James Thornton

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JamesThornton.com Theory March 15, 2001

James Thornton's Theory-of-the-Week, March 15, 2001: Godwin's Law [Usenet] "As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one." There is a tradition in many groups that, once this occurs, that thread is over, and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever argument was in progress. Godwin's Law thus practically guarantees the existence of an upper bound on thread length in those groups. However there is also a widely- recognized codicil that any intentional triggering of Godwin's Law in order to invoke its thread-ending effects will be unsuccessful. Eric S. Raymond (compiler), New Hacker's Dictionary (The MIT Press, Cambridge, M.A., 1996)

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