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Ockham's Razor Argumentative Analysis

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Ockham's Razor was an argumentative strategy constructed during the Middle Ages, which empiricists have applied multiple times to use in order to support a counterargument in opposition to the rationalists' explanations for 'innate ideas.' Although shown to be useful for the former argument, is it an effective tool for analyzing the proofs of God? In this paper, it will be argued that when trying to analyze proofs of God, it is best to reply to questions with hypothetical answers that make the fewest presumptions. "The answer to the question "Why do so many people believe in gods?" is a very complicated one because it entangles us in a thicket of psychological, sociological, anthropological, and philosophical-not to mention purely religious-issues." (Palmer 155). The general concept of Ockham's Razor is that the simpler answer to a problem is usually the correct one. One debate in which the razor appeared to be used successfully was in the form of theory of planetary motion produced by Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), which was derived from the …show more content…

It would be unreasonable to explain the watch in terms of natural accidents and coincidences. But nature is even more marvelous in the intricacies of its workings than a watch is. The human heart pumps blood at exactly the right pressure to sustain human life; the planets move in their orbits with absolute mathematical precision; each plant is in nearly perfect harmony with its environment. In summary, the universe is such an intricate system of balanced mechanisms that it can be explained only in terms of the purposes and intentions of an intelligent creator, as in the case of the watch. In the case of the universe, that intelligent creator is God." (Palmer

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William Paley was a well known theologian in the 19th century responsible for surmising the existence of “an intelligent creator by design.” His argument, built up to and stated on page 29, Chapter III, paragraph 1 in sentence 1 is as follows: “for every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature”. Before diving into the meaning behind this, there are terms to be defined. By contrivance, Paley means artificiality, or to have been made. A watch, as easy as it is to grasp, is simply the mechanism on your wrist that tells you the time of day.

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180 Words | 1 Pages

After much debate, America finally offered $15 million for the land and France gladly accepted. April 30, 1803 the treaty was written making Louisiana officially American land. Some people however, were upset with the buy. They had believed that the new land would take all the attention and the older eastern land would get forgotten.

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In Lara Buchak’s essay, Can It Be Rational to Have Faith? , she asserts that everyday faith statements and religious faith statements share the same attributes. She later states that in order to truly have faith, a person ceases to search for more evidence for their claim, and that having faith can be rational. Although she makes compelling arguments in favor of faith in God, this essay is more hearsay and assumption than actual fact. In this paper, you will see that looking for further evidence would constitute not having faith, but that having faith, at least in the religious sense, is irrational.

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I think your analysis is solid. I agree that upon Peter’s death, Martin is the sole property owner. I like how you pointed out that the gesture to transfer Peter’s property to Andrew “contradicts the legal agreement of joint tenancy.” I think there is validity to your assertions that Otis is a trespasser and for Martin to start the eviction process. I also like the suggestion of pursuing a lease with Otis.

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The show begins with one single newscaster John Ladarola, introducing the headline news event. He introduced the headline as bad news for Obamacare as Aetna insurance giant would be pulling out of many insurance exchanges that help fund and run Obamacare. He then moved on to question, by stating “but why exactly are they pulling out”. John Ladarola then ran through some financial numbers that Aetna claims is showing they are losing over 100 million a year. With this, Aetna is claiming that it is not financially feasible to continue operating in the same manner.

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Dr. Bennet Omalu said, “I wish I never met Mike Webster. CTE has driven me into the politics of science, the politics of the NFL. You can’t go against the NFL. They will squash you.” Dr. Bennet is saying the NFL is to powerful and they’re not helping protect their players.

