Physicist: The mathematical statement of Murphy’s Law, as used in scientific communities, is tremendously complex. But the common form, “everything that can go wrong will”, is fairly accurate and more than sufficient for most applications.
The short answer is: yes, Murphy’s Law is real. There are a lot of basic logical reasons for this. For example; nothing lasts forever, so eventually every part of every machine will eventually break down. Or, because being in traffic involves spending more time getting from place to place, you can expect to spend disproportionately more time in traffic than not. But, as you’ve no doubt noticed, using logic and random chance alone it’s impossible to explain away the preponderance of horrible happenstances that show up seemingly without pause, everywhere, at all times.
“Coincidences” like that are a strong indication that a physical law is in play. We can clearly see that Murphy’s law is both real, and unfairly applied to people colloquially known as “clumsy”. Robert Oppenheimer, in addition to some entirely forgettable work he did in physics, pioneered research into Murphy’s law by studying his own unfortunate condition. Bob’s affliction was first brought to the attention of his colleges when it was noticed that when he was in the lab, everyone’s muffins and buttered scones were 42% more likely to land upside-down. Even sandwiches with particularly binding peanut-butter were more likely to open on the way down.
(Left) Wilhelm Murphy, the discoverer of Murphy’s Law, shown here suffering from complications after a gum-chewing incident. (Right) Oppenheimer, extended and modernized our knowledge of Murphy’s Law. This is the only known picture of Oppenheimer with his eyes open.
Oppenheimer, after he was politely asked not to work in the laboratories, made several starling discoveries such as the fact that Murphy’s Law is “recursive”, “pessimistically optimal”, and “robustly unfair”. The recursive nature of the Law is one of the more obvious. It says, in effect, that Murphy’s Law can’t be out-smarted. For example, washing you car is almost certain to make it rain. However if your intention is to make rain, then washing your car will probably just make someone slip and fall.
Oppenheimer was involved in one of the better examples of Murphy Recursion. During a celebration of his accomplishments and “clumsiness”, some of his fellow scientists constructed a lever attached to a prop chandelier, such that when Oppenheimer walked in and inevitably pulled the lever the chandelier would drop. However, they forgot to take into account the recursive nature of Murphy’s Law, and the lever didn’t work. Of course, had they tried to take Murphy Recursion into account, something else would have gone wrong.
Many people known to be “unlucky” or “followed by a black cloud of misfortune” are the sad victims of the fact that Murphy’s Law is demonstrably unfair. This is the essential reason behind why computer problems only exist until you try to show someone else. The range of “what can go wrong” varies wildly from person to person. For Roy Sullivan (for example) being struck by lightning is something that can go wrong (and did go wrong seven times). Despite specifically trying to avoid storms and clouds, he could barely leave his house without some lightning bolt setting him on fire.
So, Murphy’s Law is certainly very real, and can even be measured qualitatively. However, it can’t be anticipated or taken into account. We can only wait for terrible, unfortunate things to happen, and hope that they won’t be too bad.
I’m sure I’ve seen Oppenheimer with a squint.
I was half way the article until I thought; “Wait a minute, when was this posted?” and then it struck me… lighting that is, and it made me chuckle.
The name of the guy after whom the law was named is captain ED (EDWARD) Murphy!
Of course, not on the 1st of April
What if I said that this law was true exactly 50% of the time? Would it still be true? Or would it just be that people remember the incidents where Murphy’s law was true more than the incidences where Murphy’s law failed? In other words- Does Murphy’s law boil down to psychology?
I’M sure that Psychology has nothing to do with Physics…
Murphy’s law was not propounded by Murphy, but rather by another man with the same name.
Has anyone here studied the relevance of O’Brians Law.
It postulates that Murphy was an optimist.
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Murphy`s law is meant to indicate that what can happen could/can/may or will occur…it does not mean that it will be for the bad or good or mute…just that an unseen event…applied to your undertaking…
I know of no formula applied to Murphy`s Law that could predict any outcome under any circumstance…
yep , it boils down to just psychology. get real. and get used to it
I guess the best way to account for Murphy’s Law is to have a Plan B?
