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Scientists Define Murphy's Law
Jesrad writes "A mathematician, a psychologist and an economist commissioned by British Gas have finally put into mathematical terms what we all knew: that things don't just go wrong, they do so at the most annoying moment.The formula, ((U+C+I) x (10-S))/20 x A x 1/(1-sin(F/10)), indicates that to beat Murphy's Law (a.k.a. Sod's Law) you need to change one of the parameter: U for urgency, C for complexity, I for importance, S for skill, F for frequency and A for aggravation. Or in the researchers' own words: "If you haven't got the skill to do something important, leave it alone. If something is urgent or complex, find a simple way to do it. If something going wrong will particularly aggravate you, make certain you know how to do it." Don't you like it when maths back up common sense ?"
Women are evil.
Jesrad writes "A mathematician, a psychologist and an economist commissioned by British Gas have finally put into mathematical terms what we all knew: that things don't just go wrong, they do so at the most anno.... 503 service unavailable
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Quick, somebody start arguing about probability!
Now that we've written down Murphy's law, here's a bunch of other laws we can write down mathematically. I + B*E^ANS = 3SHI/TS LOG(T + A) = G/00.D/(L^A/Y) and for the final one Undescribable life bitching + mathematical formulas = Utter bullshit
Bumper sticker for me!
((U+C+I) x (10-S))/20 x A x 1/(1-sin(F/10))
Yeah baby! Learn it, live it, love it!
Actually, this formula is my life story in a nutshell.....
Since, after all, they included a sin() call. As everyone knows, it's not real math unless it includes a trigonometric function. And lots of parens. Gotta have lots of those.
Shame they didn't work in some of those cool Greek characters, though.
My friends love using quantifiers on values that can'be given a number:
:)
"I have hundreds of luck. HUNDREDS!"
So, what are the units of urgency, complexity, importance, skill, frequency and aggravation?
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no sig for you. come back one year.
And from today's joke at thehun.com (link not work safe!!) ...
From a strictly mathematical viewpoint it goes like this:
What makes 100%?
What does it mean to give MORE than 100%?
Ever wonder about these people who say they are giving more than 100%?
We have all been to these meetings where someone wants you to give over 100%
How about achieving 103%? What makes up 100% in life?
Here's a little mathematical formula that might help you answer these question.
If:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z is represented as:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.
Then:
H A R D W O R K
8+18+4+23+15+18+11 = 98%
K N O W L E D G E
11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%
But:
A T T I T U D E
1+20+20++9+20+21+4+5 = 100%
And:
B U L L S H I T
2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103%
AND, Look how far ass kissing will take you.
A S S K I S S I N G
1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7 = 118%
So, one can conclude with mathematical certainty that whilst hard work and knowledge will get you close, and attitude will get you there, it's the bullshit and ass kissing that will put you over the top.
Sure it works that way. Here's another mathematical formula for you:
sense_of_humor(/. user 26199) = 0
If you're looking for self help, why would you read a book written by somebody else?
That's not self help. That's help.
There's no such thing as self help. If you did it yourself, you didn't need help!
</Carlin>
So, when we're trying to estimate the parameters, we take logs and get:
log(U+C+I) + log(10-S) - log20 + logA - log(1-sin(F/10))
That means that we can estimate the effects of skill, aggravation and frequency separately, but the effects of urgency, complexity and importance can't be separated from one another.
I'm pretty sure there's some deep, philosophical meaning to that.
See what I've been reading.
I don't see how this particular formula is testable. How does one quantify urgency or aggravation in order to test the model? Methinks they left out the most important variable, B for Bullshit, measured in metric tons. ;)
The biggest dilemma is that this formula is just not testable. Clearly any test would be very Important and have to be carried out Frequently, and a test that covers all the situations to which Murphy's law might apply is clearly going to have to be Complex. So plugging all of that in, we see that, even if the formula is correct, all your attempts to verfiy it are doomed to failure!
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
Is actually an inverse corollary of the Schroedinger's cat equations:
"Anything that can go wrong, already has, but you won't observe it until the most critical time."
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
When asked why so many of his psychotherapy patients commit suicide, Dr. Lewis went on to say, "You're implying something went wrong. They would have become serial murderers or child rapists if I handn't helped them. Are you saying I should be aggravated over the outcome of having saved lives while protecting little children from molestation? If I didn't have the skills I have, you might not be standing here asking such questions, you Wanker."
Seastead this.
Murphy's Law: If it can go wrong it will
Sod's Law: It will go wrong at the worst posible time.
For example, the exclamation point key will stop working on a keyboard: Murphy's Law.
/. and completely reverse the subject's meaning: Sod's Law.
It'll do it when typing a subject into
And yes, it really did stop working. Bugger.
It's the outstanding skills that makes your chances to get laid negative
I think the problem is that the joke isn't funny. Since one of the distinguishing traits of a joke is being funny, this joke is hard to recognize as a joke.
To those who find this joke funny, I recommend suicide. You're perverting the one thing that could make the world a happier place.
You sure about that?
You want my job?
Follow me around for a day. You'll change your tune.
are trying to decide if girlfriends or wives are better.
./).
The economist says that wives are better because you have to spend more money on girlfriends.
The psychologist says that girlfriends are better because they make you feel younger.
The mathematician says that he prefers to have both. That way, his wife always thinks he's at his girlfriend's place, his girlfriend thinks he's at home, and he can go to the office and get some goddamn work done!
(Yes, I realize a joke about wives and girlfriends might be out of place on
Man will I get my coffee in this morning?
((U+C+I) x (10-S))/20 x A x 1/(1-sin(F/10))
Urgency = yeah I'd give that a 50, I mean it's pretty urgent.
Complexity = it's pretty simple so a 1.
Importance = it's not important for my boss, but really important for me, so a 400.
Skill = well a child or drunk person might have problems, so it sounds like a 4.
Frequency = well, I'll probably want 2 cups today.
Aggravation = yeah I'll get really aggrivated without my coffee, so 100 is about right.
Let's see plug all those in:
((50 + 1 + 400) x (10 - 4)) / 20 x 100 X 1/(1 - sin(2/10))
bust out calc.exe and punch in the numbers right:
1.3482771486352022902422017615702
Alright now I'm rocking. There is 1.3482771486352022902422017615702 that I'll get my 2 cups of coffee today. Glad that's straightened out.
PS. I think magic 8 ball is faster.
I have a short fuse, so:
((U+C+I) x (10-S))/20 x A x 1/(1-sin(F/10))
should be rewritten as:
((U+C+I) x (10-S))/20 x A^2 x 1/(1-sin(F/10))
!!
-bk
How does one quantify urgency
Fraction of bladder. 0 = bladder empty, no urgency. 1 = bladder full. Hoo boy, that's urgent.
I'd prefer to see it in terms of probabilistic unity, a decimal fraction. Then we can plug it into a good hot cup of tea, and blink across the multiverse. Trillian, I'm coming!
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make install -not war
You must be an engineer and a mathmatician.
Only an engineer would get something new and look for ways to break it.
Only a mathmatician could break it.
-Adam
the problem is that if you open one up to have a look, it's not black anymore, mainly because your letting too much light in.
and i'm sure the sheep wouldn't be happy about being opened up either
No beer, no TV make Lifthrasir something something