Murphy's Laws: The Ultimate Guide to Life's Inevitable Humor.

Ralph's Observation: It is a mistake to allow any mechanical object to realize that you are in a hurry.

Randolph's Cardinal Principle of Statecraft: Never needlessly disturb a thing at rest.

Rangnekar's Modified Rules Concerning Decisions:
If you must make a decision, delay it.
If you can authorize someone else to avoid a decision, do so.
If you can form a committee, have them avoid the decision.
If you can otherwise avoid a decision, avoid it immediately.

Rapoport's Rule of the Roller-Skate Key: Certain items which are crucial to a given activity will show up with uncommon regularity until the day when that activity is planned, at which point the item in question will disappear from the face of the earth.

Raskin's Zero Law: The more zeros found in the price tag for a government program, the less Congressional scrutiny it will receive.

Law of Raspberry Jam: The wider any culture is spread, the thinner it gets.

Rather's Rule: In dealing with the press do yourself a favor. Stick with one of three responses: (a) I know and I can tell you, (b) I know and I can't tell you, or (c) I don't know.

Rayburn's Rule: If you want to get along, go along.

Fundamental Tenet of Reform: Reforms come from below. No man with four aces howls for a new deal.

Law of Reruns: If you have watched a TV series only once, and you watch it again, it will be a rerun of the same episode.

Law of Research: Enough research will tend to support your theory.

Law of Restaurant Acoustics: In a restaurant with seats which are close to each other, one will always find the decibel level of the nearest conversation to be inversely proportional to the quality of the thought going into it.

Law of Revelation: The hidden flaw never remains hidden.

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

Third Law of Revision: If, when completion of a design is imminent, field dimensions are finally supplied as they actually are -- instead of as they were meant to be -- it is always easier to start all over.
Corollary: It is usually impractical to worry beforehand about interferences -- if you have none, someone will make one for you.

Fourth Law of Revision: After painstaking and careful analysis of a sample, you are always told that it is the wrong sample and doesn't apply to the problem.

Richard's Complementary Rules of Ownership:
If you keep anything long enough you can throw it away.
If you throw anything away, you will need it as soon as it is no longer accessible.

Richman's Inevitables of Parenthood:
Enough is never enough.
The sun always rises in the baby's bedroom window.
Birthday parties always end in tears.
Whenever you decide to take the kids home, it is always five minutes earlier that they break into fights, tears, or hysteria.

Riddle's Constant: There are coexisting elements in frustration phenomena which separate expected results from achieved results.

Riesman's Law: An inexorable upward movement leads administrators to higher salaries and narrower spans of control.

Rigg's Hypothesis: Incompetence tends to increase with the level of work performed. And, naturally, the individual's staff needs will increase as his level of incompetence increases.

Law of Road Construction: After large expenditures of federal, state, and county funds; after much confusion generated by detours and road blocks; after greatly annoying the surrounding population with noise, dust, and fumes -- the previously existing traffic jam is relocated by one-half mile.

Robertson's Law: Everything happens at the same time with nothing in between.

The Three Laws of Robotics:
A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.

Rodovic's Rule: In any organization, the potential is much greater for the subordinate to manage his superior than for the superior to manage his subordinate.

Rodriguez's Observation: A consultant is someone who, when hired to find out what time it is, borrows your watch to find out.
Corollary (Martin): If you hire a consultant to read your own watch to you, you got your money's worth.

Roemer's Law: The rate of hospital admissions responds to bed availability. If we insist on installing more beds, they will tend to get filled.

Roger's Ratio: One-third of the people in the United States promote, while the other two-thirds provide.

Rosenbaum's Rule: The easiest way to find something lost around the house is to buy a replacement.

Rosenfield's Regret: The most delicate component will be dropped.

Rosenstock-Huessy's Law of Technology: All technology expands the space, contracts the time, and destroys the working group.

(Al) Ross's Law: Bare feet magnetize sharp metal objects so they always point upward from the floor -- especially in the dark.

(Charles) Ross's Law: Never characterize the importance of a statement in advance.

Rudin's Law: In a crisis that forces a choice to be made among alternative courses of action, most people will choose the worse one possible.

Runamok's Law: There are four kinds of people: those who sit quietly and do nothing, those who talk about sitting quietly and doing nothing, those who do things, and those who talk about doing things.

Runyon's Law: The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that's the way to bet.

First Rule of Rural Mechanics: If it works, don't fix it.

Ryan's Law: Make three correct guesses consecutively and you will establish yourself as an expert.

Sadat's Reminder: Those who invented the law of supply and demand have no right to complain when this law works against their interest.

Sam's Axioms:
Any line, however short, is still too long.
Work is the crabgrass of life, but money is the water that keeps it green.

Sattinger's Law: It works better if you plug it in.

Sattler's Law: There are 32 points to the compass, meaning that there are 32 directions in which a spoon can squirt grapefruit; yet, the juice almost invariably flies straight into the human eye.

Saunders's Discovery: Laziness is the mother of nine inventions out of ten.

Sayre's Third Law of Politics: Academic politics is the most vicious and bitter form of politics, because the stakes are so low.

Schenk's First Principle of Industrial Market Economics: Good salesmen and good repairmen will never go hungry.

Schickel's TV Theorems:
Any dramatic series the producers want us to take seriously as a representation of contemporary reality cannot be taken seriously as a representation of anything -- except a show to be ignored by anyone capable of sitting upright in a chair and chewing gum simultaneously.
The only programs a grown-up can possibly stand are those intended for children. Or, more properly, those that cater to those pre-adolescent fantasies that most have never abandoned.

Schmidt's Law: Never eat prunes when you're hungry.

Schmidt's Law (probably a different Schmidt): If you mess with something long enough, it'll break.

Schuckit's Law: All interference in human conduct has the potential for causing harm, no matter how innocuous the procedure may be.

Schultze's Law: If you can't measure output, then you measure input.

Schumpeter's Observation of Scientific and Nonscientific Theories: Any theory can be made to fit any facts by means of appropriate additional assumptions.

Old Scottish Prayer: O Lord, grant that we may always be right, for Thou knowest we will never change our minds.

Scott's First Law: No matter what goes wrong, it will probably look right.

Scott's Second Law: When an error has been detected and corrected, it will be found to have been correct in the first place.
Corollary: After the correction has been found in error, it will be impossible to fit the original quantity back into the equation.

Screwdriver Syndrome: Sometimes, where a complex problem can be illuminated by many tools, one can be forgiven for applying the one he knows best.

Segal's Law: A man with one watch knows what time it is; a man with two watches is never sure.

Law of Selective Gravity (the Buttered Side Down Law): An object will fall so as to do the most damage.
Corollary (Klipstein): The most delicate component will be the one to drop.

Sells's Law: The first sample is always the best.

Laws of Serendipity:
In order to discover anything you must be looking for something.
If you wish to make an improved product, you must already be engaged in making an inferior one.