fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
-- Jules Bean
%
-"...Yet terrible as UNIX addiction is, there are worse fates. If UNIX
-is the heroin of operating systems, then VMS is barbiturate addiction, the
-Mac is MDMA, and MS-DOS is sniffing glue. (Windows is filling your sinuses
-with lucite and letting it set.) You owe the Oracle a twelve-step program."
- --The Usenet Oracle
-%
Dropping non-free would set us back at least, what, 300 packages? It'd
take MONTHS to make up the difference, and meanwhile Debian users will
be fleeing to SLACKWARE.
-- Sammi Hadzovic [in Andy Newman's 2003/02/14 NYT article.]
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/14/nyregion/14EYEB.html
%
-"The question of whether computers can think is like the question of
-whether submarines can swim."
- -- Edsgar Dijkstra
+[T]he question of whether Machines Can Think, [...] is about as
+relevant as the question of whether Submarines Can Swim.
+ -- Edsger W. Dijkstra "The threats to computing science"
%
"There are two major products that come out of Berkeley: LSD and UNIX.
We don't believe this to be a coincidence."
If in their place we find a thing more precious growing
A rare, exotic plant, our gardener's heart delighting
A child whom we are teaching, a booklet we are writing
- -- Frederick RÂ\81ükert _Wisdom of the Brahmans_
+ -- Frederick Rükert _Wisdom of the Brahmans_
[Hermann Hesse _Glass Bead Game_]
%
Of course, there are cases where only a rare individual will have the
system which had never before even been recognized as a system; then
such people often devote their lives to convincing other people that
the system really is there and that it aught to be exited from.
- -- Douglas R. Hofstadter _GÂ\81ödel Escher Bach. Eternal Golden Braid_
+ -- Douglas R. Hofstadter _Gödel Escher Bach. Eternal Golden Braid_
%
Fate and Temperament are two words for one and the same concept.
-- Novalis [Hermann Hesse _Demian_]
The game of science is, in principle, without end. He who decides one
day that scientific statements do not call for any further test, and
that they can be regarded as finally verified, retires from the game.
- -- Sir Karl Popper _The Logic of Scientific Discovery_ Â\81§11
+ -- Sir Karl Popper _The Logic of Scientific Discovery_ §11
%
[A] theory is falsifiable [(and therefore scientific) only] if the
class of its potential falsifiers is not empty.
- -- Sir Karl Popper _The Logic of Scientific Discovery_ Â\81§21
+ -- Sir Karl Popper _The Logic of Scientific Discovery_ §21
%
I shall require that [a scientific system's] logical form shall be
such that it can be singled out, by means of emperical tests, in a
negative sense: it must be possible for an emperical scientific system
to be refuted by experience.
- -- Sir Karl Popper _Logic of Scientific Discovery_ Â\81§6
+ -- Sir Karl Popper _Logic of Scientific Discovery_ §6
%
It was said that life was cheap in Ankh-Morpork. This was, of course,
completely wrong. Life was often very expensive; you could get death
(John Brunner _Stand On Zanzibar_ p256-7)
%
"I'm a rational being--of a sort--rational enough, at least, to see the
-symptoms of insanity around me. And I'm human, the same as the poeple
+symptoms of insanity around me. And I'm human, the same as the people
I think of as victims when my guard drops. It's at least possible I'm
even crazier than my fellows, whom I'm tempted to pity.
"There seems only one thing to do, and that's get drunk"
- -- Chad C. Mulligan (John Brunner _Stand On Zanzibar p390)
+ -- Chad C. Mulligan (John Brunner _Stand On Zanzibar_ p390)
%
"You have many years to live--do things you will be proud to remember
when you are old."
- -- Shinka proverb. (John Brunner _Stand On Zanzibar p413)
+ -- Shinka proverb. (John Brunner _Stand On Zanzibar_ p413)
%
If you find it impossible to believe that the universe didn't have a
creator, why don't you find it impossible that your creator didn't
%
Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing, after they
have exhausted all other possibilities.
- -Â\9côòó W. Churchill
+ -- W. Churchill
%
As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both
instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly
into the background, to try to convince the audience that the goon
behind the computer has something significant to say.
-- Charles Stross _The Jennifer Morgue_ p33
+%
+This isn't life in the fast lane, it's life in the oncoming traffic
+ -- Terry Pratchett
+%
+Some pirates achieved immortality by great deeds of cruelty or
+derring-do. Some achieved immortality by amassing great wealth. But
+the captain had long ago decided that he would, on the whole, prefer
+to achieve immortality by not dying.
+ -- Terry Pratchet _The Color of Magic_
+%
+Only one creature could have duplicated the expressions on their
+faces, and that would be a pigeon who has heard not only that Lord
+Nelson has got down off his column but has also been seen buying a
+12-bore repeater and a box of cartridges.
+ -- Terry Pratchet _Mort_
+%
+He no longer wished to be dead. At the same time, it cannot be said
+that he was glad to be alive. But at least he did not resent it. He
+was alive, and the stubbornness of this fact had little by little
+begun to fascinate him -- as if he had managed to outlive himself, as
+if he were somehow living a posthumous life.
+ -- Paul Auster _City of Glass_
+%
+I really wanted to talk to her.
+I just couldn't find an algorithm that fit.
+ -- Peter Watts _Blindsight_ p294
+%
+Everyone has to die. And in a hundred years nobody's goling to inquire
+just how most people died. The best thing is to do it in the way that
+strikes your fancy most.
+ -- Kenzaburō Ōe _Silent Cry_ p5
+%
+I learned really early the difference between knowing the name of
+something and knowing something
+ -- Richard Feynman "What is Science" Phys. Teach. 7(6) 1969
+%
+Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle
+is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to
+fool.
+ -- Richard Feynman "What is and What Should be the Role of Scientific
+ Culture in Modern Society"; 1964
+%
+To punish me for my contempt of authority, Fate has made me an
+authority myself
+ -- Albert Einstein
+%
+The computer allows you to make mistakes faster than any other
+invention, with the possible exception of handguns and tequila
+ -- Mitch Ratcliffe
+
projects / lib.git / blobdiff