How Murphy's Law Works, the Redux

good about it, okay, but there it's out there. There's one that always stuck out to me that I was like, there's so much more information. You remember, like back in the day, we used to try to hit these things at like five minutes. Yeah, to say this is evolved is an understatement, right. Um. So there was one that I was like, five minutes is not an enough for this, Let's do something like thirty seven minutes instead. And um it was Murphy's Law. So I really this article a

long time ago. It was like how Murphy's Law works. Like I was raised on these unnatural laws, like the Peter principle, which we've podcasted on Parkinson's Law, which is um work expands to fill the time allotted, and then Murphy's Law, which is, of course anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Right. So I was kind of always aware of this, and I pitched this idea like how Murphy's Law works, like right after I got here at how stuff works, and um, I got the assignment

and started doing this research. I found out that there's this awesome backstory to this, which I know you know now and have for a while because we made a Toyota commercial based on part of it. You're telling me this now exactly exactly, So I guess what I'm saying is I wanted to redo how Murphy's Law works, a reboot, and let's do it. And no disrespect to previous podcasters, but this was just too short, you know, too short. You can't cover Murphy's on in five minutes. No you can't.

So here's the expanded version, and we're not gonna like start rerunning things. Don't worry, there's plenty of topics out there. This one just really kind of I always wanted to redo this one was stuck in your crawl and no it's no, it's out it's not your crawl. Uh idiom, Josh, that's what we're talking about. Whatever can go wrong, we'll

go wrong. And uh, you make a good point at the beginning of this is it's it's an idiom because we've made it an idiom, and uh, you don't notice and make remarks about when things go perfectly right, you might feel good and be like, hey, everything's coming up rosen today, or maybe that's an idiom. It's not an idiom. Actually it's a saying. But you never you don't say, you know, boy, I got in this lane of traffic and it's just speeding along, and I should make a

saying about that. You can, but very rarely do you Like, we humans tend to focus more on the negative, you know, And that's what Murphy's law is. It's a focus on the negative. That's right. We look out for the bad in a way. And Murphy's law itself, Chuck, is not that old, to tell you the truth, And it wasn't Um. It wasn't Murphy who originally coined this idea. There was

a um. There was a something called Sod's law that's still around in Great Britain, which says, uh, basically the same thing, any bad thing that can happen to some poor sod which is short for sodomite, is it? Yeah? Yeah, no comment. And then there was a magician named Adam hole Shirk apparently in wrote something called on Getting out of Things, an essay on magic, which is not on

the internet. Yeah I did too. Actually, um it said in a magic act, nine out of ten things that can go wrong usually will And I thought maybe Adam was just a bad magician when I read that. Really, so he he gets credit, like just about any origin story of Murphy's Law includes Adam hole Shirk, and it should. But it wasn't called Murphy's Law, no, um until a guy there actually was a guy named Murphy, and he actually did live not too long ago. He died in

nineteen nine, I believe this article says, but it's eighty nine. Um, you're gonna go back and change that. And um, he was a captain in the Air Force, and he is attributed with not coining Murphy's Law depending on who you talk to, but spurring the idea of Murphy's law who were which was coined by somebody else? Right, So let's let's set the stage Chuck, it's ninety we're in California in my hand exactly. We're at um Edwards Air Force Space. We need to get into the way back machine here. Man,

it's been a while. Okay, So as I said, Edwards Air Force Pace. It's very nice. Um, there's Chuck Yeager right, see look at him go and then over there on that that that railroad track is kind of in the middle of nowhere. Uh is the rocket sled the g whiz rocket sled. That's a Nego name. So let's talk about that. Okay, what is it? Well, this was part of the Project m X, and they were tests to

determine how the body, the human body, reacted to G force. Yeah, there's a long standing idea that the human body could withstand eighteen g s and all airplanes were designed to uh withstand eighteen g's of force and nothing more, right, which means that, um, they were kind of hamstrung by this magical number. But no one knew exactly where that number came from. Her if it was true. What's screwy is that they had no way to find out except

for these rockets led tests. That's right, using a real live human being, Because if you're going to test something, you can't throw a crash test dummy in there. You could in the ninety nine. Now, well, yeah, these days they have sensors and actually not to be pluggy, but Toyota came up with the thing that that measures the total human uh model for safety and it measures internal damage. So like it's very sophisticated now, but back then, if you want to find some of the stuff out, you

