What is William of Ockham?
[[File:William of Ockham.png|thumb|right|alt=Stained-glass window showing William of Ockham|William of Ockham]] [[File:William of Ockham - Logica 1341.jpg|thumb| A drawing in a copy of Ockham's book ''[[Summa Logicae]]''. It says, ''Frater Occam iste'' (''That one is brother Occam'').]] '''William of Ockham''' was a [[Franciscan]] [[friar]] who lived in the [[14th century]]. He was born around 1285, in Ockham, Surrey, England, and died on 9 April 1347 in [[Munich]]. He was a [[Scholasticism|scholastic]] [[philosopher]] and [[theologian]]. He is most famous for inventing [[Occam's razor]]. He wrote about [[logic]], [[epistemology]], natural philosophy, [[political philosophy]], [[metaphysics]] and [[ethics]]. William of Ockham went to school at the [[University of Oxford]], where he studied [[theology]]. After he graduated, he became a teacher of [[philosophy]] at the school. However, the Church did not like the ideas he was teaching, and brought him to court on charges of [[heresy]] in 1327. Because he was afraid he would be executed, William of Ockham fled the school and spent the rest of his life living with a group of friars who also did not like the large power that the Church had. {{Bio-stub}} {{Social and political philosophy}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Ockham, William of}} [[Category:1280s births]] [[Category:1347 deaths]] [[Category:English philosophers]] [[Category:English Roman Catholics]] [[Category:English theologians]] [[Category:Franciscans]] [[Category:Writers from Surrey]] [[Category:14th-century works]]