Hanlon's Razor

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The English term Hanlon's Razor (German: Hanlon's razor ) describes a proverb that says something about the most likely cause of human error. "Do not write to the malice, as evidenced by: It is stupidity is sufficiently explained" (English: Never attribute to malice That Which can be perform adequately explained 'by stupidity ). Or, in short: “Do not assume malice when stupidity is enough” (English: Never assume malice when stupidity will suffice ).

Hanlon's razor concerns the phenomenon of incorrect causal attribution ( causal attribution ). It is similar to Occam's razor , the principle of giving preference to the simplest explanation of a condition.

Origin and naming

One of two explanations of origins is that Robert J. Hanlon was a real person and this saying can be ascribed to him. According to the theory, the saying came as a letter from Hanlon in Murphy's Law Book Two , published in 1980 . More Reasons Why Things Go Wrong .

The other popular explanation for its origins attributes the proverb to science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein ; the spelling "Robert Hanlon" is a misspelling or corruption of "Robert Heinlein". In the short story Logic of Empire or German auction on Venus from 1941, Heinlein writes:

"You have attributed conditions to villainy that simply result from stupidity."

"You have attributed circumstances to villainy that are based solely on stupidity."

use

Hanlon's Razor is often used to reject conspiracy theories . With this in mind, for example, Bernard Ingham , Margaret Thatcher's press secretary said :

“Many journalists have fallen for the conspiracy theory of government. I do assure you that they would produce more accurate work if they adhered to the cock-up theory. "

“A lot of journalists fall for the theory that there is a conspiracy behind the government. I can assure you that they did a better job assuming they were botched instead. "

- Sir Bernard Ingham

With this statement, Ingham coined the English motto Cock-up before conspiracy ("botch instead of conspiracy"), which can be seen as a laconic variant of Hanlon's razor.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Joseph Bigler: First email to Quentin Stafford-Fraser
  2. ^ Joseph Bigler: Second email to Quentin Stafford-Fraser
  3. ↑ Arthur Bloch: Murphy's Law Book Two. More Reasons Why Things Go Wrong. Price Stern Sloan, Los Angeles 1980, ISBN 0-417-06450-0 , p. 52.
  4. ^ Robert A. Heinlein: Logic of Empire. In: Astounding Science-Fiction. March 1941. Published in book form in The Past Through Tomorrow , among others . Putnam, New York 1967, ISBN 0-441-65304-9 (new edition in paperback).
  5. ^ Robert A. Heinlein: Auction on the Venus. In: The green hills of the earth. Goldmann, Munich 1964.
  6. ^ Steve Clarke: Conspiracy Theories and Conspiracy Theorizing . In: Philosophy of the Social Sciences 32/2 (2002), pp. 144-147
  7. ↑ What quote