The Origin of Murphy's Law

All of us are aware of Murphy’s laws but few of us know how it got originated.

Edward A. Murphy, Jr. was one of the engineers on the rocket-sled experiments that were done by the U.S. Air Force in 1949 to test human acceleration tolerances (USAF project MX981). One experiment involved a set of 16 accelerometers mounted to different parts of the subject's body. There were two ways each sensor could be glued to its mount, and somebody methodically installed all 16 but the wrong way around. Murphy then made the original form of his pronouncement, which the test subject (Major John Paul Stapp) quoted at a news conference a few days later.

Within months `Murphy's Law' had spread to various technical cultures connected to aerospace engineering. Before too many years had gone-by variants had passed into the popular imagination, changing as they went. Most of these are variants referred to as Finagle's Law. The mimetic drift apparent in these mutants clearly demonstrates Murphy's Law acting on itself!

The correct, original Murphy's Law reads: "If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, then someone will do it." This is usually given in mutant forms less descriptive of the challenges of design for losers. For example, you don't make a two-pin plug symmetrical and then label it `THIS WAY UP'; if it matters which way it is plugged in, then you make the design asymmetrical!

Finagle's Law: The generalized or `folk' version of Murphy's Law, fully named "Finagle's Law of Dynamic Negatives" and usually rendered "Anything that can go wrong, will". The label `Finagle's Law' was popularized by SF author Larry Niven in several stories depicting a frontier culture of asteroid miners; this `Belter' culture professed a religion and/or running joke involving the worship of the dread god Finagle and his mad prophet Murphy.

Hanlon's Razor: A corollary of Finagle's Law, similar to Occam's razor, that reads "Never attribute to malice that can be adequately explained by stupidity." The derivation of the common title Hanlon's Razor is unknown; a similar epigram has been attributed to William James. This probably reflects the hacker's daily experience of environments created by well-intentioned but short-sighted people.

Sturgeon's Law: "Ninety percent of everything is crap". It is derived from a quote by science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon, who once said, "Sure, 90% of science fiction is crud. When Sturgeon's Law is cited, the final word is almost invariably changed to `crap'.

Murphy's First Corollary:

• Left to themselves, things tend to go from bad to worse.
• It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious.
• Quantized Revision of Murphy's Law: Everything goes wrong all at once.
• Murphy's Constant: Matter will be damaged in direct proportion to its value.
• The Murphy Philosophy: Smile... tomorrow will be worse.

Samples:

• If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the first one to go wrong.
• If you perceive that there are four possible ways in which something can go wrong, and circumvent these, then a fifth way, unprepared for, will promptly develop.
• If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.
• Everything takes longer than you think.
• You never find a lost article until you replace it.
• If nobody uses it, there's a reason.
• You get the most of what you need the least.
• Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.