But, friend, when you know certain things: these things lead to dispassion not to passion; to detachment not to bondage; to diminution not to accumulation; to having few wishes, not to having many wishes; to contentment not to discontent; to seclusion not to gregariousness; to the arousing of energy, not to indolence; to frugality not to luxurious living – of such things you can be certain.

— Thera Nyanaponika and Bhikkitu Bodhi, Numerical Discourses of the Buddha

Intellectual activity nurtures an inner life, a human core that is a refuge from suffering as much as it is a resource for reflection for its own sake.

— Zena Hitz, Lost in Thought

…the problem about programming is not that we haven’t found the right syntax for it but that people have to learn this unnatural act.

— Peter Seibel, Coders at Work

The hard problems around legacy modernization are not technical problems; they’re people problems. The technology is usually pretty straightforward.

— Marianne Bellotti, Kill It With Fire

Sympathy for all would be tyranny for thee, my good neighbor.

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Skin in the Game