What Murphy's Law says

Is the principle “if something can go wrong, it will go wrong” true? The news is full of events that are often difficult to explain. Let's try to understand better what we are referring to when we talk about “Murphy's Law”.

Many may have heard about it in the movie “Interstellar” directed by Christopher NolanBut few know that Murphy's Law is nothing more than a set of pseudoscientific paradoxes born from the brilliant mind of the writer and humorist Arthur Bloch. In practice, it is a series of humorous phrases that aim to make fun of the negative events that happen to us in our daily lives. It must be said that the first axiom, namely Murphy's Law itself, is nothing more than a more interesting and alternative way of defining Probability calculation. But let's go in order.

Where does Murphy's Law come from?

The concept that “if something can go wrong, it will” is considered by many to be one of the few mathematical certainties in life. But it was scientist Edward Murphy, an American soldier, who uttered the historic phrase: “If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can lead to disaster, someone will do it that way.” This phrase was later mentioned during a press conference by Doctor John Paul Stapp, the subject of a test involving experiments on railway missiles.

Arthur Bloch Collections

The Murphy's Law axiom was then followed by a series of other satirical aphorisms, such as “Nothing is as easy as it seems” or “Every solution generates new problems”, all collected (or almost) by Arthur Bloch in the successful series “Murphy's Law” in 1988, which followed Many other publications.

Murphy's axiom

Murphy's axiom sums it up Mathematical statistical fact Which brings us back to calculating probabilities. However, it is unlikely that a particular event will occur after a large number of occasions. The same concept can be expressed by: The fact that an event is improbable does not mean that it cannot happen in the first attempts.

Randomness of events

However, Murphy's Laws take on a more cynical meaning. In fact, they claim that an event that was initially considered improbable often or even always occurs on the first try. It is exasperation, if you will. It is true that when we are in a hurry, we always encounter a red light, but it is also true that when we drive at a more moderate speed, it is easier to encounter a green light, or not even notice it at all. So, to sum it up, it is a law that strengthens our mind, especially regarding what we fear will happen.

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