List of eponymous laws

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This list of eponymous laws provides links to articles on laws, adages, and other succinct observations or predictions named after a person. In some cases the person named has coined the law — such as Parkinson's law. In others, the work or publications of the individual have led to the law being so named — as is the case with Moore's law. There are also laws ascribed to individuals by others, such as Murphy's law; or given eponymous names despite the absence of the named person.

Contents

[edit] A

[edit] B–D

[edit] E–G

[edit] H–K

  • Hanlon's razor — A corollary of Finagle's law, normally taking the form "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.". As with Finagle, possibly not strictly eponymous. Alternately, "Do not invoke conspiracy as explanation when ignorance and incompetence will suffice, as conspiracy implies intelligence."
  • Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle — States that one cannot measure values (with arbitrary precision) of certain conjugate quantities, which are pairs of observables of a single elementary particle. The most familiar of these pairs is the position and momentum.
  • Hebb's law states that "Neurons that fire together wire together."
  • Henry's law — The mass of a gas that dissolves in a definite volume of liquid is directly proportional to the pressure of the gas provided the gas does not react with the solvent.
  • Herblock's law states that "If it's good, they'll stop making it." Possibly coined by Herbert Lawrence Block, whose pen name was Herblock.
  • Hofstadter's law — "It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law." It was created by Douglas Hofstadter in his book Gödel, Escher, Bach.
  • Hooke's law — The tension on a spring or other elastic object is proportional to the displacement from the equilibrium. Frequently cited in Latin as "Ut tensio sic vis." Named after Robert Hooke (1635–1703)
  • Hotelling's law in economics — Under some conditions, it is rational for competitors to make their products as nearly identical as possible.
  • Hubble's law — Galaxies recede from an observer at a rate proportional to their distance to that observer. Formulated by Edwin Hubble in 1929.
  • Hutber's law — "Improvement means deterioration". Coined by financial journalist Patrick Hutber.
  • Hume's Law — In meta-ethics, the assertion that normative statements cannot be deduced exclusively from descriptive statements.
  • Isaac Bonewits laws of magic - "laws" synthesized from a multitude of belief systems from around the world, collected in order to explain and categorize magical beliefs within a cohesive framework, by Isaac Bonewits.
  • Kepler's laws of planetary motion — govern the motion of the planets around the sun, and were first discovered by Johannes Kepler
  • Kerckhoffs' law on secure cryptography by Auguste Kerckhoffs a cryptosystem should be secure even if everything about the system, except the key, is public knowledge
  • Keynes' Law — Demand creates its own supply
  • Kirchhoff's laws — one law in thermodynamics and two about electrical circuits, named after Gustav Kirchhoff.
  • Kranzberg's First Law of Technology - Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral. [1]

[edit] L–M

  • Leibniz's law — a principle in metaphysics also known as the Identity of Indiscernibles. It states: If two objects have all their properties in common, then they are one and the same object.
  • Linus's law — named for Linus Torvalds, states "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow".
  • Little's law, in queuing theory, says The average number of customers in a stable system (over some time interval) is equal to their average arrival rate, multiplied by their average time in the system. The law was named for John Little from results of experiments in 1961.
  • Littlewood's law — States that individuals can expect miracles to happen to them, at the rate of about one per month. Coined by Professor J E Littlewood, (1885–1977)
  • Meadow's law is a precept, now discredited, that since cot deaths are so rare, "One is a tragedy, two is suspicious and three is murder, until proved otherwise." It was named for Sir Roy Meadow, a discredited paediatrician prominent in the United Kingdom in the last quarter of the twentieth century.
  • Metcalfe's law — In communications and network theory, states that the value of a system grows as approximately the square of the number of users of the system. Framed by Robert Metcalfe in the context of the ethernet.
  • Moore's law — An empirical observation stating that the complexity of integrated circuits doubles every 24 months. Outlined in 1965 by Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel
  • Moynihan's law — "The amount of violations of human rights in a country is always an inverse function of the amount of complaints about human rights violations heard from there. The greater the number of complaints being aired, the better protected are human rights in that country." Coined by Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1927–2003).
  • Muphry's law — "if you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written", first described by Australian editor John Bangsund in 1992. Name derived from Murphy's law.
  • Murphy's law — Ascribed to Edward A. Murphy, Jr. who stated "If there's more than one way to do a job, and one of those ways will end in disaster, then someone will do it that way."

