Programming Quotes - Page 2

• The generation of random numbers is too important to be left to chance.

  Robert Coveyou

  Learning, Numbers, Important

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• For every scientific (or engineering) action, there is an equal and opposite social reaction.

  Norman Ralph Augustine

  Engineering, Opposites, Action

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• When your language is nowhere near Turing-complete, syntactic sugar can be your friend.

  Eric S. Raymond

  Sugar, Language

  Eric S. Raymond (2001). “The Cathedral & the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary”, p.46, "O'Reilly Media, Inc."

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• Programming is similar to a game of golf. The point is not getting the ball in the hole but how many strokes it takes.

  Hayley Mills

  Learning, Golf, Games

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• Computers are good at following instructions, but not at reading your mind.

  Donald Knuth

  Funny Inspirational, Reading, Following Instructions

  Donald Ervin Knuth (1984). “The texbook”, Addison-Wesley Professional

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• It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we say about nature.

  Niels Bohr

  Learning, Thinking, Theoretical Physics

  "The philosophy of Niels Bohr" by Aage Petersen in "Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists", Volume 19, No. 7 (September 1963), as quoted in Abraham Pais "The Genius of Science: A Portrait Gallery" (p. 24), 2000, and in Paul McEvoy "Niels Bohr: Reflections on Subject and Object" (p. 291), October 2000.

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• I don't try to describe the future. I try to prevent it.

  Ray Bradbury

  Future, Trying, Describe Myself

  "Fictional character: Darien Fawkes". "The Invisible Man", www.imdb.com. 2000 - 2002.

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• It is tact that is golden, not silence.

  Samuel Butler

  Silence, Golden, Butlers

  Samuel Butler (2008). “The Note-books of Samuel Butler: Easyread Super Large 18pt Edition”, p.43, ReadHowYouWant.com

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• Nothing is so good as it seems beforehand.

  George Eliot

  Wisdom, Disappointment, Memorable

  George Eliot (2006). “Silas Marner: Literary Touchstone Edition”, p.155, Prestwick House Inc

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• The Nobel is a ticket to one's own funeral. No one has ever done anything after he got it.

  T. S. Eliot

  Funeral, Done, Tickets

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• You know that I write slowly. This is chiefly because I am never satisfied until I have said as much as possible in a few words, and writing briefly takes far more time than writing at length.

  Carl Friedrich Gauss

  Time, Writing, Math

  "Calculus Gems". Book by George F. Simmons, 1992.

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• When a philosopher says something that is true then it is trivial. When he says something that is not trivial then it is false.

  Carl Friedrich Gauss

  Truth, Philosopher, Corny

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• I mean the word proof not in the sense of the lawyers, who set two half proofs equal to a whole one, but in the sense of a mathematician, where half proof = 0, and it is demanded for proof that every doubt becomes impossible.

  Carl Friedrich Gauss

  Mean, Math, Two

  Letter to Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers on May 14, 1826. "Calculus Gems". Book by George F. Simmons, 1992.

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• It took us three years to build the NeXT computer. If we'd given customers what they said they wanted, we'd have built a computer they'd have been happy with a year after we spoke to them - not something they'd want now.

  Steve Jobs

  Years, Three, Want

  "The Entrepreneur of the Decade". Interview with Bo Burlingham, George Gendron, www.inc.com. April 1, 1989.

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• Praise or blame has but a momentary effect on the man whose love of beauty in the abstract makes him a severe critic on his own works.

  John Keats

  Men, Criticism, Blame

  John Keats (2015). “John Keats - The Man Behind The Lyrics: Life, letters, and literary remains: Complete Letters and Two Extensive Biographies of one of the most beloved English Romantic poets”, p.225, e-artnow

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• A list is only as strong as its weakest link.

  Donald Knuth

  Teamwork, Strong, Team Building

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• A successful person isn't necessarily better than her less successful peers at solving problems; her pattern-recognition facilities have just learned what problems are worth solving.

  Ray Kurzweil

  Successful, Peers, Patterns

  Ray Kurzweil (2000). “The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence”, p.100, Penguin

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• We appear to be programmed with the idea that there are 'things' outside of our self, and some are conscious, and some are not.

  Ray Kurzweil

  Self, Ideas, Conscious

  "Are We Spiritual Machines?". Live Chat, www.kurzweilai.net. July 24, 2002.

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• To the scientist there is the joy in pursuing truth which nearly counteracts the depressing revelations of truth.

  H. P. Lovecraft

  Depressing, Joy, Scientist

  H. P. Lovecraft (1999). “The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories”, p.321, Penguin

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• When a pianist sits down and does a virtuoso performance he is in a technical sense transmitting more information to a machine than any other human activity involving machinery allows.

  Robert Moog

  Doe, Machines, Down And

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• Computing is not about computers any more. It is about living.

  Nicholas Negroponte

  Learning, Technology, Computer Literacy

  Nicholas Negroponte (2015). “Being Digital”, p.6, Vintage

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• The irrationality of a thing is no argument against its existence, rather a condition of it.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Philosophical, Criminal Mind, Spirituality

  Friedrich Nietzsche, R. J. Hollingdale (1996). “Nietzsche: Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits”, p.182, Cambridge University Press

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• I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter.

  Blaise Pascal

  Time, Learning, Usual

  Lettres Provinciales no. 16 (1657) See Thoreau 34; WoodrowWilson 25

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• We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.

  Carl Sagan

  Motivational, Education, Ignorance

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.49, Ballantine Books

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• Fashion is something barbarous, for it produces innovation without reason and imitation without benefit.

  George Santayana

  Fashion, Political, Innovation

  1905-6 The Life of Reason,'Reason in Religion'.

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