had to put a human in there. Well, at first they used cadavers, then they used dummies like Sierra Sam and then on the g Wiz rocket tests they used um oscar eight ball, but there they didn't have sensors for it, so they had to use John Paul Stapp who volunteered, who was a really incredible renaissance man. He's a colonel. Yeah in the Air Force. He was a physician UM and he uh he flew around in a

in an airplane without a canopy. Remember that I've heard that. Um. He also uh basically made it his life's work to get seatbelts made mandatory in automobiles. So he staged the first ever UM automobile crash tests, and he did it at the expense of the Air Force, and the Air Force was like, hey, whoa, what are you doing? What are you expensing these dust for? These are cars, we we fly planes. And he came up with statistics that showed that more Air Force pilots died from car rex

and from plane rex and they said okay. And that was just the kind of guy. He was, real stand up dude, he was. So what he did was he jumped in the g with said, hey, I'll do it. I'm Colonel John Paul Staff. I do this kind of thing. And it would go about two hundred miles an hour down a half mile track and then stop in less than a second. And what they're trying to test is say that one more time to go two hundred miles an hour and stop and lessen a second. Yeah, that's crazy.

That's basically they're trying to test what might happen in a plane crash. So they were they were finding the force of gravity, how much a human coupe withstand? And remember eighteen was that magic number, And in very short order John Paul stap withstood eighteen ges and then twenty and then and I think he made it up to forty six point to six was the most he experienced. I think you're ever like the highest roller coaster would always go to that, but the roller coaster with the

highest acceleration is like two point seven g's. This guy did forty six point to six and he suffered for it too. Yeah, big time, broken bones, concussions, broken blood

vessels in its eyes. Yeah, he'd have white outs, which is when when he was going backwards, they'd turn him around sometimes so he wouldn't get the bugs in his face and he would have white outs, which is all the blood is pulling in the back of the head, so he has no blood in his eyes, which means you can't see or you get read out to where all the blood was pulling in the front of his face and he couldn't see because there was too much

blood in his eyes. I wonder if they were like, hey, let's put him sideways, it happens, it would be like a pink out. Yeah, a one eye is read one is white. Yeah. So this is all going pretty well for step if you consider that a success. And then Murphy Captain Murphy shows up on the scene and says, hey, you know, I've got these sensors that will give you a much more accurate read of the g force. So let's get my assistant. I don't know why he didn't do it himself. No, it was one of the This

is Project MXE. It was one of the project's assistants. Murphy. Why didn't he do it is what I want to know. I don't know, because there's another saying if you want something done right, do it yourself. And I would have rubbed that in his face. They didn't, though, and and supposedly tell him about the sensors, well, that the sensors would give you a more accurate reading. And then the assistant evidently, uh, hook them up wrong. And there are there was one way to hook up each one of these,

and he did the opposite way for two ways. Well, there's one correct way right to hook up the censor, and then he did it the wrong way on every single one of them. And then Murphy said out loud to somebody that if there are two ways of doing something, one of these will result in disaster. He's gonna do it that way, or he said something along the lines of if there's any way they can do it wrong, they will. Um. It depends on who you talk to.

There were living witnesses in two thousand when this guy for Improbable Research, who who hosts the ig Nobel Awards UM wrote a pretty comprehensive article on it um and he interviewed these people and they said he roughly said that, or he said something like you said, but ultimately he was grumbling and it was loud enough, and he was saying it about these people that he just met, who had you know, incorrectly hooked up the sensors. Okay, well let's hook him right and do it again. It's not

a big deal. So Murphy apparently, if you talk to the witnesses, was kind of thought of as a bit of a jerk. That's what I think, which is something his son still to this day disputes. He says that that is not in his father's character. His father was not a jerk, and he wouldn't have he wouldn't have been so rude or boorish. But most of the witnesses say he said something like that. That was the seed. How did the tree come about? The tree came about?

Because uh, stab was apparently a pretty gregarious guy. Obviously, if he's taking part in these tests with a plum, then he's gonna probably be a pretty fun guy to be around. Well, he had he had two books Chuck of um idioms. One was it was called STAPs Almanac, the other was four Year Moments of Inertia. And he had already come up with his own little saying Stepp's ironical paradox, which is the universal aptitude for an aptitude

makes any human accomplishment an incredible miracle. So he was already generally on the lookout for new bits of wisdom. He's stealing these things from people, basically, and he stole it from Murphy Fee and at a press conference the next day said and this is where you know it took off obviously, because the press conference he said that, hey, uh, we we have a good safety record because we are aware of Murphy's law, which is whatever can go wrong will go wrong. And they all got a big laugh.

