Occam's Razor

Biological Parallel

Biology relentlessly eliminates unnecessary complexity through selection. C-value paradox demonstrates this: genome size doesn't correlate with organism complexity. Humans have 20,000 genes; Paris japonica (a plant) has a genome 50x larger but isn't remotely 50x more complex. Selection prunes non-functional DNA because replication costs scale with genome size. Every base pair costs energy to copy—cells that carry excess DNA pay a metabolic tax every division. Metabolic pathways show the same parsimony. Glycolysis uses 10 enzymatic steps to convert glucose to pyruvate, not 15 or 20. Each additional enzyme requires genetic encoding, protein synthesis, and cellular space. Evolution favors minimal sufficient complexity. The electron transport chain could theoretically have dozens of intermediate carriers, but uses exactly 4 protein complexes because that's sufficient for efficient ATP production. Additional complexity without functional benefit gets selected against. Neural architecture follows Occam's Razor ruthlessly. C. elegans achieves complex behaviors with exactly 302 neurons—no more, no less. Every neuron serves a function; non-functional neurons don't persist because maintaining them costs energy without benefit. Mammalian brains prune synapses aggressively during development, eliminating connections that don't carry useful signals. Infant brains have ~2x the synaptic density of adult brains; development is subtraction. The principle emerges from thermodynamics: complexity costs energy. Organisms that achieve function with minimal complexity outcompete those carrying unnecessary parts. Occam's Razor isn't a philosophical preference—it's an economic necessity enforced by natural selection. The simplest explanation that accounts for the data wins because maintaining extra explanatory machinery costs resources without improving predictive accuracy.