We now come to the decisive step of mathematical abstraction: we forget about what the symbols stand for. ...[The mathematician] need not be idle; there are many operations which he may carry out with these symbols, without ever having to look at the things they stand for. -- Hermann Weyl, The Mathematical Way of Thinking

Another feature about this guy is his low threshold of boredom. He'll pick up on a task and work frantically at it, accomplishing wonders in a short time and then get bored and drop it before its properly finished. He'll do nothing but strum his guitar and lie around in bed for several days after. Thats also part of the pattern too; periods of frenetic activity followed by periods of melancholia, withdrawal and inactivity. This is a bipolar personality. -- The bipolar lisp programmer

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect. -- Mark Twain

Attitude is no substitute for competence. -- Eric S. Raymond, How to become a hacker

I think that a lot of programmers are ignoring an important point when people talk about reducing code repetition on large projects. Part of the idea is that large projects are intrinsically *wrong*. That you should be looking at making a number of smaller projects that are composable, even if you never end up reusing one of those smaller projects elsewhere. -- Dan Nugent

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

Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne

Happiness is not something readymade. It comes from your own actions. –Dalai Lama

It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see. ~Anonymous

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away. –Maya Angelou