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" APL is a mistake, carried through to perfection. It is the language of the future for the programming techniques of the past: it creates a new generation of coding bums. "

Edsger Dijkstra

Perfection

Mistake

Future

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" The students that, like the wild animal being prepared for its tricks in the circus called 'life', expects only training as sketched above, will be severely disappointed: by his standards he will learn next to nothing. "

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" Don't compete with me: firstly, I have more experience, and secondly, I have chosen the weapons. "

Edsger Dijkstra

Chosen

Compete

" The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim. "

" 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. "

" The traditional mathematician recognizes and appreciates mathematical elegance when he sees it. I propose to go one step further, and to consider elegance an essential ingredient of mathematics: if it is clumsy, it is not mathematics. "