Occam's Razor - "The Bush Presidency"

[rpgamerd00d]

From Wikipedia:

Occam's Razor (also spelled Ockham's Razor) is a principle attributed to the 14th-century English logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. It forms the basis of methodological reductionism, and is also called the principle of parsimony or law of economy.

In its simplest form, Occam's Razor states that one should make no more assumptions than needed. Put into everyday language, it says
Numquam ponenda est pluritas sine necessitate.

which translates to:
Entities are not to be multiplied without necessity.

or
Multiples should never be used if not necessary.

or
"Shave off" (omit) unnecessary entities in explanations.

But the more commonly used translations are:
Given two equally predictive theories, choose the simpler, and The simplest answer is usually the correct answer.


Election 2000:
a) Did democratic (black) voters get purged totally by coincidence in specific districts around the country, and were there many coincidental cases of voter disenfranchisement across the country, and the governor of FLA just so happen to be Bush's brother, and did the Supreme Court just happen to coincidentally get involved in a way never before done in US History;
or
b) Did the Republicans commit election fraud?

Election 2004:
a) Did democratic (black) voters get purged totally by coincidence in specific districts around the country, and were there many coincidental cases of voter disenfranchisement across the country, and the Sec of State in OH just so happen to be Republican and sequestor the vote tabulation from the public for no reason, and did the owner of Diebold just coincidentally claim to "vow to deliver Ohio to Bush";
or
b) Did the Republicans commit election fraud?

UAE Port Deal:
a) Is there some sinister scheme involving some kind of incriminating evidence on Bush, and does this deal just coincidenally happen to involve a country that was involved with attacking us on 9/11 who coincidentally support the Taliban and the destruction of Israel;
or
b) Bush is doing the deal for cash

[Lindacooks]

1. Beautiful!

This analysis can be applied to just about everything in the chimp administration!

[electropop]

2. Dunno if you're the wikipedia editor on this one,

but just a reminder to folks: it's "election fraud" not "voter fraud." Calling it "voter fraud" makes it misleadingly sound as if the fraud was committed by voters rather than against them, as actually happened.

[rman]

3. No need for Occam's Razor

the exit poll- and disenfranchisement anomolies overwhelmingly being in favor of Bush is simply way beyond coincidence.

Besides, though Occam's Razor does apply to Physics, i'm pretty sure it does not apply to human behaviour. Ie a conspiracy theory might seem complicated compared to incompetence theory, but it's a fact that conspiracies, even big conspiracies (ie Watergate, Iran-Contra) do take place.

[Dr. Jones]

4. I personally don't believe

Occam's Razor applies to Bush's ports deal - I believe both answers are correct actually, and are not mutually exclusive of one another.