.

Now – we can believe two things here.

• It was a “real” Bigfoot.
• It was somebody in a Bigfoot suit, DECEIVING US.

Which one of these alternatives is the one favored by Occam’s razor?  That is actually a very good question.  To an honest naturalist in the woods of Washington or Oregon in 1910, when “cryptozoology” was still somewhat possible, a “real” animal of some sort would have seemed more likely.  The idea of somebody using a suit to deceive a naturalist would have sounded fantastic, and would require far more explanation than a new species of animal.

But in 2010, with many more “Bigfoot costumes” in existence than reported visual sightings of Bigfoot in all of history, the prediction FLIPS, because we have NEW INFORMATION.  We have to allow for DECEPTION as a kind of additional information.

BIGFOOT DECEPTION is now ORDINARY.  BIGFOOT REALITY remains rather EXTRAORDINARY.

Now – what if you’re a modern person, but your knowledge is like that of a naturalist in 1910?  What if you are not AWARE of what deceptions are POSSIBLE?  In that case you will use Occam’s razor on the WRONG DATA SET.  You will be DECEIVED, and Occam’s razor, operating on insufficient data, will AID THE DECEPTION.

This is how magic works, folks.  The SIMPLE and OBVIOUS explanation is WRONG.  Hidden complexity is used to FOOL YOU.  YOU don’t have all the information.  By HIDING information, you are led to USE Occam’s razor with too little information, and come to the wrong conclusion.

Now with magic, we know we are being fooled.  But then again, nobody has to TELL YOU that you are experiencing a magic show.

Welcome to DISINFORMATION.

And this is the most important part.  It doesn’t have to be something extraordinary like Bigfoot.  I could just be trying to convince you of an ordinary fact.  That is not true.

Let me repeat that.  If I try to convince you of an OBVIOUS, SIMPLE NON-EXTRAORDINARY THING, but it’s really a complicated, deceptive story that benefits me, Occam’s razor just turned into MY advantage, and MY survival tool.

Two words.

Insect mimicry.

The simple explanation is that it’s a THORN.  It’s not.  It’s a LEAF-HOPPER.

The simple explanation is that it’s a LEAF.  It’s not.  It’s a BUTTERFLY.

The simple explanation is that it’s a BEE.  It’s not.  It’s a FLY. 

The simple explanation is that it’s LICHEN.  It’s not.  It’s a MOTH.

The simple explanation is that it’s a FLOWER PETAL.  It’s not.  It’s a SPIDER / MANTIS / ASSASSIN BUG.

If you look MORE CLOSELY at any one of these, you get MORE INFORMATION, and go “OH SHIT, LOOK AT THAT!” and see the coolness of the DECEPTION.  What has happened is that MORE INFORMATION changed the output of Occam’s razor.  You now have MORE FACTS.

One might say that:

Occam’s razor is dependent upon the observer, whereas truth is not.

Now – back to an explanation of Occam’s razor which deals with “ordinary” versus “extraordinary”:

One has to be very careful here.  ORDINARY and EXTRAORDINARY are likely to flip back and forth as FACTS BECOME KNOWN, as our EXPERIENCE with those facts increases, and as the validity of those facts CHANGES.

BLACK HOLES were at one time EXTRAORDINARY.  Now they are NOT.

Relativistic effects in general were at one time EXTRAORDINARY.  Now they are NOT.

Atomic energy was at one time EXTRAORDINARY.  Now it is NOT.

Talking to somebody on the other side of the world was once EXTRAORDINARY.  Now it is ORDINARY.

Aluminum was at one time EXTRAORDINARY and PRECIOUS.  Now it is COMMON and can be used for TIN FOIL HATS. 

There is a reason the INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES try to stay ahead of the curve, BUELLER.  It is so THEY have all the FACTS and YOU DON’T.

Are you starting to see the picture now? 

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER WHEN THE OTHER PERSON DOESN’T HAVE IT.

In other words, it’s not really knowledge that is power.  It’s a DIFFERENTIAL in knowledge that is power.

Now – put this in reality terms.  This point about Ordinary vs. Extraordinary is very important for assisting DECEPTION.  If I can HIDE the formerly extraordinary as MY ordinary, I can almost guarantee that the SUCKER will pick the known ORDINARY explanation.  But if I LOSE the SECRET of my extraordinary, it becomes the TARGET’S ordinary, and they are no longer fooled.

WELCOME TO MY WORLD.

Now – even in deception, Occam’s razor still operates.  If you have all the information, and there are two ways you can be fooled, the SIMPLER ONE is probably the RIGHT ONE.

If you are being deceived about ORDINARY STUFF and there are competing ORDINARY EXPLANATIONS, you are very likely to MISS EVERYTHING.  The same goes for TWO COMPETING EXTRAORDINARY EXPLANATIONS.  If there is deception, you can use Occam’s razor to pick the wrong one, by picking the SIMPLER of the two, if you don’t know all the facts.

And THAT is where we are led into one of the most EXTRAORDINARY events in modern history.

Next time, in:

9/11: From Believer to Skeptic

See you then!

W