Edsger Dijkstra Quotes

We are all shaped by the tools we use, in particular: the formalisms we use shape our thinking habits, for better or for worse, and that means that we have to be very careful in the choice of what we learn and teach, for unlearning is not really possible.

The tools we use have a profound and devious influence on our thinking habits, and therefore on our thinking abilities.

A programming language is a tool that has profound influence on our thinking habits.

For many people the reason why they're idiots is not necessarily that their brain doesn't work well, it's that they got in a terrible pattern.

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

WHAT a person thinks is determined by HOW a person thinks.

It is very true, that the way you think creates reality for yourself.

To understand animal thinking you've got to get away from a language.

[Research] suggests that what we think of as free will is largely an illusion: much of the time, we are simply operating on automatic pilot, and the way we think and act – and how well we think and act on the spur of the moment – are a lot more susceptible to outside influences than we realize.

You have rappers saying "stay off drugs, go to school" - empty verbal behavior. I think all of this became institutionalized in the early '90s. And it's become more and more solidified, more and more entrenched.

Whatever a person frequently thinks and reflects on, that will become the inclination of their mind.

Language serves not only to express thought but to make possible thoughts which could not exist without it.

What you habitually think largely determines what you will ultimately become.

Training- training is everything; training is all there is to a person. We speak of nature; it is folly; there is no such thing as nature; what we call by that misleading name is merely heredity and training. We have no thoughts of our own, no opinions of our own; they are transmitted to us, trained into us.

Like computer viruses, successful mind viruses will tend to be hard for their victims to detect. If you are the victim of one, the chances are that you won't know it, and may even vigorously deny it.

The polls undoubtedly help to decide what people think, but their most important long-term influence may be on how people think. The interrogative process is very distinctly weighted against the asking of an intelligent question or the recording of a thoughtful answer.

I think also, that general virtue is more probably to be expected and obtained from the education of youth, than from exhortations of adult persons; bad habits and vices of the mind being, like diseases of the body, more easily prevented than cured. I think moreover, that talents for the education of youth are the gift of God; and that he on whom they are bestowed, whenever a way is opened for use of them, is as strongly called as if he heard a voice from heaven.

What people think, believe, and feel affects how they behave. The natural and extrinsic effects of their actions, in turn, partly determine their thought patterns and affective reactions.

A good programming language is a conceptual universe for thinking about programming.

The mind is a product of experience. It is the result of past thinking and is modified by present thinking.

…the majority of men do not think in order to know the truth, but in order to assure themselves that the life which they lead, and which is agreeable and habitual to them, is the one which coincides with the truth.

A belief is really only a thought that you keep thinking.

Our existing thinking habits are excellent, just as the rear wheels of a motor car are excellent, but not enough.

Your life is but a reflection of the predominance of your thoughts.

Einstein says common sense is just habit of thought. It's how we're used to thinking about things, but a lot of the time it just gets in the way.