I think the parent's point is that even highly inspired wisdom can be irrelevant if applied to all situations

More like "it doesn't apply" than "it's inherently invaluable"

Also your comment is technically an appeal to authority

That's the most humble HNer for you btw.

It is indeed not particularly relevant to the emergence of AGI and its effect on our work.

First, this is an argument by authority. One of the "world's best computer science educators" can still say all kinds of wrong stuff. Especially someone as opinionated as Dijkstra, with many controversial opinions other world leading computer science educators disagree with.

Second, relevance and applicability is depending on context. On the context of this discussion, about practical programming in the trenches, what Dijkstra said is irrelevant.

For starters, he was talking about computer science.

Programmers in the trenches (what the thread is discussing) don't do computer science. They merely apply stuff developed by computer scientists (but also by non-scientific practioners in the field), in informal (and often haphazard) manner, to solve business problems (often the same problems again and again, which is something totally beneath a scientist).

So, yes, something Dijkstra had said can still be wrong, regardless of his achievements. And it can also far more easily be irrelevant, as this just needs his saying to be unrelated to the discussion.

We're not talking about Dijkstra, OP is paraphrasing Harold Abelson.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hal_Abelson

This is an argument of "challenging those who have the hubris to think Harold's statement is irrelevant to stop thinking small minded", if I were to call it anything.

Additionally, even if I concede it is an argument solely on authority, just because an argument contains a fallacious point doesn't make it untrue, otherwise that would be the fallacy fallacy.

>Additionally, even if I concede it is an argument solely on authority, just because an argument contains a fallacious point doesn't make it untrue

Notice how you also conveniently sidestepped my arguments about why it's also untrue (on top of containing a falacious point).

As a computer science educator, it's worth remembering that Dijkstra was incredibly full of himself and his specific formal view of the field. There are large parts of computer science that have nothing to do with the machine and there are other parts that do. There's no single cut and dried answer here, we're a pretty diverse field that spans everything from mathematics to engineering to a touch of art and human factors.

What you say about Dijkstra is true, but we're not actually talking about a Dijkstra quote here, we're talking about Harold Abelson.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hal_Abelson

I think we all started replying to a sibling comment that quoted from Dijkstra and we got it threaded wrong.

"Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes” - Edsger Dijkstra

"Science advances one funeral at a time"

- Max Planck

Are you saying Max Planck is wrong here? There is plenty of evidence that he was right, that statements made by famous scientists holds fields back because they were reductive or hurting different perspectives. Putting their words at an altar is holding us back.