A very quotable quote.

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

The background to this was a series of IETF mail that dealt with the lack 
of looking at past work. (a characteristic of modern computer science.

Dick had, along with George Mealy, one  of the greatest influences on my 
career as a young Bell Laber.  His life long advise was always welcome but 
his advice to a young MTS with no Phd was key to the directions I took. I 
cherish the memories and the person.

Unfortunately no one listened to the below quote.

Dave


> From: bukys () cs rochester edu
>
> One of my favorites, so I have accumulated a little history at
> http://www.cs.rochester.edu/~bukys/quotes.html
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Indeed, one of my major complaints about the computer field is that
> whereas Newton could say, "If I have seen a little farther than others,
> it is because I have stood on the shoulders of giants," I am forced to
> say, "Today we stand on each other's feet." Perhaps the central problem
> we face in all of computer science is how we are to get to the situation
> where we build on top of the work of others rather than redoing so much
> of it in a trivially different way. Science is supposed to be cumulative,
> not almost endless duplication of the same kind of things.
>
> -- Richard W. Hamming, "One Man's View of Computer Science," 1968 Turing
> Award Lecture, quoting from Sir Issac Newton's letter to Robert Hooke,
> February 5, 1675/76. See ACM Turing Award Lectures: the First Twenty
> Years: 1966-1985. (ACM Press. 1987). See also this 1986 talk.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

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