December 02, 2003
Good Judgement Comes From Experience
Good judgement comes from experience
Experience comes from bad judgement
--The Murphy's Law Calendar (circa 1987)
This epigram is an old favorite of ours, and evidently quite a few others. I tried tracking it down, and came up with a gaggle of purported attributions, going back as far as Mark Twain. I'd like to believe the Twain attribution, but I've yet to find a solid citation for its source. The quip appears without attribution in a number of places, leading me to wonder if anyone really knows where it came from...
The remark has been variously attributed to:
Barry Le Patner
Jim Horning
Fred Brooks
General Bolivar Buckner
Rita Mae Brown
Will Rogers
Buster Bunny
Bob Packwood
Mickey Mouse
Texas Bix
Anonymous
Cousin Woodman
Mark Lacas
Arthur Jones
DC Stultz
Evan Hardin
Robert Kennedy
Lazarus Long
An Australian Aviation Magazine
Mark Twain
If you want people to always say "As Thomas Jay Peckish always says" before they say something, then Thomas Jay Peckish has to always say it...
--Thomas Jay Peckish II