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PaperclipPerfector  4mo ago (text post)   4223 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 10, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

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Most people here will be familiar with the "This never happens...actually it's a good thing!" sequence. Is there a name for this? I feel like I've heard a name for it before, but I can't remember where (probably here) or what it was.

Also, does anyone know where this was first described?

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-law-of-merited-impossibility/

Michael Anton calls it the Celebration Parallax, and Rod Dreher calls it the Law of Merited Impossibility.

If you want to keep the law form, Anton calls it the Law of Salutary Contradiction, in the same essay.

Celebration Parallax is very closely related, though.

The Narcissist’s Prayer is how it’s usually described.

I heard it as the Law of Merited Impossibility or the Narcissist's Prayer (it's form is a bit different, but expresses the same sentiment).

The Law of Merited Impossibility wasn't what I was thinking of, because it was definitely a sequence of assertions, shifting over time as earlier stages become untenable. The Narcissist's Prayer is much more similar to what I had in mind. The name doesn't ring a bell, but maybe that was it.

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