15th July 2007, 9:10 AM
"Hope" has to be warrented. Blind hope in the face of contradictory or lacking evidence is worse than no hope at all.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)