In the judgment of design engineers, the ordinary means of communicating with a computer are entirely inadequate. [...] Graphical communication in some form or other is of vital importance in engineering as that subject is now conducted; we must either provide the capability in our computer systems, or take on the impossible task of training up a future race of engineers conditioned to think in a different way.
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Sect. 4: Design and AssemblyMaurice Wilkes
» Maurice Wilkes - all quotes »
Computer Algebra Systems are NOT the Devil but the new MESSIAH that will take us out of the current utterly trivial phase of human-made mathematics into the much deeper semi-trivial computer-generated phase of future mathematics. Even more important, Computer Algebra Systems will turn out to be much more than just a `tool', since the methodology of computer-assisted and computer-generated research will rule in the future, and will make past mathematics seem like alchemy and astrology, or, at best, theology.
Doron Zeilberger
What causes us the most misery and pain... has nothing to do with the sort of information made accessible by computers. The computer and its information cannot answer any of the fundamental questions we need to address to make our lives more meaningful and humane. The computer cannot provide an organizing moral framework. It cannot tell us what questions are worth asking. It cannot provide a means of understanding why we are here or why we fight each other or why decency eludes us so often, especially when we need it the most. The computer is... a magnificent toy that distracts us from facing what we most need to confront — spiritual emptiness, knowledge of ourselves, usable conceptions of the past and future.
Neil Postman
Technology frightens me to death. It's designed by engineers to impress other engineers, and they always come with instruction booklets that are written by engineers for other engineers — which is why almost no technology ever works.
John Cleese
I want to be the poster girl for engineers and computer nerds.
Alessandra Torresani
Because of what computers commonly do... With the exception of the electric light, there never has been a technology that better exemplifies Marshall McLuhan's aphorism "The medium is the message." ...the "message" of computer technology is comprehensive and domineering. The computer argues, to put it baldly, that the most serious problems confronting us at both personal and professional levels require technical solutions through fast access to information otherwise unavailable. ...this is... nonsense. Our most serious problems are not technical, nor do they arise from inadequate information. If a nuclear catastrophe occurs, it shall not be because of inadequate information. Where people are dying of starvation, it does not occur because of inadequate information. If families break up, children are mistreated, crime terrorizes a city, education is impotent, it does not happen because of inadequate information. Mathematical equations, instantaneous communication, and vast quantities of information have nothing whatever to do with any of these problems. And the computer is useless in addressing them.
Neil Postman
Wilkes, Maurice
Wilkinson, James H.
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