[edit] N–Q

  • Newton's laws of motion — In physics, three scientific laws concerning the behaviour of moving bodies, which are fundamental to classical mechanics (and since Einstein, which are valid only within inertial reference frames). Discovered and stated by Isaac Newton (1643– 1727).
    • First law: A body remains at rest, or moves in a straight line (at a constant velocity), unless acted upon by a net outside force.
    • Second law: The acceleration of an object of constant mass is proportional to the force acting upon it.
    • Third law: Whenever one body exerts force upon a second body, the second body exerts an equal and opposite force upon the first body.
  • Newton's law of cooling — the rate of cooling (or heating) of a body due to convection is proportional to the difference between the body temperature and the ambient temperature.
  • Occam's razor — States that explanations should never multiply causes without necessity. When two explanations are offered for a phenomenon, the simplest full explanation is preferable. Named after William of Ockham (ca.1285–1349)
  • Ohm's law — In physics, states that the ratio of the potential difference (or voltage drop) between the ends of a conductor (and resistor) to the current flowing through it is a constant, provided the temperature also does not change. Discovered and named after Georg Simon Ohm (1789–1854).
  • Okrent's Law – The pursuit of balance can create imbalance because sometimes something is true. Stated by Daniel Okrent, first Public Editor for The New York Times
  • Pareto principle — States that for many phenomena 80% of consequences stem from 20% of the causes. Named after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, but framed by management thinker Joseph M. Juran.
  • Parkinson's law — "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." Coined by C. Northcote Parkinson(1909–1993), who also coined its corollary, "Expenditure rises to meet income." In computers - Programs expand to fill all available memory.
  • Peter principle — "In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence." Coined by Dr. Laurence J. Peter (1919–1990) in his book The Peter Principle. In his follow-up book, The Peter Prescription, he offered possible solutions to the problems his Principle could cause.
  • Planck's law - In physics, given a black body at a given temperatures, describes the spectral radiance of the object. After Max Planck
  • Poe's Law - That there is a maximum desirable length for poems: "the unit of poetry must be fixed by the reader's capacity of attention, and ... the limits of a poem must accord with the limits of a single movement of intellectual apprehension and emotional exaltation". Named for Edgar Allan Poe.[2][3] See "The Philosophy of Composition".
  • Poisson's Law of Large Numbers — For independent random variables with a common distribution, the average value for a sample tends to the mean as sample size increases. Named after Siméon-Denis Poisson (1781–1840) and derived from "Recherches sur la probabilité des jugements en matière criminelle et en matière civile" (1837; "Research on the Probability of Criminal and Civil Verdicts").
  • Premack's principle — More probable behaviors will reinforce less probable behaviors. Named by David Premack (1925 - ) [Roeckelein, Dictionary of Theories, Laws, and Concepts in Psychology, Greenwood, 1998 ISBN 0313304602 548 pages page 384]

