Hitchens's razor
Hitchens's razor is an epistemological razor expressed by writer Christopher Hitchens. It says that the burden of proof regarding the truthfulness of a claim lies with the one who makes the claim; if this burden is not met, then the claim is unfounded, and its opponents need not argue further in order to dismiss it.
Hitchens has phrased the razor in writing as "What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."Origin
The concept, named after journalist, author, and avowed atheist Christopher Hitchens, echoes Occam's razor. The dictum appears in Hitchens's 2007 book titled God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. It takes a stronger stance than the Sagan standard, instead applying to even non-extraordinary claims.
It has been compared to the Latin proverb :q:en:Latin proverbs#Q|quod grātīs asseritur, grātīs negātur, which was commonly used in the 19th century.
