The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not "Eureka!", but "That's funny...". - Isaac Asimov
I am not young enough to know everything. - Oscar Wilde
We're better at stuff because we've figured out how to become better. Talent is not a thing; it's a process. - David Shenk in his book "The Genius In All Of Us"
We teach math and literature and we don't necessarily expect students to become mathematicians or writers or poets. We should teach computer science without necessarily expecting students to become programmers or computer scientists. But, the moment students decide to take no more computing-related courses they should listen carefully. They might be able to hear the sound of closing doors. - Haggai Mark (paraphrasing James Caballero)
You think you know when you learn, are more sure when you can write, even more when you can teach, but certain when you can program. - Alan Perlis
Knowledge is one. Its division into subjects is a concession to human weakness. - Halford John Mackinder
The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder. - Ralph Sockman
Formalism First = Rigor Mortis 1. Intuition First = Rigor's Mortise 2 - Charles F. Van Loan
The better we get at getting better, the faster we will get better. - Doug Engelbart
It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer. - Albert Einstein
Daring ideas are like chessmen moving forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Computers are to computing as instruments are to music. Software is the score whose interpretations amplifies our reach and lifts our spirits. Leonardo da Vinci called music the shaping of the invisible, and his phrase is even more apt as a description of software. - Alan Kay
Computer science is no more about computers (or programming languages) than astronomy is about telescopes. - (mis)attributed to Edsger Wybe Dijkstra
Computer programming is an art, because it applies accumulated knowledge to the world, because it requires skill and ingenuity, and especially because it produces objects of beauty. A programmer who subconsciously views himself as an artist will enjoy what he does and will do it better. - Donald Knuth
An ancient programmer’s proverb: “Hours of coding can save minutes of design.” (anonymous)
A (programming) language that doesn't affect the way you think about life (and problem solving), is not worth knowing. - Haggai Mark (paraphrasing Alan Perlis)
It goes against the grain of modern education to teach students to program. What fun is there to making plans, acquiring discipline, organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail, and learning to be self critical. - Alan Perlis
It is software that gives form and purpose to a programmable machine, much as a sculptor shapes clay. - Alan Kay
There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult. - C.A.R. Hoare
The programmer, like the poet, works only slightly removed from pure thought-stuff. He builds his castles in the air, from air, creating by exertion of the imagination. Few media of creation are so flexible, so easy to polish and rework, so readily capable of realizing grand conceptual structures. - Frederick P. Brooks
If debugging is the process of removing software bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra
I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. - Richard Feynman
When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. - Helen Keller
You don't want a million answers as much as you want a few forever questions. The questions are diamonds you hold in the light. Study a lifetime and you see different colors from the same jewel. - Richard Bach
Often when you think you're at the end of something, you're at the beginning of something else. - Fred Rogers
Some men went fishing in the sea with a net, and upon examining what they caught they concluded that there was a minimum size to the fish in the sea. - Richard Hamming
There is broad consensus among researchers of expert performance that inborn talent does not account for much more than a threshold; you have to have a minimum amount of natural ability to get started in a sport or profession. After that, the people who excel are the ones who work the hardest. - Mary Poppendieck
A Brief, Incomplete, and Mostly Wrong History of Programming Languages (where you shouldn't believe anything3 except for the names and places; maybe...)
To Err is Human (Douglas Hofstadter)
1 - Rigor Mortis - when the limbs of a corpse become stiff and difficult to move or manipulate.
2 - Mortise - To join or fasten securely, as with a mortise and tenon.
3 - Similar to former Soviet Union newspapers (the main ones: Pravda and Izvestia4), you could (maybe) believe the printing date, but even there, you should watch for typos...
4 - Pravda = in Russian: Truth; Izvestia = in Russian: News. It was said that In Pravda there was no truth and in Izvestia there was no news.