[edit] R–T

  • Raoult's law — In chemistry, Raoult's law states that the vapor pressure of mixed liquids is dependent on the vapor pressures of the individual liquids and the molar vulgar fraction of each present in solution.
  • Reed's law is the assertion of David P. Reed that the utility of large networks, particularly social networks, can scale exponentially with the size of the network.
  • Reilly's law — of Retail Gravitation, people generally patronize the largest mall in the area.
  • Roemer's law — a hospital bed built is a bed filled
  • Rothbard's law — everyone specializes in his own area of weakness.
  • Salem hypothesis — the conjecture that an education in the engineering disciplines forms a predisposition to Scientific Creationism
  • Sarnoff's law — the value of a broadcast network is proportional to the number of viewers.
  • Say's law — attributed to economist Jean-Baptiste Say and contrasted to Keynes' law (discussed above), saying that "supply creates its own demand," i.e., that if businesses produce more output in a free market economy, the wages and other payment for productive inputs will provide sufficient demand so that there is no general glut[1].
  • Sayre's law — "In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the stakes at issue." By way of corollary, the law adds: "That is why academic politics are so bitter."
  • Schneier's Law - "Any person can invent a security system so clever that she or he can't think of how to break it."
  • Segal's law — "A man with a watch knows what time it is. A man with two watches is never sure."
  • Shermer's Last Law — a corollary of Clarke's three laws, it states that "Any sufficiently advanced alien intelligence is indistinguishable from God." Originally posited in Shermer's "Skeptic" column in the Jan 2002 issue of Scientific American.
  • Skitt's law — a corollary of Muphry's law, variously expressed as "any post correcting an error in another post will contain at least one error itself" or "the likelihood of an error in a post is directly proportional to the embarrassment it will cause the poster."
  • Smeed's Law — an empirical rule relating traffic fatalities to traffic congestion as measured by the proxy of motor vehicle registrations and country population. After R. J. Smeed. [2]
  • Snell's law is the simple formula used to calculate the refraction of light when traveling between two media of differing refractive index. It is named after one of its discoverers, Dutch mathematician Willebrord van Roijen Snell (1580–1626).
  • Stang's law — a Proto-Indo-European phonological rule named after Norwegian linguist Christian Stang. The law governs the word-final sequences of a vowel, followed by a laryngeal or a semivowel */y/ or */w/, followed by a nasal, and according to the law those sequences are simplified in a way that laryngeals and semivowels are dropped, with compensatory lengthening of a preceding vowel.
  • Stevens' power law — In physics this law relates the intensity of a stimulus to its perceived strength. It supersedes the Weber-Fechner law, since it can describe a wider range of sensations. The theory is named after its inventor, S. Smith Stevens (1906–1973).
  • Stigler's law — No scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer, named by statistician Stephen Stigler who attributes it to sociologist Robert K. Merton, making the law self-referential.
  • Stokes' law — an expression for the frictional force exerted on spherical objects with very small Reynolds numbers, named for George Gabriel Stokes, (1819–1903)
  • Sturgeon's law — "Nothing is always absolutely so." Derived from a quote by science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon (1918–1985)
  • Sturgeon's revelation — "90 percent of everything is crap."
  • Sutton's law — "'Go where the money is'". Often cited in medical schools to teach new doctors to spend resources where they are most likely to pay off. The law is named after bank robber Willie Sutton, who when asked why he robbed banks is claimed to have answered "Because that's where the money is."
  • Szemerényi's law — a Proto-Indo-European phonological rule, named after Hungarian linguist Oswald Szemerényi, according to which word-final clusters of vowels (V), resonants (R) and of either */s/ or */h₂/ are simplified by dropping the word-final fricative (*/h₂/ was phonetically itself probably a back fricative), with compensatory lengthening of the preceding vowel.
  • Thomas theorem - "If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.", a social law as far as there are any. (after W.I. Thomas and D.S. Thomas)

[edit] U–Z

  • Verdoorn's Law — named after Dutch economist, Jake Verdoorn. In economics, this law pertains to the relationship between the growth of output and the growth of productivity. According to the law, faster growth in output increases productivity due to increasing returns.
  • Verner's law — Stated by Karl Verner in 1875, Verner's law describes a historical sound change in the Proto-Germanic language whereby voiceless fricatives *f, *þ, *s and *x, when immediately following an unstressed syllable in the same word, underwent voicing and became respectively *b, *d, *z and *g.
  • Weber-Fechner law — This law named after the Germans Ernst Heinrich Weber and Gustav Theodor Fechner attempts to describe the human perception of various physical stimuli. In most cases, Stevens' power law gives a more accurate description.
  • Wiener's Law There are no answers, only cross-references. (Norbert Wiener was the classic absent-minded professor) [4]
  • Wike's law of low odd primes "If the number of experimental treatments is a low odd prime number, then the experimental design is unbalanced and partially confounded" (Wike, 1973, pp. 192-193).[5]
  • Wiltshire's Law of Explanation "To define is to limit" (Nevsky, 1964, pp. 65-68).[6]
  • Wirth's law — Software gets slower faster than hardware gets faster.
  • Zawinski's law — Every program attempts to expand until it can read mail. Those programs which cannot so expand are replaced by ones which can.
  • Zipf's law — in linguistics, the observation that the frequency of use of the nth-most-frequently-used word in any natural language is approximately inversely proportional to n, or, more simply, that a few words are used very often, but many or most are used rarely. Named after George Kingsley Zipf (1902–1950), whose statistical work research led to the observation. More generally, the term Zipf's law refers to the probability distributions involved, which are applied by statisticians not only to linguistics but also to fields remote from that.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Evolution_of_Technology/Tech-OV1.htm
  2. ^ Murry, John M. (1923/1969). Pencillings. Ayer Publishing. p. 88. ISBN 0836912292. http://books.google.com/books?id=DV76OQAACAAJ. 
  3. ^ Eliot, TS. Chapbook. http://books.google.com/books?id=uYiRAAAAIAAJ.  as cited in Monte, Steven (2000). Invisible fences: prose poetry as a genre in French and American literature. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. pp. 145. ISBN 0-8032-3211-X. 
  4. ^ Neil, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Health Fair, Virtualbookworm, 2002 page 165)
  5. ^ Wike, E. L. (1973). Water beds and sexual satisfaction: Wike’s law of low odd primes (WLLOP). Psychological Reports, 33, 192-194.
  6. ^ James, S. F. (1964). Meditations on Mankind. Thompson Manifests, 13, pp65-68.
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