magazine
Laws and other Observations
Over the years people have noticed situations happening repeatedly. These observations have become “Laws”. Some of these laws are tongue in cheek; some of them are quite serious. Here are three: Murphy’s Law, Occam’s Razor and Newton’s law. By Howard Flomberg
Murphy’s Law
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This is the one we all know. If anything can go wrong, it will. One of the most popular corollaries is “and at the worst possible time”. Murphy reportedly was Air Force Captain Edward A. Murphy. Murphy was an engineer and he deduced the law while working on a project. There are, obviously, many other versions of the law’s origin. My favorite is a legend on Captain Murphy’s demise: One dark evening (in the U.S.), Murphy’s car ran out of gas. As he hitchhiked to a gas station, while facing traffic and wearing white, he was struck from behind by a British tourist who was driving on the wrong side of the road. Here you have Murphy’s Law in a nutshell. When I was a technician in the Air Force, it was universally agreed that Murphy was an optimist.
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