We remember what we learn when we care about performing better and when we believe that what we have been asked to do is representative of reality. -- Roger Schank, Engines for Education

What do Americans look for in a car? I've heard many answers when I've asked this question. The answers include excellent safety ratings, great gas mileage, handling, and cornering ability, among others. I don't believe any of these. That's because the first principle of the Culture Code is that the only effective way to understand what people truly mean is to ignore what they say. This is not to suggest that people intentionally lie or misrepresent themselves. What it means is that, when asked direct questions about their interests and preferences, people tend to give answers they believe the questioner wants to hear. Again, this is not because they intend to mislead. It is because people respond to these questions with their cortexes, the parts of their brains that control intelligence rather than emotion or instinct. They ponder a question, they process a question, and when they deliver an answer, it is the product of deliberation. They believe they are telling the truth. A lie detector would confirm this. In most cases, however, they aren't saying what they mean. -- The culture code.

La connaissance d'un défaut ne l'enlève pas, elle nous torture jusqu'à sa correction. -- Daniel Lovewin (Guillaume Kpotufe)

Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans. -- John Lennon

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

Any sufficiently complicated C or Fortran program contains an ad hoc, informally specified, bug-ridden, slow implementation of half of Common Lisp. -- Philip Greenspun (Greenspun's Tenth Rule)

Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don’t really matter. ~Francis Chan

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. –Steve Jobs

Dream big and dare to fail. –Norman Vaughan

The only way to do great work is to love what you do. –Steve Jobs