Other sources have questioned that the Murphy in the name was an actual person. In his memoire Into Orbit, , John Glenn states that:. Murphy was a careless, all-thumbs mechanic who was prone to make such mistakes as installing a propeller backwards. The case for Edward A. Murphy being the source is fairly strong, but perhaps not quite 'beyond all reasonable doubt'.
Sod and Finagle certainly weren't real people. Sod's Law isn't known until later and the first example of it that I can find is from The New Statesman , October This is a stronger variant of Murphy's Law, using the expletive 'sod' for accentuation.
All rights reserved. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www. If not, no worries — just another instance of Murphy's Law. All this from a snafu in the desert. Report an error. Journalistic Standards. About The Star. More News. Top Stories. About Contact Us Feedback. Toronto Star Newspapers Ltd. Nichols' Fourth Law says, "Avoid any action with an unacceptable outcome. John P. Stapp, had a paradox: Stapp's Ironical Paradox, which says, "The universal aptitude for ineptitude makes any human accomplishment an incredible miracle.
Murphy's Law or Sod's Law? While I admit that the name of Murphy's laws is a pleasant one as is the story of how it came to light, but the original name for 'if anything can go wrong it will' was sod's law because it would happen to any poor sod who needed such a catastrophic event the least. It also removes the ability to say "I coined this phrase!
In the English County of Yorkshire I know it to have been around for generations because it has been passed through several Yorkshire families I know. But this original name is dying out because sod over here is a cursory so is not used much.
Murphy's on the other hand is nothing insulting or lacking in hope I hope this clears any problems up and while this maybe hard to come to terms with, think about it, would such an obvious piece of logic have only come about in the second half of the 20th century???? Chris Monkman In the late 's I read an article that was photocopied from a magazine where I saw the term "Murphy's Law" coined. Should I say, I believe the term was coined in this article.
A key sensor was installed completely backward, allegedly by Murphy , who never checked it before it was made operational. As a result, the test went utterly haywire much to the embarrassment of everyone concerned. It really took off pardon the pun in when the Mercury astronauts cited Murphy's Law in explaining why everything was checked and rechecked before spaceflight.
Murphy died in In the s, he worked on the Apollo moon mission on safety and life protection issues. He always claimed his law was a positive development, by teaching people to expect the worst and safeguarding against it. 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.
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