To the optimist, the glass is half full. To the pessimist, the glass is half empty. To the engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be. -- author unknown (quoted in `Robust Systems', Gerald Jay Suseman)

The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. -- Elie Wiesel

Premature abstraction is an equally grevious sin as premature optimization. -- Keith Devens

That is the inevitable human response. We’re reluctant to believe that great discoveries are in the air. We want to believe that great discoveries are in our heads—and to each party in the multiple the presence of the other party is invariably cause for suspicion. -- Malcolm Gladwell, Who says big ideas are rare?

All non-trivial abstractions, to some degree, are leaky. -- Joel Spolsky (The Law of Leaky Abstractions)

We really have to get over the idea that some stuff is just worth knowing even if you never do anything with it. Human memories happily erase stuff that has no purpose, so why try to fill up children's heads with such stuff? -- Roger Schank, Engines for Education

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life. ~Steve Jobs

There are no traffic jams along the extra mile. –Roger Staubach

A real entrepreneur is somebody who has no safety net underneath them. ~Henry Kravis

If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work. ~Thomas J. Watson