Talk:Hanlon's razor

Evidence against

The entire article (and mostly the French one, too) assumes that this law is valid, and busies itself with questions of prior publication. I think it would be less biased if it acknowledged that there are evil people in the world. Those of us who've had the misfortune to spend the early 21st Century in the United States certainly have plenty of evidence that Hanlon's Razor correctly describes the rank-and-file Republicans who really do take horse deworming medicine while rejecting the vaccines. To my surprise, even those right-wing talk radio hosts who are dying of COVID-19 turn out to be stupid rather than evil. But we also have plenty of evidence that almost all Republican Members of Congress will admit in private that Trump lost the election and that his movement is leading the country toward fascism, but insist on the opposite in public because they (probably correctly) believe they would be removed from office in the next Republican primaries if they spoke the truth. It doesn't seem to me that this behavior can be attributed to stupidity or to ignorance.

If I'm wrong about that, the article should still address the question. Is Trump stupid, or evil? It matters a lot. If Wikipedia is going to come down on the side of Trump-is-stupid, it needs to address the evidence to the contrary and explain why the principle still applies.

Although I like to think that naked evil in politics is a new phenomenon in this century, the whole question of slavery suggests the contrary. The article should discuss that too. Briankharvey (talk) 08:34, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Late reply but it's a philosophical razor, a rule of thumb, not an absolute. I understand your frustration but philosophical razors tend to be pithy aphorisms that are mostly true but not scientifically or rigorously tested (and weren't meant to be). Jasonkwe (talk) (contribs) 16:11, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

sorry, but a speculative statement like "I think it would be less biased if it acknowledged that there are evil people in the world" falls foul of WP:NOTFORUM. Does "evil" exist? Arguably not. Does ignorance exist? Certainly. Acousmana 16:20, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

Origin of the term "Hanlon's razor"

The Wikipedia article states that the adage became known as Hanlon's razor in 1990. But Wiktionary has a quotation from a 1980 Playboy interview which can be easily verified to use the term! It's on column 1 of this page: [1]. 70.172.194.25 (talk) 16:32, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

Good find - I think it would be worth including in the previous paragraph on the Murphy's Law book, which also appeared in 1980? I guess the Murphy's Law book appeared in Jan 1980, while the Playboy appeared in October 1980, so the book may well be the source of the usage in Playboy? David Malone (talk) 19:49, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

I reorganized the relevant paragraphs to clarify the chronology once more. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 19:59, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

Excellent find @70.172.194.25:! And thanks to @Robin Lionheart: for originally adding that example w/ its source. Jasonkwe (talk) (contribs) 16:18, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

Links for updates

I don't have time to do related mods this year, though someday I might get to it. In the mean time, Quote Investigator has far more detailed information at https://quoteinvestigator.com/2016/12/30/not-malice/.

An important point is that the Jargon File's attribution to William James is incorrect. (Note that the WP article only links to WJ, not to a specific work.) The correct cite is to William James Lindlay. https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Royal_Academy_Its_Uses_and_Abuses/IKYaAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22most+men,+do+it+with+no+malice+at+all%3B+in+fact,+far+from+it,+it+is+more+like+stupidity%22&pg=PA115&printsec=frontcover Paleolith (talk) 20:56, 24 December 2022 (UTC)