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TheAncientGeek comments on Occam's Razor - Less Wrong
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What I find fascinating is that Solomonoff Induction (and the related concepts from Kolmogorov complexity) very elegantly solves the classical philosophical problem of induction, as well as resolving a lot of other problems:
Despite this, it is almost unheard of in the general philosophical (analytic philosophy) community. I've read literally dozens of top-grade philosophers discussing these topics, with the implication that these are still big unsolved problems, and in complete ignorance that there is a very rich mathematical theory in this area. And the theory's not exactly new either... dates back to the 1960s.
Anyone got an explanation for the disconnect?
Possibly because .Solomonoff induction isnt very suitable to answering the kinds of questions philosophers want answered, questions of fundamental ontology.. It can tell you what programme would generate observed data, but it doesn't tell you what the programme is running on..the laws of physics, Gods mind, .or a giant simulation. OTOH, traditional Occams razor can exclude a range of ontological hypotheses.
There is also the problem that there is no absolute measure of the complexity of a programme: a programming language is still a language, and some languages can express some things more concisely than others, as explained in kokotajlods other comment. http://lesswrong.com/lw/jhm/understanding_and_justifying_solomonoff_induction/ady8