That's brilliant, and they all ranted the pay phones and called it in. Yeah, it makes it into like some aerospace publications, and then it disseminates out. It's just like just a perfect gem, perfectly encapsulated. Whatever can go wrong will go wrong. It's just say universal truth in unnatural law, right, and um it kind of gave a kickstart to this whole There's a trend in the fifties of people being

pithy like like, um because Peter and Principle. Yeah, and actually I found out, Um, Lawrence Peter, who who came up with the Peter principal and um Captain Murphy became lifelong friends. Wasn't that special in it? Um. But it gave rise to all these other ideas, these unnatural laws. It was kind of a trend. Like I said, in the fifties and sixties, I think people wanted to put

their name on something. Right, So I selected a few out of there's lists on the internet that are just you can scroll for hours now at the bottom of these things, right, but um, you want to read some of these Uh. It tours observation. The other line moves faster, which makes sense. Boobs law. You will always find something in the last place you look. What's another good one here? Franklin's rule, blessed is he who expects nothing, for he will not be disappointed. Lincoln's law, those who can do

do those who cannot teach, which just mean. It is mean, especially to teachers. It's so disrespectful. Uh. And then Patton General Georgia's Patton had a law that a good plan to day is better than a perfect plan tomorrow, because by then Charlie's killed you Right, he wasn't Vietnam, No, but oh you just meant a guy named Charlie. Okay, yeah, uh so yeah. People obviously like naming things after themselves and coming up with pithy little sayings that people like

to say. Right, But there's there and there's two ways that Murphy's law can be um categorized. It can be categorized in the realm of pithy sayings from the fifties and sixties, like the Peter principle, which, as you remember, it did make sense it had it had some gravity

to it Peter. Or you can look at Murphy's law and the coining of it in by John Paul stat as the formulation of the basis for all engineering thought that came after that point, which was the creation of fail safe, the creation of redundant systems, and the idea that you should plan for everything going wrong so that if it does go wrong, it's covered and the system doesn't want it won't break down. Sure, it gave a

saying to that practice. It was already in practice, but people didn't start building fail says because of Murphy's Law. You know what I'm saying, I don't know, man, well, seatbelts, that's a fail safe. Uh. And that is not just from Murphy's Law. That was from staff himself when you're pushing this legislation. So let's talk about like the principles going on behind Murphy's law. Fatalism, it's pretty much it.

Fatalism is the idea that we are just walking around subject to whatever fate, you know, whatever happens to us, whatever fate dictates. Like, if you're in a line of traffic, right, yeah, and you it seems like all other lines are going except for yours, right. This is explainable. It's explicable, Like you're not paying attention to the other lines of traffic when your line is going because you're paying attention to

not hit the person in front of you. When you're just sitting there, all you notice is that the other lanes are going. But if you could really statistically explain, you know, how often the lanes of traffic are moving, it's probably fairly even. Probably, so I always kind of well, actually have I go in the lane that I think is going to be moving. But because we're fatalistic, we we It's like, why why does the universe hate me? I'm totally powerless to make traffic move right? And then

free will was not well, not the opposite. But that's the other idea, is that, uh, we have free will for all of our choices and all of our consequences are due to things that we have made happen, right, and the the attendant with free will is the risk of failure. So when we have a fifty chance of getting something right, well, we're gonna get it wrong or we're gonna notice mostly when we get it wrong, because then we have to do it again, and it's just so much trouble to try to put the plug in

the right way. Yeah right, the three pong failsafe plug you yeah, okay, but other prongs electrical sockets. If you look at them, one's bigger than the other, that's fail safe. After Murphy's Law changed everything another for that, it was just death ville for everything there was well yeah, well there, let me put it to you this way. There was something like um, twenty five million licensed motorists in the US and like forty three thousand deaths on the highways

in like nineteen sixty, I think something like that. In two thousand there was seventy five million licensed motorists and about as many deaths. So yeah, when before Murphy came along and there were no fail safe and one had any idea what they were doing, I'll dispute that. But did ever show you the video of the the car crashes like the old what blood on the asshole? The uh? They did this? High speed car crashes with an old like you know when you see those old tanks like

oh man, back then were in Paula or something. Yeah, like those big old tanks. Those were like they were tanks because their tanks and they I bet you were safe in those seat belts. But they compared the crash to a modern car and the old car, man just I mean squashed and crumbled like a tin can. Really, oh dude, yeah, because cows cows. Cars are just engineered these days, as our cows couple zones and things like yeah, man, and it's it might be made of plastic, but it's

