On the fact that the Atlantic Ocean has two sides (1982) [pdf]

Also available in HTML: https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD06xx/E...

Not advocating Alan Kay's view on Dijkstra here, but his answer to this is still very funny: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KivesLMncs

"You may know that arrogance in computer science is measured in Nano-Dijkstras. [..] I wrote a rebuttal paper just named 'On the fact that most software in the world is written on one side of the Atlantic'."

24 years later, the description/criticism he makes of the American university culture is accurate for (at least most of) Europe as well. We even have "management science" everywhere.

I like his description of one unfortunate aspect of American culture he discovered on his first visit:

"...for the first time in my life I was confronted with a civilization that did not give its scientists the automatic benefit of the doubt or the respect that I was used to. On that trip I learned the word "egg-head" as a truly untranslatable Americanism...I was shocked to see how intellectuals could be-—as it were—-by definition suspect, and I remember that the feeling of uncertainty from which I saw my colleagues suffer, worried me very much."

That's Djykstra. Programming is too hard for the average programmer. He's probably right, yet work does get done. More or less.

A fascinating read.

> P.S. I apologize for having been so often so apologetic.

Made me chuckle.