MrMind comments on Understanding and justifying Solomonoff induction

[MrMind]

Thanks for the very interesting papers.

In Kelly’s page, this

Bayesian explanations of Ockham’s razor are based on a circular appeal to a prior bias toward simple possibilities.

I think it is possible to appeal to simpler principles, modifying some of the points I made above.

Indeed, I think it is possible to non-circularly explain why

the Razor is the rule which says “among the theories compatible with the evidence, chose the simplest”, and the question is why this leads to the truth better than a rule like “among the theories compatible with the evidence, chose the one whose statement involves the fewest occurrences of the letter ‘e’”, or even “the one which most glorifies Divine Providence”.