William of Ockham's Philosophy: Razor, Nominalism, and Divine Will
William of Ockham's Philosophical Foundations
For William of Ockham, theology fundamentally differs from philosophy, as true faith is primarily a matter of belief, not solely reason. He accepted Saint Anselm's ontological argument, defining God as pure and free will (voluntarism). Ockham asserted that the individual is more perfect than universal forms or essences, a core tenet of nominalism.
Ockham did not believe in two distinct paths of faith and reason converging on a single truth. Philosophy, for Ockham, must concern itself with the natural and finite world.
Ockham's Philosophical Critique: Two Principles
Ockham's philosophical critique is founded on two key principles:
1. The Principle of Omni-Divine Power
Ockham extended the postulate of God's absolute freedom and omnipotence to its ultimate consequences. An omnipotent being, being pure will, is absolutely free and without restriction. This divine being is the only necessary existence; everything else is radically contingent. Therefore, humanity cannot fully explain why the world is as it is, but can only describe how it actually is, until it ceases to be so.
God's absolute freedom means that natural or rational theology is impossible. The divine will is not reasonably accessible; it is knowable only through faith and revelation. Consequently, human reason should adhere to the concrete and the immediacy of our sensory experience.
2. Ockham's Razor: The Principle of Parsimony
According to this principle, one must always seek the simplest explanation, using only what is necessary. Through Ockham, experience was re-established as a crucial source of knowledge.
Universals: Aquinas vs. Ockham
The positions concerning the issue of universals, as debated by Aquinas and Ockham, were:
- Moderate Realism (e.g., Aquinas): Universals exist in the mind as concepts, derived from particulars.
- Anti-Realism / Moderate Nominalism (Ockham): Universals are not actual things or mere words, but names (concepts or signs) that have meaning and can be predicated of things. Ockham was a staunch nominalist, asserting that individual things possess similarities, which allows them to be represented by a common sign.
The consequence of Ockham's nominalism in the field of knowledge is profound: there is no knowledge gained purely by abstraction, as this type of knowledge disregards the sensible and particular. Furthermore, if universal symbols are merely concepts developed by ourselves without any direct correlation to external reality, then we cannot truly know if something exists or if there is something that does not exist.
This philosophical stance significantly contributes to the separation between reason and faith. The unique essence of existence, for Ockham, boils down to this: there are as many essences as there are individuals. Ockham's world is fundamentally a world of simple, individual realities.
This is the core function of Ockham's Razor: to eliminate all philosophical concepts that are either unnecessary or have no verifiable counterpart in sensory experience.
Ockham's Moral Philosophy
In contrast to Saint Thomas Aquinas, who believed God creates humanity with a specific nature imprinted with natural law (an expression of divine law), Ockham held a different view. For Aquinas, humans must discover the standards of natural law to align with God's will. Good and evil, in the moral order, are defined by conformity to or deviation from this natural law. Thus, Aquinas believed God only asks us to do what is possible based on our nature and natural law.
For Ockham, however, good and evil are not inherent in any substance or natural law, but are solely determined by the free will of God.