Hi all,
I have been thinking about what I believe might be the most fundamental principle in both science (mathematics, physics,...), philosophy (metaphysics) and ethics: the anti-arbitrariness principle, avoid all avoidable arbitrariness.
There is arbitrariness about X if we can ask a meaningful and nontrivial question: “Why X and not for example, Y or Z?” and if this question cannot be answered by a rule which does not explicitly refer to X (or if there is no reason why X would be so special). The question is meaningful when Y and Z belong to the same set or category as X (and are therefore not something completely different) and the question is non-trivial if Y and Z are not simply “non-X”.
More details and examples in science and ethics, see https://stijnbruers.wordpress.com/2015/ ... trariness/
Any comments?