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I feel saying that Murphy’s law is “tremendously complex” is a way of trying to prove this law without any mathematical or quantitative evidence. The laws of gravity, ohms law, kirchoffs voltage law and many others are constant, measurable and homogenous in practically all situations. There’s nothing in this article that would prove this theory to be anything but an adage created by a pessimistic physicist with inconclusive evidence.
i used this as evidence in an essay and i really shouldn’t have
To reiterate my previous comment, It’s either completely obvious or ironic that this was published on April 1st, because Murphy Law is a complete joke.
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Not so real that is fake
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Oh trust me, Murphy’s law of physics is real. I AM the definition of what POSSIBLY can go wrong NO MATTER WHO, what , where. When and why. But I’m still going through my life just is the WORST luck I have to just assume the worst is going to happen to me and, I gotta say that pretty much even if it’s impossible. It’ll still happen to me but it’s what you wanna see and believe, or point of view lol
If one were given by parents, A girl’s name, the world outside, would Not recognize A math gen i us. Is that Not an example?
How can we possibly get rid of Morphy’s law?
I am stuck with it and it is going to kill me. I try a lot to not think about these issues or try to be optimistic, but it does not help.
I can say 99% of the things go in the worst possible way, and my friends call me “god of luck”.
It’s easy enough to believe in Murph. because life is often so ridiculously horrid and unfair. Maybe the law is an exaggeration but life is still mostly a vicious cunt to most people.
I mean, the events in 2020 – 2021 should be an indicator of Murphy’s law.
In any test of Murphy’s law, the conclusion will always be the least convenient.
A bat in China did all this? Murphy’s Law.
Just an inconvenient result.
was reading all the comments on here since 2013. might as well leave one for the curious kids like me going through this article some day in the future.
lol this is terrible. This is not a law it is a mindset. If you are constantly in the mindset that something will go wrong then yeah it will go wrong because you will manifest negative things. If you are in a confident mindset and are secure and optimistic you will see how life is not so complicated and is quite easy and good things will happen to you. The only law there is the law of attraction/ manifestation and mindset. “Murphys Law” is code word for pessimistic people with negative mindsets who continuously attract negative things into their life. Unlucky people are unlucky because they continuously believe the worst will happen so it does and the more it happens the more they will be convinced that it will. If they stop and change their mindset and train themselves out of this “law” that is a literal formula for anxiety, they will be significantly less tense and less clumsy and much more confident and they will attract positive things into their life. I can guarantee that this law only applies to people who live by this law. Once you realize this whole time you have been fooled and the only law you have been working was the law of attraction and your own psychology, you will most definitely escape “Murphy’s law”. People who continue to believe there is no escaping Murphys law and will forever be cursed will just continue to curse themselves. Be positive, stop attracting negativity be always being worried and anxious, relax and give off positivity and believe me good things will happen to you and you will not be so clumsy and tense and you will de-burden yourself from this “law”
also clumsy people aren’t just people who are recursed by Murphys law, they are tense and anxious people because they are constantly worried about all the possibilities to go wrong. Tense and anxious people have no coordination and are just awkward overall. relax, good things will happen as long as you realize that
No psychology here. In any situation, “Murphy’s law” is just a convenient way of expressing that anything that can happen eventually will. Not a mindset, not predictable, and not necessarily bad. A belief that mindset will encourage only “good things to happen” may work, or may not, – anything can! – depending on Murphy’s law. (see post date of first post)
lol, I don’t know if you all are trolling or something but i cannot believe some people believe in some stupid bullshitty “law” that a person make because their day was bad. Welp, this is the internet, im not surprised but the fact that people are dumb enough to believe in this. The internet have some weird tendency about believing in some weird fucking dumbass shit.
Most Murphy Law cases deal with the fact that you are a dumbass or something is an asshole. Luck has always existed since before this stupid law that all of you believe for whatever God for saken reason. If you had a bad day or something happened to you, it wasn’t Murphy Law. And I love how they try to change the original statement to a “law”. God when these people will have a clear mind. I wish this was some kind of trolling but apparently it isn’t. Apart from having the mentality of possibilities, it is a bit shady.
The fact that this post was on the first of April I love it. When I’m an aircraft engineer, I’m going to invent a law so that everyone believes it like the idiots they are.
I’m going to all the internet forums that discuss this “law” and I’m going to post the same statement I made here and tell what an idiot they are for believing in this dumbass”law”. I won’t mind if the forum is kind of trolling.
Es sentir una parte de ti fuera mientras alguien te piensa o quizas te portegen, lo haces inconcientemente