Episode 36: Leges Eponymae

Nullius in Verba

In this episode, we discuss a fun mix of eponymous laws, which are laws named after individuals who postulate them.

Shownotes

• Campbell, D. T. (1979). Assessing the impact of planned social change. Evaluation and Program Planning, 2(1), 67–90. https://doi.org/10.1016/0149-7189(79)90048-X
• Merton, R. K. (1995). The Thomas Theorem and the Matthews Effect. Social Forces, 74(2), 379–422.
• Stigler, S. M. (1980). Stigler’s Law of Eponymy*. Transactions of the New York Academy of Sciences, 39(1 Series II), 147–157. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2164-0947.1980.tb02775.x
• Clarke, A. C. (Arthur C. (1962). Profiles of the future: An inquiry into the limits of the possible. New York : Bantam Books. http://archive.org/details/profilesoffuture00clar
• Brandolini’s Law: Based on a tweet, after reading Kahneman Thinking fast and slow: https://twitter.com/ziobrando/status/289635060758507521
• Preston, I. L. (1980). Researchers at the Federal Trade Commission—Peril and Promise. Current Issues and Research in Advertising, 3(1), 1–15.
• Twyman’s Law: “The more unusual or interesting the data, the more likely they are to have been the result of an error of one kind or another.” Earliest scholarly reference is in Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Series A, Vol 138, No 4, 1975. The Teaching of Statistics by A. S. C. Ehrenberg.
• Bloch, A. (1990). Murphy's law complete: All the reasons why everything goes wrong. Arrow Books Limited.