A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing. -- Alan Perlis

Training research shows that if you get speed now you can get quality later. But if you don't get speed you will never get quality in the long run. -- Philip Greenspun

In OO, it's the data that is the "important" thing: you define the class which contains member data, and only incidentally contains code for manipulating the object. In FP, it's the code that's important: you define a function which contains code for working with the data, and only incidentally define what the data is. -- almkgor, on reddit

Let me try to get this straight: Lisp is a language for describing algorithms. This was JohnMcCarthy's original purpose, anyway: to build something more convenient than a Turing machine. Lisp is not about file, socket or GUI programming - Lisp is about expressive power. (For example, you can design multiple object systems for Lisp, in Lisp. Or implement the now-fashionable AOP. Or do arbitrary transformations on parsed source code.) If you don't value expressive power, Lisp ain't for you. I, personally, would prefer Lisp to not become mainstream: this would necessarily involve a dumbing down. -- VladimirSlepnev

If something isn’t working, you need to look back and figure out what got you excited in the first place. -- David Gorman (ImThere.com)

Premature optimization is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming. -- Donald Knuth

The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success. ~Bruce Feirstein

Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no help at all. ~Dale Carnegie

You become what you believe. –Oprah Winfrey

I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed. –Michael Jordan