User talk:Garnetp

Archaeological Myths & Realities (ANTH 212) - Thanks for signing in! If you have any questions about the assignment, please don't hesitate to let me know. Once you have decided on what article you will be editing or creating, please add a brief note (with hyperlink) after your name. Be sure to sign any comments in "Talk" sections with four tildes! Hoopes (talk) 19:27, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

Sources

Please please read WP:VERIFY and WP:RS for basic Wikipedia policy. For help on inline citations, which you need to use, see Help:Referencing for beginners. Don't forget you need page numbers for books! Hoopes (talk) 17:13, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

Edit Summary

When editing Wikipedia, there is a field labeled "Edit summary" below the main edit box. It looks like this:

Edit summary (Briefly describe your changes)

If you are working in live Wikipedia or even on your own subpage, please be sure to provide a summary of every edit you make, even if you write only the briefest of summaries. The summaries are very helpful to people browsing an article's history.

Edit summary content is visible in:

• User contributions
• Recent changes
• Watchlists
• Revision differences
• IRC channels
• Related changes
• New pages list
• Article editing history

Please use the edit summary to explain your reasoning for the edit, or a summary of what the edit changes. You can give yourself a reminder to add an edit summary by setting Preferences → Editing → Prompt me when entering a blank edit summary. Thanks! Hoopes (talk) 17:13, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

May 2019

Please do not add or change content, as you did at Occam's razor, without citing a reliable source. Please review the guidelines at Wikipedia:Citing sources and take this opportunity to add references to the article. Find reliable, scientific, secondary sources for making changes to the encyclopedia; WP:RS. Zefr (talk) 18:48, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Please stop your disruptive editing. If you continue to violate Wikipedia's no original research policy by adding your personal analysis or synthesis into articles, as you did at Occam's razor, you may be blocked from editing. Also review WP:SYNTH. There are outlandish synthesis and opinion in your edit. Zefr (talk) 20:15, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

3rr

Warning: please be aware of WP:3RR William M. Connolley (talk) 09:00, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Problems With Edits

For now, it would be best not to edit in Wikipedia until you have been able to address the issues raised by these editors. It looks as if the main issue here is citation of reliable, secondary sources. It's not clear that the podcast you are citing qualifies, especially since there is a strong preference for printed sources. One strategy would be to make notes of the sources cited in the podcast and then make adjustments accordingly. The article on Occam's Razor is one that is heavily used, so it is especially worthwhile for the edits to be appropriate and adequately documented. Note that the objections are not to the critique, but to the addition of content without adequate citation. Hoopes (talk) 17:16, 7 May 2019 (UTC)

Pseudoscience

Pseudoscience consists of ideas, beliefs, and practices that claim to be scientific, but are based on theoretical evidence or do not comply with scientific method. Pseudoscience can have claims that are exaggerated, based on bias, or lack the ability to be evaluated. Occam's razor is useful to aid in distinguishing between theories that have scientific backing and theories based on pseudoscience. It is not meant to completely discredit pseudoscience, but rather it allows the user to distinguish between ideas. Occam’s razor is a useful tool for developing scientific theories, but also theories or ideas that might revolve around a practice such as alchemy or astrology. Just as Occam's razor is useful for scientific theories, it is also just as valid for theories with little scientific backing. The usefulness of Occam's razor makes it a vital tool when understanding Pseudoscience. It is a critical tool for a thinker when trying to decipher what is objectively real and what is based on subjectivity, imagination, or fictional practices.

William of Ockham

William of Ockham was an English-Franciscan friar who lived from about 1258-1349 CE. He was a genuine independent thinker and a rationalist at a time when rationalism and the church did not go hand in hand. Despite being known as a proponent of science, he was also a devout monk. William of Ockham took his vow of poverty with great seriousness and expected the Church to follow as well. He is known for blatantly questioning the leaders of the church and their principles. He would question how the leaders conducted themselves, how much money they surrounded themselves with, and how much power they carried politically in several outspoken papers. The Church did not take kindly to William’s writings and views. Pope John XXII and William fought about his views, which resulted in his excommunication from the Catholic church on June 6th, 1328. William of Ockham fled to Munich, Germany seeking refuge and was protected by emperor Louis IV. He wrote several papers about Pope John XXII in which claimed he was a heretic. In his writings, he argued for emperor Louis IV to exercise supreme control over church and state in the Holy Roman Empire. William of Ockham spent the remainder of his life critiquing political issues, including the relative authority and right of spiritual and temporal powers.

Medieval Synthesis

William of Ockham argued against Medieval Synthesis, a term coined by Thomas Aquinas. Medieval Synthesis was a theological idea that stated one’s life should revolve around God as he is the supreme being of the universe. The idea is that the sovereignty of God should be reflected in society through a complete unification of state and church. Effectively, God was first and foremost everything. If one believed in medieval synthesis, then they were a member of the church just as much as they were a member of their country. As the church believed God is the creator and sustainer of all there is and all knowledge came from him, human life, including society and culture, should all be united under God’s sovereignty.

The intricacies of Occam’s razor

Occam’s razor is a term that aids in distinguishing two hypotheses by “shaving away” unnecessary assumptions or cutting apart two similar conclusions. It is a tool that is most often used to view an idea or hypothesis in a skeptical way. However, if someone were to use Occam’s razor to disprove a counter argument or another idea, then, they would be misusing Occam’s Razor. Misuse of this philosophical principle can happen because while Occam’s razor is a good tool, it is also a highly subjective practice. One explanation might be the simplest explanation, but it might use evidence that is not plausible or can not be proven real. Which theory is the simplest is also subjective to the person who is using Occam’s razor and might not coincide with someone else’s use of Occam’s razor.

If someone is using Occam’s razor, they are inevitably making a subjective judgement of what is simpler. This is not a method to prove what is right. The original intent of Occam’s razor was not to disprove other’s ideas, but rather as a “rule of thumb” that can help guide the development of theoretical ideas. While Occam’s razor can be extremely useful, by using it incorrectly, it can lead to the obstruction of scientific progress. For example, the Big Bang is a complex and complicated idea that explains the creation of the universe. The argument could be made that the simplest theory is that God created the universe. Therefore, Occam’s razor proves that the universe was created by God. However, on the other side someone could make the argument that if simplicity was perfect and God valued simplicity, then God would have made the universe simpler. Either argument can be justified or countered using Occam’s razor based solely on the subjective judgement of the user.

The principle of Occam’s razor, that simplicity is perfect, is entirely made by man. It is a concept created by humans that value simplicity. Occam’s razor would mean the universe favours simplicity, but rather it is humans who favour this concept. A decent model could be simplicity, but rudimentary does not mean something is perfect or correct. There are many situations in which Occam’s razor is useful, such in a scientific field or a medical field. There are also plenty of circumstances where Occam’s razor does not provide any information. A theory or idea could be simple but that does not mean it is right, just as complexity does not automatically mean it is wrong. Occam’s razor simply tries to sort through clutter to find the best working theory based on knowledge at the time.