[off topic] Ig Nobel Prizes

Slashdot has just reminded me that Radio 4 this morning was reporting on this year's Ig Nobel prizes.  (I really miss Radio 4 when I'm in the States...)

The Ig Nobel prizes are awards for research that “makes you LAUGH and then makes you THINK”.  My favourite one is the research that London Cabbies brains structurally change as a result of doing The Knowledge (basically learning where every road in London is and where it goes).

The one that's not entirely off-topic for us geeks out there is the full definition of Murphy's Law, which apparently is based on a principle of engineering.  The popular understanding is “If anything can go wrong, it will”, but the full definition is actually “If there are two or more ways to do something, and one of those ways can result in a catastrophe, someone will do it”. 

See - now to me, that makes Murphy's Law relate much more strongly to development than I thought it did previously.  The popular definition implies to me that the ability to control Murphy's Law is well out of your hands - it's almost about the fact that sometimes the universe completely screws you and there ain't nothing you can do about it.  I guess the full definition, seeing as it has an engineering heritage, is much more about not assuming your user/customer isn't going to screw themselves (and therefore you) because of some crappy bit of testing or design you did.