I've come to believe that ideas/statements such as these are crucial, but neither true nor false. They're a perspective lens. Ideally, we should be able to slip in and out of such perspective lenses. A contradictory statement could be equally true/useful, even (especially?) if held simultaneously.
Avoiding computer science directly... Geophysics is a "telescope science." A typical geophysicist sees themselves as experts in seismic interpretation, the tool they use. When the subject turns to the actual subject (the earth), they call it geology, or rock physics. It's not an idealistic take, or a very scientific one, but it's apparently useful to their work.
To take the reductio ad absurdum head on, I don't think it's totally useless to think of astronomy or microbiology as telescope or microscope sciences. It certainly introduces biases, but it might also remove certain biases and lead to new ways of phrasing a question. It might lead to new lines of inquiry, and is somewhat descriptive of how these fields developed historically. Wasn't Astronomy Astrology, before it was telescope science?
You could go with an intentionally provocative "computer science is not about mathematics" or "not about science."
What if we were to phrase Dijkstra's statement as a question: "Is computer science about computers?" It's not a statement you can approach with empirical falsification. That doesn't mean it's false, or useless. It just means you can't treat it like you would F=ma.
The reverse statement would probably be something like "The core pursuit of computer science is how to best design and harness computers". Which is a reasonably accurate description of many areas within CS including machine learning, distributed systems, programming languages, and computer architecture.
>The core pursuit of computer science is how to best design and harness computers"
This is why I've been quite happy with the Information Science major. I joke that it's "watered down compsi", as it avoids higher level topics like OS design and anything beyond the introductory Data Structures. Instead, the major uses that time to introduce psychology, sociology, and user experience/interface design. As a professional, I've found that focus on "how we interact and best use technology" to be useful.
Avoiding computer science directly... Geophysics is a "telescope science." A typical geophysicist sees themselves as experts in seismic interpretation, the tool they use. When the subject turns to the actual subject (the earth), they call it geology, or rock physics. It's not an idealistic take, or a very scientific one, but it's apparently useful to their work.
To take the reductio ad absurdum head on, I don't think it's totally useless to think of astronomy or microbiology as telescope or microscope sciences. It certainly introduces biases, but it might also remove certain biases and lead to new ways of phrasing a question. It might lead to new lines of inquiry, and is somewhat descriptive of how these fields developed historically. Wasn't Astronomy Astrology, before it was telescope science?
You could go with an intentionally provocative "computer science is not about mathematics" or "not about science."
What if we were to phrase Dijkstra's statement as a question: "Is computer science about computers?" It's not a statement you can approach with empirical falsification. That doesn't mean it's false, or useless. It just means you can't treat it like you would F=ma.