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". May have been first published by Francis P.
Chisholm in his 1963 essay The Chisholm Effect, later reprinted in
the classic anthology A Stress Analysis Of A Strapless Evening Gown:
And Other Essays For A Scientific Eye (Robert Baker ed,
Prentice-Hall, ISBN 0-13-852608-7).
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. Some
technical and scientific cultures (e.g., paleontologists) know it
under the name Sod's Law; this usage may be more common in Great
Britain. One variant favored among hackers is "The perversity of the
Universe tends towards a maximum"; Niven specifically referred to
this as O'Toole's Corollary of Finagle's Law. See also {Hanlon's
Razor}.
[glossary]
[Reference(s) to this entry by made by: {bit bucket}{Hanlon's Razor}{mung}{Murphy's Law}]