amazing when you watch this thing. Back then, they were huge and made of metal, but at enough impact that metal just becomes nothing it's pretty interesting. Speaking of cows being engineered. You remember that cow um on Millage in Athens that had the porthole in it so they could like open it up and reach inside and I think fertilize it or they were doing something. I never saw that, but that cow. It was crazy. Murphy's law happened to

that cow. I wrote about that. They they have those little portals into their stomachs so they can study things

like that's like right there on the side. And then also, Chuck, I want to point out Rodyard Kipling, right, he provides us a good example of the whole y me attitude of humanity, and then the mathematical explanation of why you pal you're Kipling once lamented that no matter how you drop it, the the bread that you dropped out of your hand onto the floor always falls butter side down, which means you can't treat it any longer, and it

gives you the vapors so um. If you think about it, a buttered piece of bread is heavier on one side than the other, so thanks to the force of gravity on the way down, the bread is going to flip over that. But it's yes, but it's heavier as we proved this, give me some bread. Well, I just don't. I just wanted has proven and not. I think it's interesting. But we'll think about this. I just wonder how much butter would it literally take to cause it to flip over.

There's a certain amount, And I think also this is going to happen more frequently with um plain untoasted bread and butter rather than like toast with butter melted in it, which may be distributed evenly throughout the bread. But the point is is, yes, it's going to flip over, but it's not going to flip back over because the heavier side is now being dragged towards the earth. But if it does fall butter side up, then that's just good luck.

That's fate. Okay. So again there's there's a certain amount of I guess math or science to Murphy's law. There can be if you really want to look for it. And your name's Joel Pell right, Yeah, he's he's another fun killer, like the laughter guys. I know math people will take issue with that, but I take issue with everything having to be stated as a math formula. Well,

this guy, he begs to differ. He does he's a biological engineer at the University of British Columbia, and I think in two thousand five he came up with Murphy's equation, which basically he figured out how to quantify the probability that things will go wrong when they can go wrong. Right A, you're gonna read it. It's pretty impossible to

read out loud. Yeah, I don't. I don't think I can, because what's the opposite of to the something power when it's like down below into the right rather than up into the idea. Well, basically he figured out that the importance of the event I times the complexity of the system involved CE times the urgency of the need for the system of work you plus the frequency the system is used equals p the probability that the Murphy's law

will kick in. And one is definite. I think ten is it's not going to happen, and somewhere in between is it might happen, it might not. So what he did was he basically plugged in the um the possibility of his clutch going out in a rainstorm sixty miles a hundred kilometers from his house UM, and he came up with an answer of one, which means that his

clutch was definitely going to go out. And he further demonstrated that what now that he's stranded out in the rainstorm and he needs to get somewhere by foot, he needs his flashlight to work. Um, what's the what's the probability that Murphy's law will happen and the flashlight will be out? He plugged it in and came up with the one again. So he very facetiously proved that Murphy's Law is real and his equation worked. I hope this guy got stuck in a rainstorm a flashlight, That's what

I hope. Poor Joel pell I had to um correspond with him for this. Yeah, I did get permission to use his equation and he said, sure, here's a cool dude. Yeah really Yeah? All right, So, Chuck, we talked about like prongs being designed with fail safe seat belts are a fail safe diesel pump nozzles there. They are designed at a wider diameter than regular gas pumps, so you can't fit it in your gas tank. Did you know that? Yeah?

That wasn't always a case, because I put diesel in a in a truck one time when I shouldn't have. And when did it start? After Murphy's law became widespread started in the mid nineties, I think, or that's the last time I screwed up like that? What you got? Uh? I got nothing else? Thank God for fail Safe. So thank god for John Paul Staff and Captain Edward A. Murphy, Jr. I have a Chuck's key law. I got my two house keys. I have a outer security like a clear

door and then my regular door. Two different keys that look the same. On my dog Leach will almost a hundred percent of the time I used the wrong key. I'll bet if you paying attention to it, you use the wrong you about fifty percent at the time. That's Murphy's law. Well, then something's up. I also have my directional thing. I have a port into direction almost dude,

it's awful. I didn't know that almost a hundred percent of the time I will go the wrong way if faced with a choice, should I go this way or that way? And if I try to trick myself and go I want to go right, then I'm gonna go left. It was right nice. That's Murphy's law too. I know then it ruins my life. But you can't just hijack Murphy's law and slape your name on it. Those are Chuck's that's chuck ski law and Chuck's law of direction. Right,

that's Murphy's law. All right. If you want to learn more about Murphy's law and read my article on it. It was one of the first articles I wrote it. I like it. Um, you can type in Murphy's Law in the search bar at how stuff works dot com. Thank you for listening to this one twice. Yeah, thanks for doing it with me. Now, well it was it was Do we were due for this one? Yeah? Um, I think I said hand these first part, didn't I?

