Occam's Razor Revisited for 2025

From the JFK assassination to the most recent Epstein case, from UFOs to  Big Foot and to the Bermuda Triangle, and last year's attempted assassination of Pres. Trump conspiracy theories continue to thrive from generation to generation of believers and skeptics; from the sublime academics to armchair speculators, from serious to the un-serious contributors to social media, from named to nameless influencers.

"William of Occam (or Ockham) was an English Friar born in 1285 who lived to his 62nd birthday". Occam’s Razor was named after him but he was not really the originator of the principle; however, he was known to frequently use it in his writings and arguments as a tool to get to the truth if it were obscured by the absence of physical evidence or reliable testimony". In a nutshell, it is summarized as follows:

"Occam’s Razor is a philosophical principle that says that in situations where there are competing explanations, we should prefer the simplest explanation since it’s most likely to be the correct one".

In other words, when one looks for an explanation from among several plausible alternatives, the simplest one is likely the correct one.  However, even when an explanation seems complicated, it could and should still  be expressed as simply as possible for everyone to understand it. 

There is a caveat to that expression. 

In ancient times, in Greek mythology, a lot of natural phenomena such as lightning and thunder were explained as heavenly manifestations of the power of the gods - primarily by the head god, Zeus - to express anger with or warning to ordinary mortals.  Now we know, or at least known to many, what is behind thunder and lightning.  Explaining how it happens in scientific terms, however can be complicated, distilling it in layman's terms is even more challenging without having to go through the fundamental nature of electrons and ionization, how electric fields are built up between the ground and the upper atmosphere, and so on and on.  Suffice it to say that thunder and lightning occur naturally without some god or gods causing them; albeit, one example where Occam's razor is needed to shave off more than several layers before unraveling the truth.

Superstitions are one of the main casualties to the sharp razor of Occam. A while back I wrote about scary witches recalled from my childhood memories, below is one snippet:

Scary Witches, Recast (November, 2024 in time for Halloween)

The "mantiw" was one that no one had ever seen but they were around when it was windy. During the night, of course.  They have long legs because everyone can hear them running over the homes, but not touching any of the structures; but they'd come by so fast  disturbing the air to rush out and back, accompanied by a whistling, sometimes roaring, sound. There could be a herd of these "mantiw" running, especially when it was raining, as if they were either fleeing from or going after something.  But nobody could see them and they were not known to harm anyone.

The home where I grew up as a child was a nipa-thatched-roof in a village near the shores.  The elders would talk about those long legged "mantiw" during the monsoon seasons but later, as a grown up, I realized the "mantiw" running through the village was simply the strong winds that accompanied the rain and the whistling we heard was merely the sound of the wind over our flimsy homes.

Of course, I grew up later realizing that a lot of the childhood superstitions that I and my friends believed in were easily explained as natural phenomena and our imaginations were merely co-conspirators until then.

William of Occam and many philosophers of his time lived about three centuries before the Age of Enlightenment when the likes of Isaac Newton and many notable scientists began their work on the sciences and modern philosophy. Meanwhile Friar William and his contemporaries depended mostly on logical reasoning to get to the truth if it were obscured by the absence of physical evidence or reliable testimony. One must use a razor to shave away the coverings that hid the truth. The razor was not that of experimentation but by pure logical reasoning. The idea was that there should only be a minimal amount of suppositions to explain anything - the lesser the number of suppositions the better. The simpler the explanation the more likely that it is the correct one.

Presently, we have the Epstein file or "client list". Its supposed existence was either oversold that resulted in bated anticipation from the public, politicians and conspiracy theorists  or there was no such file to begin with. However, once anyone and everyone comes up with all kinds of assumptions, conjectures and speculation, as usually presented in cases of conspiracy theories, the less likely it will lead to the truth.  But in this case, it appears that either there was such a file or it was over promised by the Attorney General, or there was no such file to begin with. If there  was some file, it was not what was originally expected. 

Is this a case of Occam's razor's failure?  Actually, this is, first of all, an interesting case where the "truth is obscured by the absence of physical evidence or reliable testimony" that is either intentionally kept away from the public or that there was no such evidence in the first place.  Let's set that aside for now. 

One rather more interesting story that has now been overshadowed by the file is the speculation as to whether Epstein killed himself or he was murdered in his cell while being held in a New York jail. Clearly, speculations started to swirl from there which pushed the existence of the file aside. Conspiracy theorists had a field day that lasted for months up to now, nearly six years later.  

If we go by Occam's Razor, in the midst of all kinds of conspiracy theories - many of them had the complexity of a Robert Ludlum novel - the simple explanation is that he killed himself. In the case of the file or more intriguingly described as the "client list", the simple explanation is that there was no such list. 

If the list existed, is it not likely there was a copy somewhere or held by someone else, i.e. by Epstein's most loyal partner,  Ghislaine Maxwell? The Attorney General took a serious risk in saying that there was no such list if later such a list shows up. At this point, the beginning of another conspiracy theory is inevitably hatched.  As we can see, in the absence of compelling evidence or testimony (Epstein's or Maxwell's and potentially others), the simplest explanation prevails. For the time being, that is.

From the once popular TV series, The X-Files, we quote, "The truth is out there,” says Scully, before following up with “but so are lies”.

We are at this point in a state of unknowing. Is this then the case of Occam's razor's dulling failure? Possibly, until such time, if at all, that compelling evidence is brought up at some future time. In such a case, Occam's Razor is no longer needed.