Everything that can be invented has been invented. -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899

J'ai toujours préféré la folie des passions à la sagesse de l'indifférence. -- Anatole France

The art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it [Leadership]. -- Dwight D. Enseinhover.

I think it is wise, and only honest, to warn you that my goal is immodest. It is not my purpose to "transfer knowledge" to you that, subsequently, you can forget again. My purpose is no less than to effectuate in each of you a noticeable, irreversable change. I want you to gain, for the rest of your lives, the insight that beautiful proofs are not "found" by trial anf error but are the result of a consciously applied design discipline. I want you to raise your quality standards. I mean, if 10 years from now, when you are doing something quick and dirty, you suddenly visualize that I am looking over your shoulders and say to yourself "Dijkstra would not have liked this", well, that would be enough immortality for me. -- E. W. Dijkstra

The lesson of the story might appear to be that self-interested and ambitious people in power are often the cause of wastefulness in developing countries. But self-interested and ambitious people are in positions of power, great and small, all over the world. In many places, they are restrained by the law, the press, and democratic opposition. Cameroon's tragedy is that there is nothing to hold self-interest in check. -- Tim Harford

Some may say Ruby is a bad rip-off of Lisp or Smalltalk, and I admit that. But it is nicer to ordinary people. -- Matz, LL2

Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning. –Gloria Steinem

Don’t let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do. ~John R. Wooden

In my experience, there is only one motivation, and that is desire. No reasons or principle contain it or stand against it. ~Jane Smiley

I find that when you have a real interest in life and a curious life, that sleep is not the most important thing. ~Martha Stewart