“Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitate”

There is a heuristic, or rule of thumb, attributed to 14th century Franciscan Friar and philosopher William of Ockham, called “lex parsimoniae” or “law of parsimony.” It states that, given that all things are equal, the simplest answer tends to be the correct one. Lex parsimoniae is better known today as Occam’s Razor.

Sometimes this principle gets whittled down to "keep it simple,” but that's not accurate (as this wine makes clear). The heuristic merely states that you don't need X hypotheses when Y hypotheses will do (where Y is smaller than X). It makes no guarantee that the simpler answer will be correct, it merely states that the simpler answer is more likely to be correct.

Occam’s Razor is one of the guiding principles we use in our lives.