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Argument Against the Argument of Pascal’s Wager In Pascal’s Wager, Pascal pioneered new thoughts and opinions amongst his peers in probability theories by attempting to justify that believing in God is advantageous to one’s personal interest. In this paper, I will argue that Pascal’s argument rationalizing why one should believe in God fails and I will suggest that even if one was to accept Pascal’s wager theory, this will not be a suffice resolution to reap the rewards that God has promised to Christian believers like myself who has chosen to believe in God due to my early childhood teachings, familial and inherited beliefs. Pascal offers a logical reason for believing in God: just as the hypothesis that God's existence is improbable, the

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Another one of Robert Maine arguments was that Windshuttle claimed that the 20,000 deaths of the Aboriginals did not happened because it was not documented. Although Windshuttle argument of the Aboriginals being illiterate and not keeping any written records does not mean there history did not happen. ‘They responded to violence by the Aborigines towards white settlers cautiously and reluctantly, and their overriding concern was to prevent retaliatory violence by settlers and convicts from getting out of hand.’ That was one of Windshuttle argument that the only reason the white people killed Aboriginals was in retaliation, but all aboriginals on Tasmania were killed which is also know as a genocide. The white settlers were on a mission to kill

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Daniel Garcia TH 1:30-2:50pm March 14, 2017 Advanced Concepts in Criminal Justice From the works of Morenoff and Astor, we are to explain why crime might be higher among second generation immigrant Americans. Though there are many assimilation theories which coincides with this, Portes and Zhou’s theory of segmented assimilation stands up to be the strongest of them all. My reasoning behind it is based on the array of the data from Morenoff and Astor collected in this article and my own interpretation which I experienced first hand. The article shows segmented assimilation branching out to two main scenarios of the straight line assimilation, the positive and the negative. Segmented assimilation is carried though by the immigrants themselves or by their offspring adopting aspects of the culture in which they 're residing in.

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It is sad so much confusion surrounds Initiative 42, especially when nearly 200,000 Mississippians signed petitions to have it placed on the November ballot to amend the state Constitution. If passed, Initiative 42 will hold the Mississippi legislature accountable for keeping its promise to fully fund public schools. That should be simple enough, but Governor Bryant has done everything within his power to confuse the issue. Is he that two-faced?

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Throughout our history the belief in a higher being has been a common practice. There have been many versions of these beliefs and it is understandable why. When a person believes in a superior force it helps them be motivated. In Homer’s The Odyssey you see humans blaming their problems and crediting their success to the gods.

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Texas is a complicated state with profound roots implanted in restricted government power. It is a very conservative state that holds to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation, typically in relation to politics or religion. Governor, Rick Perry, within seconds of his speech he states, " millions of Texans…, are tired of Washington D.C,. trying to tell us how to run Texas". Just about every Texan, supports the restricted government in the middle of residents and state.

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With the year-round pressure pertaining to college applications on high school seniors follows the impending decision of choosing an appropriate college major. Generally, the decision-making process involves prioritizing one field of interest over another, however, due to globalization and constant innovation in technology determining a college major has increasingly become the modern day equivalent of the metaphorical line between life and death. Even so, the obvious choice would be the prestigious STEM fields over liberal arts due to the instant job opportunities which are seemingly ludicrous to a recent graduate. Nevertheless, liberal arts education should be encouraged to be pursued at higher education institutions in USA because it helps

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St. Anselm and Descartes are known for presenting the first ontological arguments on the existence of God. The word ontological is a compound word derived from ‘ont’ which means exists or being and ‘–ology’ which means the study of. Even though Anselm and Descartes’ arguments differ slightly, they both stem from the same reasoning. Unlike the other two arguments on God’s existence (teleological and cosmological), the ontological argument does not seek to use any empirical evidence but rather concentrates on pure reason. The rationale behind this school of thought

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Rwanda has been rather well-known for its seemingly effective post-conflict reforms; and Paul Kagame, the leader of the RPF, has been celebrated for his efforts to bring about political stability to the nation. However, underneath this guise, the ruling party has created a police state where all political competition, government dissension and open government criticism is severely punished. While Rwanda is no longer a nation that is known for its vicious ethnic divisions, it is now a nation that can be known for the human rights abuses that the shepherds of peace dish out to the electorate. The stringent conditions that have been put into place, requiring Rwanda to be ethnicity-less, have focused solely on ensuring that negative peace prevails throughout the nation.

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