On 04-14-98 Frank Masingill wrote to All... 
 FM>    How quickly it could all end as though in a flash of lightening.  A 
 FM> sudden diminution in the availability of fuel, a breakdown ... 
Perhaps you recall James Burke's 'Connections' series on TV; this 
series began with him standing in the machine shed of some modern 
agribusiness operation with the behemoth tractors outside, and in 
the building, all the tools, chemicals, and equipment used to get 
the crop in the ground. 
 
He walks over to the main, and trips the breakers, and poses just 
such a question by pointing out, that if the electricity stopped, 
the fuel could not be pumped into the tractor; the crop would not 
be put in the ground, much less cultivated or controlled for bugs 
and weeds, nor harvested. 
 
In the years since then, I've also become aware that agribusiness 
has to confer with the bankers to buy the latest hybrid and then, 
and *only* then, is the crop put in the ground. 
 
But, as long as the electricity and the money and the seed arives 
on time, it is all marvelously efficient, and produces all of the 
bounty you note at the market.  If it ever does not, then we will 
no doubt, cite Murphy's law, which would also suggest, that if we 
take steps to avoid catastrophy, they are the wrong steps. 
 
From the standpoint of philosophy, is Murphy's law correct? 
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