This is a classic amongst the EWDs. It contains many brilliant quotes on the state of computing science in that era, shortly before he left the Netherlands for

This is a classic amongst the EWDs. It contains many brilliant quotes on the state of computing science in that era, shortly before he left the Netherlands for teaching at the University of Texas at Austin. His view of "software engineering" is at least insightful (and sadly true as far as I am concerned) and the thinking that the programming language is our primary obstacle to finding the Elixir and/or the Stone can be found often--given one tries to look closly enough... (The metaphor alone is very well chosen and in the usual witty Dijkstra style; reading is highly recommended!)