1922 – 1990. American computer scientist. The first recipient of the Turing Award.
Quotes:
1. In software systems it is often the early bird that makes the worm.
2. The eleventh commandment was: “Thou Shalt Compute” or “Thou Shalt Not Compute” – I forget which.
3. Everyone can be taught to sculpt: Michelangelo would have had to be taught not to. So it is with great programmers.
4. In the long run every program becomes rococo - then rubble.
5. Beware of the Turing tar-pit in which everything is possible but nothing of interest is easy.
6. Editing is a rewording activity.
7. Why did the Roman Empire collapse? What is Latin for office automation?
8. The only constructive theory connecting neuroscience and psychology will arise from the study of software.
9. The use of a program to prove the 4-color theorem will not change mathematics. It merely demonstrates that the theorem, a challenge for a century, is probably not important to mathematics.
10. Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatics suffer it. Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it.
