150 How to Win Every Argumentotherwise. In fact the onus is upon the person who wishes to
change the status quo to supply reasons. He has to show why our
present practices and beliefs are somehow inadequate, and why
his proposals would be superior./ believe that a secret conspiracy of llluminati has clandestinely directed
world events for several hundred years. Prove to me that it isn't so.
(We don't have to, anymore than we have to prove that it isn't done
by invisible elves or Andromedans living in pyramids under the Ber-
muda triangle.)The maxim of William of Occam, usually shortened to 'entities
should not be multiplied beyond necessity', tells us not to
introduce more by way of explanation than is needed to explain.
World events are already explained by divine purpose, evolu-
tionary progress or sheer random chaos. We do not need
llluminati added to the brew, and he who would introduce them
must show what evidence requires them to explain it.
Shifting the burden is a very widespread and common fallacy.
Popular conception has it that he who says 'prove it' and he who
says 'prove it isn't' are on equal ground. It is a misconception.
The one who asks for proof is simply declaring an intention not
to accept more than the evidence requires. The other is declaring
his intent to assume more than that.
This particular fallacy is the frail prop on which rests the entire
weight of unidentified flying objects, extrasensory perception,
monsters, demons and bending spoons. Advocates of these, and
many other, ethereal phenomena try to make us accept the
burden of establishing falsity. That burden, once taken up, would
be infinite. Not only is it extraordinarily difficult to show that
something does not exist, but there is also an infinite load of
possibilities to test.