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Finagle's law of dynamic negatives (also known as Melody's law, Sod's Law or Finagle's corollary to Murphy's law) is usually rendered as "Anything that can go wrong, will—at the worst possible moment." The term "Finagle's law" was first used by John W. Campbell Jr., the influential editor of Astounding Science Fiction (later Analog).
Hanlon's razor is a corollary of Finagle's law, named in allusion to Occam's razor, normally taking the form "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." As with Finagle, possibly not strictly eponymous.
The adage was a submission credited in print to Ronald M. Hanlon of Bronx, New York , in a compilation of various jokes related to Murphy's law published in Arthur Bloch's Murphy's Law Book Two: More Reasons Why Things Go Wrong! (1980). [1] A similar quotation appears in Robert A. Heinlein's novella Logic of Empire (1941). [2]
Sod's law, a British culture axiom, states that "if something can go wrong, it will". The law sometimes has a corollary: that the misfortune will happen at "the worst possible time" (Finagle's law). The term is commonly used in the United Kingdom (while in many parts of North America the phrase "Murphy's law" is more popular). [1]
Murphy's law [a] is an adage or epigram that is typically stated as: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.".. Though similar statements and concepts have been made over the course of history, the law itself was coined by, and named after, American aerospace engineer Edward A. Murphy Jr.; its exact origins are debated, but it is generally agreed it originated from Murphy and his team ...
What most people call Murphy's Law is actually Finagle's Law, and despite the name, Finagle's Law doesn't follow from the specific version of Murphy's Law. On the other hand, the Murphy's Law article is already about Finagle's Law, and the original statement of Murphy's Law is now little more than a footnote in the public mind.
The major exposition of his system is in The New Art of Memory (1812). [2] John Millard, assistant librarian to the Surrey Institution, was the editor of this work, according to Thomas Hartwell Horne, who was Millard's brother-in-law, and who helped him with notes of Feinaigle's lectures.
Critical reception has been positive. [4] [5] The journal The Physics Teacher, in recommending it to both scientists and non-scientists alike, gave The Character of Physical Law a favorable review, writing that although the book was initially intended to supplement the recordings, it was "complete in itself and will appeal to a far wider audience".