I think so? All right, Well that since it's time for what we're gonna wind up the old Facebook asked Jock and Chush questions and people did so you always get like a hundred of him in a couple of minutes. I have to shut it down. Yeah, people want to know, all right, So let's just run through some of these. Josh, you got one, go ahead, all right? Who's your favorite Simpsons character who was not a Simpson? Well? Cheers? And I even saw this one yesterday and I didn't it's

so hard. I like Lionel huts a lot. He was good. Um, I like uh, I like the whole Flanders family. I think Ned's a great complex character, like the one where he has the nervous breakdown. Yeah, and it turns out he was part of a spanking protocol research study. I like it when he's occasionally ripped. Yes, well he is all the time because sometimes he's wearing a shirt. Well, clearly different when like when when he's in the ski suit than when he's in his sweater. Yeah, that's most hilarious.

Stupid sexy Flanders. What about yours? I'm gonna go with a cop out. I'm gonna go with a pair with Ralphin and Chief Wigham. Yeah, they're good, pretty good. Or Smithers and Flanders. I mean that's those two that are hard to beat as a as a duo. I mean you can't leave out Seymour Skinner yeah boo yeah, or Barney. We can keep doing this for hours. Actually, I like mo are you a mo fame? Yeah? Huge mo fame? Okay, all right, we could do this for hours. Go ahead, Uh, Chuck,

do you have a job outside of the podcast? Um? I do. I'm the chef and housekeeper. At my home. I think I mean here. Oh no, do you not since when? Oh? Well yeah, sure we write stuff? Yeah right now, blog right quizzes? Do? Uh? We we manage Facebook? Can Twitter? We managed the stuff? You should know? Brandon? Uh, what do you want written on your tombstone? I don't you go ahead? How about died tragically rescuing his family from the wreckage of a destroyed sinking battleship. That is suspicion.

You're gonna say that. Yeah, that's a good one. Um. Oh that was Kelly Cronly. I'm sorry, and Drew Clinkole asked about The Simpsons. Thanks Drew and Kelly on my tombstone. I want to say what? Uh this is from trash Goblin Toby? Is this from Twitter? I guess it is. Have you seen Hodgeman's mustache in real life? And is it as scary as I have heard it is? We've both seen Hodgman's mustache in real life. It accidentally brushed my shoulder. I was like, like, how did that happen? Uh?

It is not scary. I think John wears it well. Yeah, and it's not an ironic mustache. He's grown his hair out a little bit. He turned off hippie, hasn't it? Yeah, it's kind of fun. He's like, I like it. Uh, let's see it. Could it be? This is from How Awesome is Joe? A k A Joe on Twitter? Okay, could it actually be possible for human to be raised by apes? Like Tarzan? I would say the answer is undeniably yes. Yeah, And I'm gonna wind it up for my last one with um something. People ask a lot

what does c O A mean? And that it's from Joseph Gubbles, do not explain it. That's a trick. He's been trying to figure it out forever and if he can't do it on his own, he has to figure it out on his own, Chuck, or else he's never gonna learn. All right. Uh sorry Joseph, but that was a SmackDown. Um, what's our favorite episode? Chuck? Of what of stuff? You should know? I thought were on the Simpson Oh man, I get asked this a lot I have.

It's always different today. I'm gonna go with um Lobotomyes, it's a good one. Nothing, none of them. It's there's just so many. I know, it's hard to choose. Like I'll look through occasionally in spot ones they're like, oh, how's it going. I don't think that because we're always assets and always say the same like five things like who lobotomy's body, farms, cannibalism, you know what. Um, I've recently listened to what is the FDA regular herbs. I think I was telling you good and that is worth

listening to again. All Right, some people you know are making their way through again. They've already made it through, and they've made it through. They're making it through again the whole catalog. I'm looking at you. OMG, Chris, there's a name for people like that, Josh Massacus. Super fans, same thing. Yes, if you are a super family want to hear from you always. We're pretty friendly guys, so we'll say hi back usually. UM. If we don't, don't

take it personally, keep saying high a lot of them. Twitter. Uh, that's s y s K Podcast is our Twitter handle. We're on Facebook at facebook dot com slash stuff You should know um and you can send us email like you just mentioned to Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast,

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