And it should be considered that nothing is more difficult to handle, more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage, than to put oneself at the head of introducing new orders. For the introducer has all those who benefit from the old orders as enemies, and he has lukewarm defenders in all those who might benefit from the new orders.

— Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince

Gell-Mann Amnesia effect, where people realize that news stories about their areas of expertise are simplistic or inaccurate, but completely trust news stories about topics they know nothing about.

— Adam Barr, The Problem With Software

you can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those that can do nothing to him

— Anja Publications, Philosophy Now

Hype, and the notion of one-size-fits-all undermine our ability to put together project-focused, strong, sensible solutions. We continue to seek the Holy Grail while knowledgeable people tell us over and over again that we are not going to find it.

— Robert L. Glass, Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering

Many biases involve being insufficiently moved by dry, abstract information…

— Eliezer Yudkowsky, Map and Territory