We all know a lot of very “book smart” people who can tell you all the facts and figures. But when it comes time to get their hands dirty, they’re more talk than anything. That’s because to actually apply something takes an even higher level of knowledge.

— Jonathan A. Levi, The Only Skill That Matters

Good operations can often work around the limitations of bad (or incomplete) software, but good software cannot run reliably with bad operations.

— Martin Kleppmann, Designing Data-Intensive Applications

Many people interpret this as “agile developers don’t do documentation,” which is wrong. Agile developers do create documentation, but they use a pragmatic filter to make sure the investment in creating any documentation is really worth the effort.

— Andy Hunt, Pragmatic Thinking and Learning

These “standards” have nothing to do with the organization’s image as perceived by outsiders. It’s the image perceived by insiders that matters. The insiders in question—typically second- and third-level managers with shaky self-confidence—are uncomfortable with any kind of behavior that is different from average. They need to impose safely homogenized mores on those beneath them to demonstrate that they are in charge.

— Tom DeMarco and Tim Lister, Peopleware

The goal of strong AI is to produce machines with humanlike intelligence, able to converse with and guide humans. Deep learning has instead given us machines with truly impressive abilities but no intelligence.

— Judea Pearl and Dana Mackenzie, The Book of Why