Law of Research

Enough research will tend to support your theory.

Gordon's First Law

If a project is not worth doing at all, it's not worth doing well.

Cahn's Axiom

When all else fails, read the instructions.

Anthony's Law of Force

Don't force it - get a bigger hammer.

Schmidt's Law

If you mess with a thing long enough, it'll break.

Lowery's Law

If it jams - force it. If it breaks, it needed replacing anyway.

Sattinger's Law

It works better if you plug it in.

Wyszkowski's Second Law

Anything can be made to work if you fiddle with it long enough.

Law of Selective Gravity

An object will fall so as to do the most damage.

Jennings' Corollary: The chance of the bread falling with the butter side down is directly proportional to the value of the carpet.

Law of the Perversity of Nature

You cannot successfully determine beforehand which side of the bread to butter.

Shaw's Principle

Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it.

Lubarsky's Law of Cybernetic Entomology

There's always one more bug.

First Law of Revision

Information necessitating a change of design will be conveyed to the designer after - and only after - the plans are complete. (Often called the 'Now They Tell Us' Law)

Corollary : In simple cases, presenting one obvious right way versus one obvious wrong way, it is often wiser to choose the wrong way, so as to expedite subsequent revision.

Second Law of Revision

he more innocuous the modification appears to be, the further its influence will extend and the more plans will have to be redrawn.

Etorre's Observation

The other line moves faster.

The Airplane Law

When the plane you are on is late, the plane you want to transfer to is on time.

The Laws of Gardening

• Other people's tools work only in other people's yards.
• Fancy gizmos don't work.
• If nobody uses it, there's a reason.
• You get the most of what you need the least.

Lewis' Law

No matter how long or hard you shop for an item, after you've bought it, it will be on sale somewhere cheaper.

Glatum's Law of Materialistic Acquisitiveness

The perceived usefulness of an article is inversely proportional to its actual usefulness once bought and paid for.

Laws of Computer Programming

I. Any given program, when running, is obsolete.
II. Any given program costs more and takes longer.
III. If a program is useful, it will have to be changed.
IV. If a program is useless, it will have to be documented.
V. Any program will expand to fill available memory.
VI. The value of a program is proportional to the weight of its output.
VII. Program complexity grows until it exceeds the capabilities of the programmer who must maintain it.
VIII. Any non-trivial program contains at least one bug.
IX. Undetectable errors are infinite in variety, in contrast to detectable errors, which by definition are limited.
X. Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.

Klipstein's Law

Tolerances will accumulate unidirectionally toward maximum difficulty of assembly.

Klipstein's Second Law

You never find a lost article until you replace it.

Non-Reciprocal Law of Expectations

Negative expectations yield negative results. Positive expectations yield negative results.

Zymurgy's First Law of Evolving Systems Dynamics

Once you open a can of worms, the only way to recan them is to use a bigger can.

Howe's Law

Everyone has a scheme that will not work.

Commoner's Second Law of Ecology

Nothing ever goes away.

Ehrman's Commentary

Things will get worse before they will get better. Who said things would get better?

Ginsberg's Restatement of the Three Laws of Thermodynamics

• You can't win. 
• You can't break even. 
• You can't quit.

Rudin's Law

In crises that force people to choose among alternative courses of action, most people will choose the worst one possible.

Gumperson's Law

The probability of anything happening is in inverse ratio to its desirability.

Finagle's First Law

If an experiment works, something has gone wrong.

Finagle's Second Law

No matter what the experiment's result, there will always be someone eager to:

1. misinterpret it;
2. fake it; or 
3. believe it supports his own pet theory.

Finagle's Third Law

In any collection of data, the figure most obviously correct, beyond all need of checking, is the mistake.

Finagle's Fourth Law

Once a job is fouled up, anything done to improve it only makes it worse.

Scott's Second Law

When an error has been detected and corrected, it will be found to have been correct in the first place.