Simplicity As Evidence of Truth (Aquinas Lecture) by Richard Swinburne (PDF)

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Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐With the book measuring in at 17.8 cm by 11.4 cm (about 7 inches by 4.5 inches), and the main content of the book being only 57 pages, it’s more of a booklet than a book. Remarkably, it still succeeds in providing valuable insights on using simplicity to evaluate theories.The book has no chapters but Swinburne divides it into eight sections.I. The structure of an explanationII. Explanation and PredictionIII. The Best ExplanationIV. The Nature of SimplicityV. The Role of Background KnowledgeVI. Attempts to Explain Simplicity AwayVII. The Ubiquity of the Simplicity PrincipleVIII. Bayes’s TheoremSome highlights: In sections III and VI Swinburne gives compelling justification for simplicity being an earmark of truth. In section IV Swinburne explains what constitutes simplicity; interestingly Ockham’s razor (do not multiply entities beyond necessity) is only part of it, and he goes into some detail about the specifics. Section V gives an interesting insight of simplicity’s role in judging how well a theory fits in with background knowledge.This concise book is highly recommended for those with an interest in science, philosophy of science, or epistemology.

⭐This a good treatment of the topic, but a more recent and refined treatment (clearer prose and terminology, more examples, etc.) can be found in ch. 4 of Swinburne’s book, Epistemic Justification (Oxford, 2001).

⭐Simplicity as Evidence of TruthRichard SwinburneI believe this was the first Swinburne book i actually finished cover to cover, no wonder however, it is only 56 pages long, and even those few small pages.Perhaps he is making a statement about the theory in the shortness and conciseness of the book about it. *grin*The book is a philosophic justification of Occam’s razor, that is: given two theories the simple one is to be preferred, because it is more likely to be true.I have been, of late, involved in an online discussion about whether science has a philosophic component. Interestingly this little book enters into that discussion because it states clearly: “To summarize the claims in a nutshell: either science is irrational (in the way it judges theories and predictions probable) or the principle of simplicity is a fundamental synthetic a priori truth.”To be a priori makes it part of the axioms by which we judge science, these axioms are not part of science, but rather part of the metaphysics prior to and upon which science is built.The best explanation:What are the criteria for supposing one explanation is better than, is more true than another?a posteriori types:1. the one which satisfies the criteria best on the whole.2. hypothesis which best fits our background knowledge.a priori types:1. the greater the content, the more it predicts or tries to explain the more likely it is FALSE.2. and this book’s topic: all others things equal, the theory that is simplest is more likely to be true.So i saved you an hour or so, reading and rereading this little book. Glad i did it, simplicity is a key element in scientific theorizing. Plus it builds confidence to actually understand and finish one of his books.thanks for reading this rather short review.

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